Vice President Mike Pence says a former homeland security adviser who announced her intention to vote for Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden is a “disgruntled employee.”
The Washington Post reported that Olivia Troye, who left the administration over the summer, has decided to vote for Biden after observing President Donald Trump’s handling of the COVID-19 up close.
When asked about Troye’s comments, Pence told reporters, “I haven’t read her comments in any detail. But, it reads to me like one more disgruntled employee that has decided to play politics during [an] election year.”
He continued, “My staff has indicated, and she made no comments like that when she was serving under our team here at the White House.”
“I couldn’t be more proud of the work we’ve done,” he added.
Troye told the Post that Trump’s “rhetoric and his own attacks against people in his administration” only “made this ongoing response a failure.”
Additionally, she appeared in an ad created by the group Republicans Against Trump, where she blasted the president for his response to the virus.
“If the president had taken this virus seriously, or if he had actually made an effort to tell how serious it was, he would have slowed the virus spread, he would have saved lives,” she said in the ad.
NEW AD: @OliviaTroye was @VP's lead staffer on COVID-19. She put her heart & soul into the job.
— The Republican Accountability Project (@AccountableGOP) September 17, 2020
After a while she couldn't look herself in the mirror because no matter what she did, the President would undermine it and make Americans less safe.
Now she's a GOP voter for Biden. pic.twitter.com/ZIJlRUzArG
Judd Deere, a White House spokesperson, said in a statement to the Post that Troye’s “assertions have no basis in reality and are flat out inaccurate.”
“The truth is President Trump always put the well-being of the American people first,” he added.
While Troye has a negative view of Trump, she said she still has a favorable view of her former boss, “I worked very loyally for him to do everything I could for him. I don’t want this to become a speaking-out-against-him thing.”
