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Trump alleged on Saturday without evidence that former President Barack Obama wiretapped his phones at Trump Tower ahead of the 2016 election. On Wednesday, CNN affiliate WEWS' reporter John Kosich asked the vice president a yes or no question: Did he believe Trump's allegation? Pence skirted the question and tried to steer the discussion to health care, as the Trump administration has been pushing to replace Obamacare.

John Kosich, WEWS: The President has alleged that the former President committed a felony in wiretapping Trump Tower. Yes or no do you believe that President Obama did that?

Mike Pence: Well, what I can say is that the President and our administration are very confident that the congressional committees in the House and Senate that are examining issues surrounding the last election, the run-up to the last election, will do that in a thorough and equitable way.

They'll look at those issues, they'll look at other issues that have been raised. But rest assured, our focus is right where the American people are focused, and that's on bringing more jobs here to Ohio, creating a better healthcare system built on consumer choice.

CNN's Steve Brusk contributed to this report.

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Pence dodges question on Trump's wiretapping claims - CNN

The House Republican healthcare plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act has been out for more than a day now, and the GOP is attempting to sell it to the public.

To answer some questions about the plan, Vice President Mike Pence joined TODAYS TMJ4s Charles Benson live via satellite to take some questions about the new plan.

Benson asked about repealing the federal mandate under the ACA and pre-existing conditions, among other factors of the new plan, including a question from one of our Facebook fans.

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Exclusive: Vice President Mike Pence joins Live at 4 to talk healthcare bill - WTMJ-TV (press release) (registration) (blog)

Mike Pence does not get a lot of respect around the Trump White House. The vice president went around defending national security adviser Michael Flynn, who was under investigation for meeting secretly with Russian officials, and no one in the presidents inner circle bothered to tell Pence that he was making a fool of himself. Indeed, according to a Politico report, Pence only learned he had been misled by national security adviser Michael Flynn after the Washington Post reported on Feb. 9 that Flynn had discussed sanctions with the Russian ambassador

Thats embarrassing.

But it is also instructive.

When it comes to making things happen in Donald Trumps Washington, Pence does not matter much. He literally does not know what is going on.

Pence confirmed that in Janesville last week, when he announced that the American people know Obamacare has failed and Obamacare must go.

The vice president was spreading fake news.

The real news was found in the headlines that appeared in the weeks before the vice president arrived in Janesville:

NBC News (Jan. 17): As GOP pushes repeal, Obamacare has never been more popular

CNBC (Jan. 20): New poll shows Obamacare is more popular than Donald Trump

Business Insider (Feb. 2): Obamacare getting more popular

Politico (Feb. 22): Support for Obamacare is rising

CNN (Feb. 24): Support for Obamacare at all-time high

The Hill (Feb. 27): More than 6 in 10 oppose Obamacare repeal

Poll after poll after poll has indicated that the popularity of the Affordable Care Act is rising.

The current polling from the Pew Research Center finds that 54 percent of Americans approve of the ACA, while 43 percent oppose it. That, reported CNN, is the highest level of support for the health care reform measure ever recorded by Pew. The latest polling data from the Kaiser Family Foundation find the highest level of favorability measured in more than 60 Kaiser Health Tracking Polls conducted since 2010.

Polling data fluctuate. But here is the interesting twist: Surveys frequently show that, among those who favor altering the ACA, most want it to be made stronger not weaker, as Pence and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Janesville, propose.

A new McClatchy/Marist survey, released a few days before Pence came to appear with Ryan in Janesville, found that 65 percent of Americans would like to see portions of the Affordable Care Act retained. According to Washingtons The Hill newspaper, Twenty percent say lawmakers should let the health care law stand as is, while 38 percent want any changes to enable it to do more and 7 percent hope alterations make it capable of less.

Only 31 percent supported complete repeal.

Why would Pence peddle the fantasy that Americans despise the ACA when that is clearly not the case?

Perhaps he is again being misled.

Perhaps he has fallen for the falsehoods that are advanced by insurance-industry lobbyists and career politicians like Paul Ryan who simply say what their campaign donors want them to say.

Whatever the excuse, Pence is wrong.

And no one in Wisconsin should take him any more seriously than do the people who are running things in the White House.

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Editorial: Mike Pence peddles fake news in Janesville - Madison.com

When Paul Ryan wanted to spend more money, his budget got blown up. When John Boehner tried the same thing earlier on, an axe suddenly came down on his head. And now that Obamacare repeal is on the table, Vice President Mike Pence must succeed where those House speakers failed.

Specifically, Pence must win over the combative and determined House Freedom Caucus. Nothing less than the entire White House healthcare agenda rests on his ability to woo 40 of the most conservative representatives in the 435-member House. Already, though, it's been tough going.

In a closed-door meeting on the Hill this morning, Pence warned Republicans not to mount a revolt against a recently released Obamacare repeal package. A few hours later, members of the Freedom Caucus gathered for a press conference in front of the Capitol to give their answer.

"Our goal is real simple," Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, told a gaggle of reporters, "bring down the cost of insurance for working and middle-class families across the country." Without addressing Pence by name, Jordan dismissed the vice president, describing the American Healthcare Act as "Obamacare in a different form."

Specifically, the feathers of the fiscal hawks have been ruffled by the news Republican leadership planned to install a new system of refundable tax credits and keep Obamacare's Medicaid expansion in place until 2020. Long story short: The Freedom Caucus won't listen.

That's not exactly a surprising development. Both Jordan and Rep. Dave Brat, R-Va., told the Washington Examiner that leadership's repeal bill was a non-starter. "It doesn't matter who comes to us and asks us to go along with this devastating program," Brat said late Monday night. "The answer will be no." That's a bitter and personal bummer for everyone involved.

Last September, after Ryan told House Republicans to go their own way, Freedom Caucus members went out campaigning for the Trump-Pence ticket. When the nominee was behind by double digits, Brat and Jordan were climbing onstage next to the vice president in Ohio and Virginia. Ever since Trump won that election, though, the conservative faction has been losing influence.

Like a cheap date, the White House has taken a shine to leadership and left behind the Freedom Caucus. Sure, Trump elevated an original member of the Freedom Caucus, South Carolina Rep. Mick Mulvaney, to head up his Budget Office. Other than personnel changes, though, the administration hasn't followed the group's lead on policy. Soon things will get even more awkward.

Tomorrow, Jordan plans to head to the House floor and introduce a 2015 bill that thoroughly guts Obamacare. But when he dredges up the pastjust three House Republicans voted against the bill before Obama vetoed itthere won't be any going back.

Also from the Washington Examiner

Conservative insurgents in the House and Senate oppose the bill.

03/09/17 8:52 AM

Just like they bucked Boehner and Ryan before, the Freedom Caucus will be revolting against the White House. And right now, there doesn't seem like there's anything Pence can do about it.

Philip Wegmann is a commentary writer for the Washington Examiner.

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Mike Pence vs. the House Freedom Caucus? - Washington Examiner

USA Today Network Matthew Tully, The Indianapolis Star Published 2:14 p.m. ET March 7, 2017 | Updated 13 hours ago

Vice President Pence greets employees at Blain's Fleet and Farm Distribution Center in Janesville, Wis., during a listening session with Wisconsin business leaders Friday, March 3, 2017.(Photo: Rick Wood, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel)

It seems quite reasonable to consider the possibility that Donald J. Trump will leave the presidency at some point before the end of his current term.

Will he quit in a historic huff? Will he be pushed out by Congress? Or will he be lured away to host a reality show on Russian TV? I dont know. For now, the last line of this book seems easier to imagine than all the pages before it. And while I dont dispute the possibility that I could be wrong, the increasingly paranoid, reckless, authoritarian and generally unstable behavior of our new president makes it hard to see how the country or his own party sustains four years of this.

With that in mind, Ive been thinking a lot lately about the president Mike Pence would be. As the great actor Albert Brooks put it on Twitter over the weekend, amid Trumps outburst accusing President Obama of wiretappinghim: President Mike Pence. The president, Mike Pence. President Pence ... I was just practicing.

Its probably something worth practicing, and pondering. Seriously, is it really that hard to imagine a scenario in which Trump, who long ago lost his grip on facts and calmness, loses his grip on or interest in the presidency? Not for me.

President Pence hey, who knows?

Now Ill never argue that I know the vice president in any significant way he never even sent me an email from his famed AOL account. He was the kind of guy who would invite media types like me out for breakfast or lunch to chat one on one, and then stick pretty close to his political shtick while occasionally giving you a glimpse of a real person. I never left thinking I knew him. He seemed far too polished for that. But those of us who toil in Indiana politics were able to see the nations No. 2 up close when he was a candidate for governor and then governor.

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We saw him through political crises, such as the religious freedom debacle and the embarrassing plot to create a state-run media outlet. At his best, we saw him forge impressive deals, such as his Medicaid agreement with the Obama administration and his push for the state governments first investment in preschool. And we saw him at his ideological worst, such as when he killed a federal preschool grant application or when he signed an abortion bill everyone knew would be struck down.

Obviously, the Mike Pence story was thoroughly debated and discussed last year. In recent weeks, though, amid various Trump meltdowns and mistakes, it seems like conversations about Pence have centered on one certain question. Its a question that has been posed to me by several people, and debated by many more on social media.

Would a President Pence be any better than President Trump?

Excuse my language but ... hell, yes.

Heres the bottom line: Whether you reside on the political right or the left, or anywhere in the middle, Pence would be an upgrade. I say this as someone who arguably has written more critical columns about him than anyone, as someone who criticized both his politics and his leadership, and as someone who once wrote that he was out of his league as governor.

Despite all of that, I find myself these days hoping that Trump simply tires of the White House and hands over the keys to Pence.

President Pence? Given the alternative, Ill take it. In a second.

Yes, I would then surely join many others in opposing many of Pences policies. I would worry about the influence of divisive culture warriors in his inner circle. I would criticize him for joining the Trump team in the first place and for being an enabler of the presidents antics.

And then I would take a deep breath and be thankful that a human being who has exhibited stability, calmness and caution was sitting in the Oval Office. Id read about North Korea nervously, but not quite as nervously as I do now.

In these early days of the Trump presidency, I keep thinking back to Pences years as governor. It has surprised me but within those years, years filled with so much deserved criticism, I find clear evidence that Pence is simply a better person and leader than his boss. By better, I mean that he has more of the basic qualities you want to see in a leader, particularly a president, than Trump does.

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Three things:

First, Pence has never spewed disgust at the institutions and ideals that sit at the core of our democracy, from the free press and the courts, to Congress and the ability of people to challenge their leaders. I disagree quite often with Pences political views, but I dont fear that his goal is to bully or otherwise shut down the institutions and traditions that have made America great. He seems to respect these institutions, in fact.

Second, he doesnt see enemies everywhere. Take the religious freedom controversy. Indeed, he stumbled when questioned and lost control of the debate, and he surrounded himself with an out-of-touch group before signing the bill. But here is what he didnt do: He didnt lash out at his critics or his staff. He didnt label those of us questioning him as enemies or liars. He didnt offer conspiracy theories. He didnt descend into deep and dark places for his information. He actually listened to critics.

Third, while many mock Pences strict adherence to talking points, and it is indeed frustrating, the trait does make clear that he understands the value of carefully choosing ones words. It suggests he sees the value in stable, consistent messaging. It shows that he understands the damage that can come with reckless words. Imagine that.

With his conspiracy tweets about Obama, Trump showed that he is in no way suited for the presidency. He showed that he is a reckless and dangerous man, and either dishonest or delusional. He once again made it easy to imagine a scenario in which he at some point loses or leaves his job.

Mike Pence would not be my preferred president. Not by a long shot. But hes not unhinged, hes not reckless and hes not mean. That alone guarantees he would be an upgrade.

Matthew Tully is a columnist for The Indianapolis Star, where this piece first appeared. Follow him on Twitter: @matthewltully

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Practice saying President Mike Pence: Matthew Tully - USA TODAY