According to reporters for CNN and NBC News, as late as midnight last night Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump tried to back out of choosing Indiana Governor Mike Pence as his running mate.
Sources tell me @realDonaldTrump was on phone till midnight making calls, asking if he could change course on VP pick
— Kelly O'Donnell (@KellyO) July 15, 2016
Scoop: @realDonaldTrump was so unsure about @mike_pence that around midnight last night he asked top aides if he could get out of it
— Dana Bash (@DanaBashCNN) July 15, 2016
Trump's campaign is denying these reports, of course, but I'm inclined to believe it. This is Donald Trump we're talking about. We should expect nothing to go as planned. We can't even expect there to be a plan.
I don't expect we'll know the full story until after this election is over, and even at that point some of Trump's stop staff will still be bound by non-disclosure agreements, but we can say with some degree of certainty that there are sharp divisions at the very top of Team Trump.
The selection of Mike Pence as Trump's running mate was leaked to the media by somebody whose motives aren't entirely clear yesterday morning, and I don't believe it was Trump himself. Trump reportedly became very angry yesterday as he watched cable news coverage of the leak.
Either the same person who leaked that information, or someone else entirely, is now leaking more information that casts doubt on Trump's selection of Mike Pence.
Reporters for the Washington Post reported yesterday that Trump's children favored Newt Gingrich while Trump's campaign manager Paul Manafort favored Mike Pence.
It's anyone guess which members of these parties are responsible for the slow drip of information that's been fed to the press over the past 24 hours, but it's clear there's trouble in paradise.
The close involvement of Trump's children in his every decision is a wildcard that, to the best of my knowledge, is unprecedented. The entire Trump clan is slated to speak at the GOP convention, taking up nearly 20 percent of the speaking time.
Republicans have spent the last 8 years dogwhistling about the United States becoming a "banana republic," but you tell me what a Trump administration dominated by his children would look like.
The backdrop to all of this is that Mike Pence is reprehensible man with a depraved policy record.