Extra: Even More From Vice President Mike Pence

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This is the Fox News rundown.

Extra.

I'm Dave Antivine.

Today, former vice president Mike Pence, on operation Epic Fury.

And we all know he and the president are no longer close after their famous post 2020

election falling out.

But he is a big Trump supporter in this conflict against Iran as you'll soon hear.

Of course he was the vice president in the first Trump term when the Iran nuclear deal

that President Obama and our allies had signed with Iran was undone, leading to fresh

US sanctions against Iran's nuclear program that now, in his second term, President Trump

in this conflict is trying to wipe out.

So is Israel.

And they're going after Iran's missiles and drones and weapons production.

We also talked to the former vice president about his conservative advocacy ahead of the

2026 midterm elections, trying to help keep Republicans in control of Congress, of course.

So in the end, our discussion went on longer than we could fit into our rundown podcast

we posted on Thursday.

Today, without any of the time constraints that we have during the week and extra, we're

glad to listen to the entire conversation.

And we thank you for being here.

Please subscribe if you happen to be here.

We appreciate it.

There is something new on the rundown every day.

And now former vice president Mike Pence on the Fox News rundown extra.

Joining us again on the Fox News rundown, former vice president Mike Pence, we're honored

to have him return with us as we are dealing with what's happening to the Middle East and

the war that continues with Operation Epic Fury, the U.S. and Israel going after Iran

as Iran counterattacks and goes after oil shipping in the region, goes after Israel, goes

after Gulf countries as well.

Mr. Vice President, we'll also have you talk about your organization advancing America

and freedom when we get the opportunity.

But first, thank you for being back with us.

Thank you, Dave.

Thanks for having me on the rundown.

It's good to be back.

Well, with this operation, you have been a strong supporter of what President Trump and

what Israel are doing here.

Why?

Well, look, we are the better part of a week and a half since America with our ally, Israel

launched hostilities against the leading state sponsor of terror.

But the truth is that this war began 47 years ago.

In 1979, when the Mollos took over Iran, they held American hostages for nearly 400 days,

a few years after that, with the full support of Iran, a Hezbollah, a launch of terrorist

attack that claimed the lives of 220 Marines, 20 more service members, and all through the

course of the last 47 years, one administration after another has essentially been battling

against the tentacles of the Iranian terrorists.

But thanks to the courage of our armed forces and the decisive leadership of President

Donald Trump.

With our allies at our side, we're not taking the fight directly to the heart of global

terrorism.

And I couldn't be more proud of our troops.

I couldn't be more proud and grateful of our commander-in-chief for having the guts

to pull the trigger.

And my hope, my prayer, is that we are sending the conditions to bring the threat that Iran

has posed to the American people, to our interests in the region, to our most cherished

ally Israel, to and end once and for all.

The President has said that he didn't think any other President would have the guts to

do this, and he wanted to avoid another President from having to deal with Iran, like he has

and like we've had for 47 years in the future.

He took action also last year with Operation Midnight Hammer.

He said at the time that the US had obliterated with the strikes in addition to what Israel

was doing, Iran's nuclear threat.

But here we are again.

What happened?

Well, again, you make a great point, Dave.

I mean, when President Trump made the decision to launch US forces for the first time directly

into Iran against their nuclear program with Operation Midnight Hammer, it was unprecedented.

It was historic.

And I think it did obliterate that facility.

But the truth is that our best intelligence supported the fact that during four years

of appeasement and capitulation by the Biden administration that Iran in fact had been

reconstituting its nuclear program at multiple sites.

And the intelligence that's had become open source at this point is that they were very

close to having up to 10 nuclear weapons sufficient uranium.

And so I think the President made the right decision.

And he seized on a moment of a maximum opportunity being able to not only take out the IOTOLE

himself, but also some 40 members of their military and official leadership structure.

But the battle goes on.

Our prayers are with all the men and women of our armed forces who are taking this fight

into Iran with our allies Israel in a growing list of allies across the Arab world who

have come to the conclusion that we concluded during our time in the White House that Iran

represents the greatest threat to peace and stability and prosperity across the Arab

world.

And now we have an opportunity, I believe, to create the conditions where the Iranian

people can reclaim their nation and set Iran back on a pathway where it can join the

family of nations and contribute to that security and prosperity.

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President Trump has come under criticism from the left and Democrats who have said that

there have been conflicting versions as to why and how this conflict started.

And they are also uncertain.

They say there are more questions than answers when they get updates from the Pentagon about

this conflict.

What do you think the ultimate goal of this operation should be and will be?

Well, first, let me take a half step back and say it's another reason why the president's

decision was commendable.

I mean, during our administration, we got out of the Iran nuclear deal after eight years

of capitulation under President Obama.

We applied a maximum pressure campaign economically and diplomatically imposing sanctions isolating

Iran as never before.

But as I mentioned, when the Biden administration came in, they went back to the policy of

appeasement and the Molluth and Tehran were able to reconstitute and consolidate their

strength as well as restart their nuclear weapons program, and that created conditions

where the president acted last year and where he authorized U.S. forces this year.

But what's really commendable is that you could anticipate that the left, the progressive

left, would be critical, many in the media or critical of the president.

But not only did he essentially turn aside from the criticism from predictable sources,

but also the president pushed back on a growing chorus of isolationist voices on the right,

who not only opposed Operation Epic Fury, but also opposed the effort to take out nuclear

facilities a year ago.

And so I think what you saw the president do here was, in every real sense, put the

security and a long-term interest of the United States first, and I commend him for

that.

Mr. Vice President, on that front, I'm sorry to interrupt, on that front, those critics

that the president is getting from some of his mega supporters on the right is that he

campaigned on no wars, that he didn't create any wars, start any wars in his first term,

and he doesn't want any kind of endless war.

And he also has an American first agenda, and they say that how is going after Iran and

upending potentially financial markets America first?

Well, I think it's important to say, I've said it many times, the president I served with

is not an isolationist, but some of his harshest critics.

And it is a fringe of a movement that I believe overwhelmingly supports the president's

initiative and our troops in this moment.

But look, it's a loud chorus, it has some loud mouthpieces out there.

But I always understood that during our time in the White House together, and in the time

I came to know the president, that he believes in leading from the front and he saw an opportunity

here where his administration and our military could do what no previous administration had

been willing to do, and that is rather than fighting the tentacles of Iran, but take the

fight directly to Iran.

And my hope and prayer is that we'll continue to see this through with our allies at our

side, notably Israel, until we end the threat of this terrorist regime in Tehran once and

for all.

I think that is putting the interest of the American people first, the interest of our strategic

priorities first.

And I think you could see that the overwhelming majority of people who identify as Republicans

are conservative support this initiative.

But I'm happy to talk about what I think the two objectives here could be, Dave.

Please do because people have talked about, so ending the nuclear threat, ending their

missiles and launchers, that's certainly one goal.

But then we have heard that the goal is not regime change, but on the very first day of

the operation, the strikes that Israel put in Iran killed the Supreme Leader.

So what is the end game in your view?

Well, I think what's the, you know, the president will set the end game, but what I think are

two achievable objectives, that I believe our military is making possible with this extraordinary

effort in operation, epic theories is first, the military has the opportunity to degrade

the security and military infrastructure within Iran to a point where the Iranian people

can reclaim their country.

I mean, whether it was the Green Revolution in 2008, that was largely ignored by the Obama

Administration, excuse me, 2009, or whether it be the tens of thousands that took to the

streets in the first weeks of 2026, only to see the slaughter of more than 30,000 Iranians.

The people of Iran have again and again taken to the streets to reclaim their country from

the terrorists, Mullahs, and Tehran, and been gunned down.

I really believe that by hitting the security infrastructure, by degrading the ability of

the Iranian regime to impose its will by force on its people and to launch force against

the United States, Israel, and other allies in the region, you're giving the Iranian people

an opportunity to reclaim their country.

Secondly, and this is a little more long term day, but I really do believe that disasters

were all from Afghanistan under the Biden administration.

Literally squandered American credibility in ways that emboldened authoritarian regimes

and terrorists around the world.

It's no coincidence to me that after Biden's disasters were brought from Afghanistan, Russia

invaded Ukraine again and launched their brutal and unprovoked invasion to Ukraine four

years ago.

But also is no surprise that with Iran's full support and consent that Hamas launched

the worst terrorist attack, the worst attack on the Jewish people since the Holocaust on

October the 7th, I think the second opportunity that the United States has today, because

of the President's decision and the professionalism of our armed forces, is to literally restore

deterrence on the world stage by demonstrating that America remains the arsenal of democracy,

the leader of the free world, and is fully prepared to use force to advance our aims as well.

So it's about creating the conditions where the people of Iran can reclaim their country

and a free and democratic future, but secondly, I believe there's an opportunity to restore

deterrence and, in a sense, American credibility that was squandered during the Biden years.

In 1991, of course, in 1990, we had the whole Iraq invasion of Kuwait, we had the American

liberation of Kuwait, and then that conflict ended.

Some have thought the U.S. didn't finish the job and didn't do it properly, and then

we found ourselves in a conflict with Iraq again in 2003.

Could that happen again if the U.S. ends this too soon?

Do you like that?

The reasons why the piece that Fox News Digital was kind enough to publish, I made a couple

of the points that have made in this conversation, but I also said, I think it's essential that

we finish this fight once and for all.

And I am greatly informed by the fact, I was actually, first time candidate for office

back in 1990, I have vivid memories of the Persian Gulf War and that first attack.

It was, like we're seeing in Operation Epic Fury today, it was the application of overwhelming

military force, our military, under Remember General Swartzkov, and led our troops into

Iraq, pushed them out of Kuwait.

It was a brilliant military campaign, but history records that they stopped short of holding

accountable, the very dictator who had attempted to redraw international lines by force in

Saddam Hussein.

And to your point, we went back in 2003 and confronted that same enemy.

Now there was, there was flawed intelligence at the time, but there was never any question

that Saddam Hussein was a menace to his own people and he threatened stability across

the region.

And so I think the experience of 1991 is precisely the one the American people ought to reflect

on today, which is Operation Epic Fury is applying the same overwhelming force, not

stops and starts, but overwhelming military force, demonstrating, we have the greatest

military in the history of the world, but the lesson of those days is we need to finish

this job and the threat the Iranian regime has posed to the American people, to Israel,

and to the free world, once and for all.

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President Trump and Wednesday told Axios that the war will end at the time that he decides

it will end, but he did say that there was practically nothing left to target.

They've been so successful going after Iran.

There have been reports that some advisors are urging the president to end this conflict

quickly so that we don't have a huge effect to our economy.

You have been with the president.

You've been in these high-level meetings with the cabinet.

How does he go about the process?

Is he someone that advisors can pressure into making a decision he doesn't want to do?

Well, I don't think it's pressure, I think the president I served with for four years,

day in and day out, is someone who leads by asking questions.

He's someone that constantly assembles input, but then one of his virtues is he's not afraid

to make a decision.

My sense is the president, in saying earlier this week that unconditional surrender was

the requirement to bring this conflict to an end.

My sense is the president has a very clear idea in his mind of what will be required here

and that is that the mullahs who have tyrannized their own people for 47 years have threatened

the United States.

The insurgency in Iraq was wholly underwritten and supported by the Iran Revolutionary

Guard, claimed the lives of thousands of American service members in the Iraq war and in Afghanistan.

Of course, violence against Israel, direct attack, ballistic attack on Israel a year ago,

but through Hezbollah, Hamas, Houthis, David, it's time to end this and I have a sense

that in calling for unconditional surrender, President Trump has a clear sense in mind

of what will be necessary to begin a new era for the Iranian people.

I will tell you, ever since listening to President Bush's inaugural address in 2004, I was

on the platform as a member of Congress, I have deeply skeptical of nation-building and

I've never been shy about saying that.

I don't think it's incumbent for America to build a new nation in Iran, nor do the American

people want us to do that, but creating the conditions where freedom-loving people in

Iran can reclaim their country for a free democratic and non-nuclear future.

We have an opportunity to do that and my hope, my prayer, is the President and his team

will let our military create the conditions for just that to occur.

We all know the relationship you had with the President, Sour, at the end of the term,

would have to go back through 2020 and 2021.

Have you have any kind of relationship with him now, or at all?

Well, I spoke to the President at the first of the year, I've offered him my congratulations

on his reelection, but as I like to say, the President, I don't talk as much as we used

to, which was every single day for four years.

But I have a distinct sense that he and his team still listen to us.

I'm proud of the work that we're doing at my foundation, advancing American freedom.

Because we've been trying to hold up that broad, conservative agenda, American leadership

on the world stage, less government, less taxes, a commitment to the right to life and

traditional values.

And so we hope, from the outside, it continues to be a constructive voice for the agenda

that we've governed on during our four years, and I think the agenda that will lead us

to a more secure and more prosperous America, as it always has.

Lastly, on that front, the midterm elections of 2026 historically, the party in power

doesn't do all that well.

Is that, are you fearful of something that goes the wrong way for Republicans in 2026?

Well, sure, the first term midterm elections for the party that has the White House are

always tough.

But look, this is the Congress that extended the Trump-Pens tax cuts in their entirety,

the fundamentals in this economy are strong.

The President has taken decisive action against the leading state sponsor of terrorism in

the world.

All the conditions are there, but I do believe that hewing back to the conservative agenda

of less taxes, including less tariffs, would create the conditions that would, in this

extraordinary American economy, would create the kind of economic growth that would give

people the confidence to buck those historic trends.

I also think that those midterm elections are so often driven by those of us out here

who cherish the sanctity of life, and I would encourage the administration that has not

put as much emphasis, and in some cases, the opposite of what our four years did, to

return to an unwavering commitment to the sanctity of life, particularly taking steps against

mail order abortion, and the opportunity to appeal that the Biden administration made

available, and at least at this point, the new Trump administration has taken virtually

no steps to reverse.

So I think standing for the right to life of reconsidering the broad-based tariffs that

the Supreme Court recently turned back, and then telling the story of strength at home

in abroad would create the conditions for Republicans to compete and win in 2026.

Well, certainly a lot is going to happen before the voting in November.

Former Vice President Mike Pence also founder of the Advancing American Freedom Organization.

Thank you so much for joining us.

We really appreciate your time.

Dave, thanks for having me on Fox News rundown.

I look forward to being back again soon.

Mr. Vice President, an honor to talk to you again.

Thank you.

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