Indiana governor mike pence biography

Born June 7, 1959, Michael Richard Pence is one of six children born to Nancy and Edward Pence, who ran a chain of gas stations in Columbus, Indiana.

Pence is named for his grandfather, Richard Michael Cawley, an Irish Catholic immigrant who became a bus driver in Chicago, Illinois, after arriving in the United States.

In his early life, Pence was Catholic and a volunteer for the Bartholomew County Democratic Party, voting for Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election.

Pence was inspired to become a politician by Martin Luther King Jr. and John F. Kennedy. At Hanover College, where Pence earned his Bachelor’s degree in history, he became a born-again evangelical Christian and his political views began to become more conservative; He credited the influence of Ronald Reagan.

Pence earned his law degree from Indiana University’s Robert H.

McKinney School of Law in 1986 and spent some time as a private practice attorney before running unsuccessfully for congression