JD Vance adds little to Trump ticket in Pennsylvania, some political experts say
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Ben Wasserstein/WITF
The freshman senator from Ohio is now on the Republican ticket with Donald Trump.
But JD Vance is a relative newcomer to politics and some analysts aren’t sure he is the best choice for a running mate – or if the pick will swing the race at all.
“If you are drawn to Trump’s politics, or find them revolting, Vance just seconds that,” said Chris Borick, a pollster at Muhlenberg College.
Vance rose swiftly in the Republican Party, from ardent Trump critic to staunch Trump ally, and he is seen as someone who appeals to Rust Belt voters.
Samuel Chen, a Republican strategist with the Liddell Group, said that as Trump was running as an untested politician in 2016, he needed to pick a “conservative heavyweight” to reach out to disaffected party members.
He got that with Mike Pence, then the evangelical governor of Indiana.
But Chen doesn’t see such an added value with Vance.
“It’s a very young political career,” Chen said. “He just won the Senate race two years ago, so he hasn’t been a senator for two years yet. And it’s been a full embrace of the populist ‘MAGA’ part of the Republican Party. And so you have disaffected Republicans.”
Charlie Gerow, a Republican strategist and chief executive of Quantum Communications, disagreed with Chen’s assessment.
“The blue wall has been crumbling for some time,” Gerow said of traditional Democratic support across Pennsylvania and other key electoral states. “Vance is exactly what the folks along that line want to see in a candidate. And his populist appeal, I think, will be clearly seen in November.”
President Joe Biden, a Democrat, narrowly won Pennsylvania in 2020, and Democratic candidates for governor and U.S. Senate, Josh Shapiro and John Fetterman, each won in 2022 by sizable margins.
Berwood Yost, a pollster at Franklin & Marshall College, doubted Vance would expand Trump’s appeal beyond his base.
“JD Vance can help him with white rural voters,” Yost said. “But those voters were already firmly in Mr. Trump’s camp.”
Chen said picking a vice president comes down to several factors, including trust and whether the running mate could run for president when the nominee’s time is up.
He said Vance is probably among the worst options for Donald Trump’s campaign and that Gov. Glenn Youngkin, R-Va., would have been an excellent pick, considering he won a state that has leaned Democratic recently.
He also noted Gov. Doug Burgum, R-ND, Gov. Chris Sununu, R-NH, and Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fl., would have eased some concerns among conservatives.
But pollsters doubt any choice would significantly sway the election, especially with a larger-than-life personality at the top of the ticket.
“We have to remember people are choosing a president, not a vice president,” Yost said.
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