Pence speaks in North Carolina against broad Trump tariffs and praises House on tax bill

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — Former Vice President Mike Pence spoke Monday in North Carolina against the Trump administration’s zealous efforts to impose tariffs on trading partners worldwide — another effort that shows his willingness to split at times with his former boss.

The education arm of Pence’s political advocacy group kicked off in Raleigh a series of events nationwide that was also billed as building support to extend tax reductions enacted by Trump and Republicans in 2017 but set to expire at year’s end.

In a brief interview with The Associated Press, Pence praised congressional Republicans for pushing ahead President Donald Trump’s bill of tax breaks and spending cuts, saying “there should be no higher domestic priority” than making permanent income tax cuts passed in Trump’s first term. But much of the meeting focused on Pence and key conservative business leaders in North Carolina opposing Trump’s tariff program.

Monday’s event marked another step by Pence to try to distinguish himself among the small group of Republicans in Washington willing to publicly criticize policies sought by the second Trump administration.

Pence and others said protectionism would ultimately harm the U.S. economy in the form of higher prices and employment losses.

“It is ultimately for the most part American consumers that will pay the price of higher tariffs,” Pence said at the event assembled by Pence’s Advancing American Freedom Foundation and the Raleigh-based John Locke Foundation.

The massive budget bill, which also contains additional tax breaks that Trump campaigned for in the 2024 election — as well as spending reductions and beefed-up border security — initially failed to pass the House Budget Committee late last week.

A handful of conservatives who voted against the bill want further cuts to Medicaid and green energy tax breaks. House Speaker Mike Johnson wants to send the bill to the Senate by Memorial Day. The bill cleared the committee in a rare Sunday night meeting, but Johnson told reporters afterward that negotiations were ongoing.

“I’m encouraged,” Pence told the AP after the event. ”I’m grateful that conservatives in the House have been pressing for more common sense reforms in Medicaid.”

Three days ago, Moody’s Ratings mentioned the 2017 tax cuts as it stripped the U.S. government of its top credit rating, citing the inability of policymakers to rein in debt.

Conservatives see the tax cuts as providing fuel for the economy while putting more money in taxpayers’ pockets. Democrats say the wealthiest Americans benefit the most from them.

Pence told the AP the larger issue is the unwillingness of politicians to consider “commonsense, compassionate” entitlement reforms for Medicare and Social Security that would address the nation’s nearly $37 trillion of debt and “set us back on the path of fiscal integrity.”

Pence said he’s proud of Trump’s first-term efforts to use the tariff threat to reach new free-trade agreements with trading partners. And Pence agreed that China is an exception for retaliatory tariffs, citing intellectual property theft and dumping products like steel onto world markets. But Trump’s second-term effort, seeming to make tariffs large and permanent, are very different and misguided, he said.

Trump said that countries “have to pay for the right to sell here,” Pence said in recalling first-term conversations. “Any time I’d remind him that actually it’s American importers that pay the tariff, he would look a little annoyed at me from time to time and say, ‘I know how it works.’ And then he’d say, ‘but they have to pay.’”

While the former Indiana governor and U.S. House member refused to break with Trump during their time together in office, the two had a falling out over his refusal to go along with Trump’s efforts to remain in office after losing the 2020 election. Trump had tried to pressure Pence to reject election results from swing states where the Republican president falsely claimed the vote was marred by fraud.

A 2024 presidential campaign by Pence — and potentially against Trump — ended early. He committed to invigorating Advancing American Freedom by promoting conservative principles on domestic and foreign matters as Trump’s brand of populism has taken hold in the GOP.

Pence’s group spent nearly $1 million on ads opposing Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Donald Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Health and Human Services. And he’s also spoken in favor of Trump standing with long-standing foreign allies.