Former Vice President Mike Pence received a less-than-stellar welcome as he addressed the NRA-ILA Leadership Forum on Friday and was met with loud booing from the crowd.
Pence replied with a good-natured, “I love you too,” before diving into his remarks.
2024 GOP presidential candidates including Donald Trump, Nikki Haley, Asa Hutchinson, and Vivek Ramaswamy are set to address the NRA gathering as the primary season gets underway. Pence, a potential 2024 candidate, was also on hand as the event took place in his native Indiana.
Pence went on to give standard remarks for the conservative former vice president, “And welcome back to the Hoosier State. I want to thank Wayne LaPierre for his leadership. The introduction he knows I prefer is pretty short, “I’m a Christian, a conservative, and a Republican in that order.”
“And it’s my honor to welcome the NRA-ILA back to Indiana,” Pence continued, adding:
Thank you all for coming. It really is good to be back with all the patriots in the NRA, men and women who stand on the ramparts of freedom, defending all the God-given liberties enshrined in the Constitution of the United States every day. With your support, the Trump-Pence administration championed freedom for four remarkable years, and every single day we stood without apology for the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.
With your support, we achieve the lowest unemployment, the highest household income, the most pro-American trade deals, the most secure border. And we made the most powerful military in the history of the world stronger than ever before. But maybe most important of all, we appointed conservatives to every court in the land, including the highest court. We gave America a new beginning for the right to life. And this last year, that conservative majority on the Supreme Court recognized the constitutional right to self-defense exists not just inside the home, but outside the home as well.
Pence, who angered some in the MAGA base by certifying the 2020 presidential election, received a standing ovation as he concluded his remarks.
Watch the full clip above via C-SPAN.
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