President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence will simultaneously be out of the country next week, creating a "rare and unusual" situation, according to a new report.
Axios reported that with Trump traveling to Vietnam for a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Pence in Colombia on Monday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will be the top-ranked U.S. official who's actually in the U.S. that day.
"It's rare and unusual, and usually [the White House will] try to avoid it," Michael Beschloss, a presidential historian and author, told Axios.
A similar situation occurred on two days last year — Nov. 11 and Dec. 1 — when Trump and Pence were traveling to and from the U.S.
It's worth pointing out that Pelosi's duties as the leader of the House chamber will not change as a result of the top two U.S. officials being out of the country.
Axios noted that former President Barack Obama and former Vice President Joe Biden found themselves in the same situation in March 2013 for 20 minutes. In that case, Obama was traveling to Israel and Biden was on his way back from Italy.
Trump and Kim will meet Feb. 27-28 in Hanoi, Vietnam, a follow-up to their meeting last June on the issue of denuclearizing the Korean peninsula. The White House announced Thursday that Pence is heading to Bogota, Colombia on Monday to convey America's support for Venezuela's interim President Juan Guaido.
"The United States is proud to join the Lima Group and other global partners to marshal our resources, provide much needed humanitarian relief, and stand together with the people of Venezuela until democracy and freedom are fully restored," Pence's press secretary Alyssa Farah said.