July 22, 2019 01:39 PM UTC

Ghosted! Gardner Skips Fundraiser with Vice President Pence

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• by: Colorado Pols

Vice President Mike Pence is in Colorado today to raise money for the re-election campaigns of Sen. Cory Gardner (R-Yuma) and President Trump.

The bigger news is about who is NOT here: Sen. Gardner himself.

Pence is scheduled to headline a fundraiser in Aspen for the Trump/Pence re-election campaign later on Monday, but his first Colorado stop was at a mansion in Windsor, Colorado to raise money for Gardner’s 2020 re-election effort. Even though the event was located about two hours West of Gardner’s home in Yuma, Colorado’s junior Senator left town before Pence could shake his hand.

Joe St. George of Fox 31 conducted a very brief interview with Pence upon his arrival in Colorado today but was unable to get an answer to his question about why Pence wasn’t hosting any sort of public event for Gardner. Perhaps Cardboard Cory wasn’t available, either.

We speculated on Friday that Gardner might not attend his own event with the Vice President, but we’re still surprised that Gardner bolted on Pence:

We’ll be interested to see if Pence’s Windsor visit attracts more than just a few crickets — and whether this fundraiser for Gardner will be worthy of the Yuma Senator’s own attendance. Gardner kicked off his 2020 re-election effort in Washington D.C. earlier this year but has yet to hold a major campaign event inside the borders of Colorado.

Anyone who has followed Colorado politics in recent years will recognize the ridiculous irony here. In July 2014, Gardner blasted then-Sen. Mark Udall when he didn’t attend a fundraiser on his behalf hosted by President Obama. Here’s what the Los Angeles Times wrote on July 9, 2014:

Gardner’s campaign mocked Udall for skipping Obama’s Colorado events. “The only difference between President Obama’s campaign speech today and every other one he has given was that Sen. Udall wasn’t standing by his side,” campaign spokesman Alex Siciliano said. “Sen. Udall has been more than willing to follow the president on everything from healthcare and gun control to energy and out-of-control government spending. Make no mistake about it, a vote for Sen. Udall is a vote to reinforce President Obama’s old and tired policies.”

You could literally just replace “Udall” with “Gardner” and “Obama” with “Trump,” and that quote would still make sense.