Donald Trump tapped Ohio senator J. D. Vance as his vice-presidential pick.
The choice wasn’t a surprise but completed a shockingly rapid political ascent for the 39-year-old Vance, who has gone from an outspoken Never Trump author to joining Trump on a national ticket in eight short years.
A former Marine, the author of the runaway bestseller Hillbilly Elegy, and a success in the world of venture capital, Vance is smart and sure-footed. He’ll almost certainly be an effective spokesman for the ticket. He’s given to outlandish statements, especially on social media, but that isn’t his only mode. He’s very difficult for hostile interviewers to corner and was perfectly comfortable going on mainstream outlets during the VP audition period.
More fundamentally, he’s a MAGA pick for an increasingly MAGA party. In 2016, Trump believed it necessary to reach out and reassure the Reagan GOP with the pick of Mike Pence. This time around, he didn’t feel any such gesture was necessary to unite the party, and instead went with a selection that is intended — although these things are impossible to game out — to create a MAGA heir apparent to carry on the project in 2028 and beyond.
Politically, the Trump campaign believes that Vance, who is from a Rust Belt state and whose politics and economics are focused on working-class voters, can help in the blue-wall states, which could be decisive in a close race. Vance underperformed other Republicans statewide in his only race in Ohio, though, and it’s doubtful that he’s going to win voters for Trump that the populist icon wasn’t already going to win himself. Although VP picks usually don’t make much of a political difference, other choices would have had a better chance of helping Trump marginally among minorities, suburbanites, or Republicans not enamored of the former president.
Substantively, Vance has in recent years become a full-on national populist, more so even than Trump. He’s an advocate of industrial policy and has teamed up with Senate Democrats to advance various regulatory and anti-corporate policies. Like Trump, he is allergic to reforming entitlements, the main driver of the nation’s unsustainable debt. He’s a protectionist who wants more tariffs and barriers to trade. And he’s a so-called restrainer who has crusaded against more aid for Ukraine in its defensive war against Russia. Although the details and circumstances matter in any policy question, these are impulses that would, all things being equal, tend to make America less wealthy and secure.
Vance has also undergone a transformation on Trump that happened to coincide with his need to get the former president’s endorsement for his campaign in the 2022 Republican Senate primary. Everyone changes their mind about things, but Vance went from a fulsome opponent to a fulsome supporter of Trump, going so far as to say that if he had been vice president on January 6 he would have found a way to avoid simply accepting certified slates of electors.
Democrats will detail Vance’s long catalogue of anti-Trump statements and portray Vance as an extremist, especially on abortion. It is doubtful that this will come to much. Vance will reiterate that he was wrong in his past condemnations of Trump (some of which were indeed excessive, some of which were right). He has already deferred to Trump’s states-should-decide position on abortion and has even gone so far as to say that he “supports” access to abortion drugs — a position we hope he finds a way to modify. A more legitimate concern is whether Vance, who has been in the U.S. Senate for less than two years, is ready to take over the job of president — which has added significance given Trump’s age and the horrific attempt on his life. Having made Kamala Harris vice president, though, Democrats aren’t exactly in a good position to prosecute this case.
J. D. Vance, a striver who overcame considerable adversity to become an Ivy League graduate and accomplished venture capitalist, has now climbed the greasy pole of Republican politics in the Trump era. This is quite the political achievement, although as his predecessor, Mike Pence, found out, it can be treacherous up there.