VP Debate Showed Why Trump Picked Vance

If you had any confusion over why Donald Trump chose JD Vance as his running mate, Tuesday night's vice presidential debate "has been the strongest illustration in this campaign so far of why," writes Ross Douthat at the New York Times. The Ohio senator gave "one of the best debating performances by a Republican nominee for president or vice president in recent memory," and made a better case for Trump's own record than Trump himself has been able to do. Douthat wasn't the only one making that observation in reactions to the debate:

• Dace Potas previously believed Vance was a bad choice by Trump, but after the debate, Potas concedes at USA Today that he was wrong. "Trump finally has a better version of himself that voters can support," he writes. "Trump's policies sound much better when Vance talks about them ... Vance's appeal is that he can coherently sell Trump's message without the character flaws."

• At the Independent, however, Andrew Feinberg also believes the debate showed why Trump chose Vance, but his view is slightly different. Feinberg calls out Vance's refusal to give a firm answer to the question of whether Trump lost the 2020 presidential election. "Vance's entire reason for being on the GOP ticket is because Trump needed a new running mate [after Mike Pence certified the 2020 election results over Trump's wishes]—and because his previous one has refused to endorse him and has continuously called him unfit to serve as president. And he gave Walz the exact opening he needed to hammer that point home to voters," Feinberg writes.
• Even so, most of the immediate reaction seemed to agree Vance had the stronger debate, though not overwhelmingly so (see the Guardian, the BBC).
• Much of the immediate reaction also centered on how relatively affable the two men were with each other (see CNN, the AP). At one point, after Walz recounted an emotional story about his teenage son witnessing a shooting, Vance responded, "I'm sorry about that. Christ have mercy."

(More Election 2024 stories.)