Pence says 'I did my duty that day' on Jan. 6, 2021

Former Vice President Mike Pence defended his actions on Jan. 6, 2021 speaking with voters in New Hampshire on Friday, saying he believed it was time to "restore a threshold of civility in public life."

He drew the ire of his former boss, former President Donald Trump by refusing to help overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election.

"Jan. 6 was a tragic day. I was there," Pence said. "I'll always believe by God's grace I did my duty that day to support the Constitution of the United States," Pence said. "I want people to know the way forward in this country is for us to get back to what we all agree upon...I hope we proved in part that day, I'm that man."

Pence argued that his experience in the previous administration made him the most qualified for the Republican nomination. "This is not a time for on the job training," Pence said.

Pence spoke to a collection of voters at Exeter Town Hall where he drew a direct contrast to the populist message and boisterous tone of the Trump campaign.

"I'm a conservative but I'm not in a bad mood about it," Pence said.

What did Mike Pence say about climate change?

Pence recognized that the climate is changing but rebuked the Paris Climate Accords which the Trump administration pulled the United States out of.

"The climate is changing...the question is what do you do about it," Pence said.

Pence proposed that his administration would follow a market based strategy and not introduce green energy subsidies.

"I believe one of the great traditions of the Republican Party is conservation," Pence said.

Pence praises Operation Warp Speed, but opposes vaccine mandates

When asked a question about COVID vaccine mandates, Pence reiterated previous allegations that the virus came from a lab in Wuhan, China and decried vaccine mandates.

"If we had gotten four more years there would have never been a vaccine mandate," Pence said, referring to if he and Trump had won reelection.

In the same answer Pence said he was "proud" of Operation Warp Speed, the government program that sped up COVID vaccine research and production, and called the nurses and doctors who worked in hospitals prior to vaccine availability heroes.

Pence said that Democratic state and municipal governments went too far in implementing public health orders. "Schools should have never been closed, ever," Pence said.

Who is Mike Pence?

Before being elected the 48th vice president of the United States in 2016, Pence was a lawyer, a radio talk show host, a six-term conservative member of the U.S. House. In 2013, he became governor of Indiana.

“As governor, he enacted the largest income tax cut in Indiana history, lowering individual income tax rates, the business personal property tax and the corporate income tax in order to strengthen the State’s competitive edge and attract new investment and good-paying jobs,” according to Pence’s biography in the National Archives. “Due to his relentless focus on jobs, the state’s unemployment rate fell by half during his four years in office, and at the end of his term, more Hoosiers were working than at any point in the state’s 200-year history.”

Pence is the first vice president to run against the President he served under since John Nance Garner ran against Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1940.

What did Pence accomplish as vice president?

At the start of the Trump-Pence administration, there was much speculation that Pence could be an unusually influential vice president. Trump was the first president to have had no political or military background.

Businesses, trade associations and other interests looking for help from the administration beat a path to Pence's door. No vice president has been lobbied as heavily as Pence since lobbying disclosure rules began in 1998.

In Pence’s memoir, “So Help Me God,” he describes convincing Mexican officials that Trump was serious about imposing tariffs on Mexican products unless migrants seeking asylum in the U.S. could wait in Mexico while their cases were reviewed.

“I played my part, as usual, by delivering the message with a smile and then closing the sale,” Pence wrote.

Alyssa Farah Griffin, an aide first to Pence and then Trump, called Pence “instrumental” in ending Trump’s least popular policies, the migrant family separation program and his executive order banning travel from some Muslim-majority countries.

And she said Pence can take credit for the trade deal between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, judicial appointments and the tax cuts.

“fact: tax reform wouldn’t have passed if not for post midnight persuasion by Pence & McConnell,” she tweeted. “Trump was prob in bed watching tv.”

David McIntosh, a longtime friend of Pence’s and head of the influential conservative group the Club for Growth, said Pence led the effort on Capitol Hill for the tax cuts and rallied outside advocacy groups like his to support it.

Pence had the contacts and friendships “to make sure the legislative process was getting done,” McIntosh said.

“I think he can take a lot of credit for that.”

He drew the ire of Trump by refusing to help overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election on Jan. 6, 2021.

What has he said about Donald Trump?

Like many of his fellow Republicans on the campaign trail, Pence has walked the line between taking on Trump and not alienating the large block of voters who support the former president.

But he made his opposition clear to a group of reporters in Indianapolis, following news of the indictment of Trump on conspiracy charges in August. Pence said he stood by the U.S. Constitution on Jan. 6, 2021 and had no right to overturn the 2020 presidential election, despite Trump's "reckless assertion" that the former vice president could accept or reject results during the certification process that day.

“What the president maintained that day, and frankly, has said over and over again over the last two and a half years, is completely false,” Pence said. “And it’s contrary to what our Constitution and the laws of this country provide.”

Where is he in the polls?

Pence has struggled in the polls, staying well behind his former running mate. Poll aggregators 538 and Real Clear Politics both have him in fifth at 3.8% and 3.7% respectively. Real Clear Politics has Pence in eighth in New Hampshire averaging 1.4%.

Pence polled at 1% in a New Hampshire poll by USA TODAY/Boston Globe/Suffolk University.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Pence says its time to 'restore a threshold of civility in public life'