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Indiana Gov. Mike Pence's team abruptly booted his press pool on Friday when an audio recording from 2005 emerged of Donald Trump having a vulgar, behind-the-scenes exchange about kissing, groping, and seducing women.
When news of the recording broke, the vice presidential candidate was dining with his daughter at Tony Packo’s Café in Toledo, Ohio.
“The four reporters in Pence's pool were positioned to watch Pence take a look at the restaurant's main attraction -- a wall of signed cardboard hot dog buns, including one signed recently by Trump -- as he left the restaurant,” writes Politico. “Suddenly, and without explanation, the pool was told Pence would be leaving directly after he finished dining, without looking at the signatures or shaking any more hands. The pool was instructed to return to the press bus and was not permitted to film Pence leaving the restaurant -- thus stripping them of an opportunity to ask Pence for his reaction to the news.”
Politico reports that a Pence aide insisted the hasty departure was not related to the breaking news.
Despite the firestorm of criticism surrounding Trump and his crude remarks on tape, Pence continued on to a rally in Rossford, Ohio, to campaign for his running mate.
Shortly after the video was released on Friday by The Washington Post, the Trump campaign issued a statement apologizing for the Republican presidential candidate's "locker room banter.”
"This was locker room banter, a private conversation that took place many years ago,” the statement reads. “Bill Clinton has said far worse to me on the golf course - not even close. I apologize if anyone was offended.”