It’s not daily {that a} Republican from the Trump administration will get a standing ovation, or three, from a roomful of Democrats. However as Mike Pence confirmed on January 6, 2021, he doesn’t at all times follow the social gathering line.
In response to the previous vp, the assaults on the Capitol 4 years in the past have been finally unsuccessful and “a triumph of freedom” as a result of “our establishments held that day, not due to anybody individual, however as a result of leaders in each political events, Republicans and Democrats, did their duties,” Pence mentioned whereas receiving the John F. Kennedy Profile in Braveness Award in Boston on the JFK Library on Sunday.
Pence acquired the award for “placing his life and profession on the road to make sure the constitutional switch of presidential energy.”
After repeated pressure to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 election, which Joe Biden gained, Pence was to preside over Congress and the certification course of, which incorporates counting the Electoral Faculty votes, when a violent mob of Trump supporters stormed the Capitol to cease the method.
Whereas the Secret Service urged him to evacuate, Pence, his spouse, Karen, and their daughter Charlotte refused to leave the Capitol, coordinating with the army and congressional leaders throughout the assault. As soon as the Capitol was cleared, Pence resumed the certification course of.
“In these divided instances, in these anxious days, I do know in my coronary heart that we’ll discover our approach ahead as one nation,” Pence mentioned, acknowledging the present Trump administration’s agenda, with out naming the president particularly. He added: It’s the Structure that “binds us all collectively.”
Unpopular positions, principled stands
The award—named after President Kennedy’s 1957 Pulitzer Prize-winning e-book, Profiles in Braveness, which recounts the tales of eight U.S. senators who risked their careers by taking principled stands for unpopular positions—is introduced every year to public servants for making a brave resolution of conscience with out regard for the private or skilled penalties.
Kennedy’s daughter, Caroline Kennedy, and grandson, Jack Schlossberg, introduced the award to Pence, acknowledging the brand new political local weather of concern that has taken over within the final 4 months.
“We’re particularly grateful in your presence this yr, as many are afraid to talk out or present up,” Kennedy mentioned. “It’s laborious to imagine that attending a black-tie gala may very well be described an act of braveness—however right here we’re. President Kennedy referred to as his time ‘the hour of most hazard’ and welcomed the problem. We live in an analogous second now.”
Simply as President Kennedy famously acknowledged, “my fellow Individuals: Ask not what your nation can do for you; ask what you are able to do in your nation,” Caroline Kennedy mentioned, “now could be the time to behave as a result of, as we have now seen up to now 100 days, we are able to now not take our democracy with no consideration.”
“Everybody needs to be talking their hearts”
These in attendance included Democratic Sen. Ed Markey of Massachusetts, who referred to as Pence “a profile in braveness [for] standing up in opposition to a pacesetter of his personal social gathering,” and comic David Letterman, who mentioned, “Nowadays, braveness must be recognized and celebrated on this approach. It didn’t use to be that approach.”
When requested what Individuals can do proper now, Letterman informed Quick Firm: “They need to be talking their hearts. Everybody needs to be talking their hearts.”
“This was a second when the vp stood up for the structure, and we have now to all do not forget that in the present day,” U.S. presidential historian Doris Kearns Goodwin informed Quick Firm. “Historical past reveals that individuals working from the bottom up are what make all of the adjustments. So it’s at your native space, it’s in your state, it’s in your metropolis. Each change—whether or not it’s civil rights, girls’s rights, homosexual rights—has come from the bottom up. That’s what we have to do.”
Earlier award recipients embrace former presidents Barack Obama and George H. W. Bush, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, former Republican Congresswoman Liz Cheney, and former Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.
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