Donald Trump has picked a trustworthy gladiator for his Make America Great Again movement on the Republican ticket, expecting J.D. Vance’s modification from blue-collar Rust Belter to senator can assist him secure victory.
A White House candidate usually prefers a vice-presidential running mate who can appeal to new categories of voters or compensate for recognized flaws in terms of image or policy.
Trump, though, tapped a conservative white man like himself, from a state he already had every possibility of winning.
“We’re ecstatic,” Alex Triantafilou, chairman of the Ohio Republican Party, said on the Republican National Convention floor minutes after Vance was announced as Trump’s VP choice, calling him a “great addition” to the ticket.
Vance has “lived that experience” shared by millions of working-class and middle-class Americans, he said.
Age difference
Even if his rival Joe Biden seems to be suffering more than him from advanced age, Trump knows he is no inexperienced at 78.
By choosing Vance, who at 39 is hardly half Trump’s age — and the first millennial on a main US party presidential ticket — he could balance what had been the rather youthful advantage of Biden’s vice president, 59-year-old Kamala Harris.
Mandel Ngan | AFP | Getty Images
The former US President may also be looking for a qualified young successor to take the torch of Trumpism forward — and no doubt he thinks Vance can lead a new MAGA generation.
Loyal supporter
Vance was once a harsh Trump opponent, but he has made a U-turn to prove himself as one of the billionaire’s most devoted defenders.
He has deleted earlier tweets necessary of Trump and instead passionately embraced his ideas, supporting a radical anti-immigration fight and severe economic protectionism. And he demonstrated his loyalty by protecting tooth and nail Trump’s theory that the 2020 election was robbed.
Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images
Trump was scalded by his experience with his vice president in his first term, Mike Pence, who, after years of persistent loyalty, had dropped on January 6, 2021, to comply when Trump asked him to deny approve Biden’s election victory.
“Trump picked J.D. Vance as his running mate because he will do what Mike Pence wouldn’t on January 6: bend over backwards to enable Trump and his extreme MAGA agenda, even if it means breaking the law, and certainly no matter the harm to the American people,” said Biden campaign manager Jen O’Malley Dillon.
Crucial battlegrounds
Ohio has steadily shifted rightward, and Trump would theoretically take his running mate’s home state without him. But he is betting Vance can assist him win the neighboring states of Michigan and Pennsylvania, along with Wisconsin.
All three of them are crucial battlegrounds capable of tipping the scales on November 5.
Vance’s 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” was extolled by some as a window into the lives and concerns of the white working class — and their support for Trump.
Haiyun Jiang—The New York Times/Redux
Vance “embodies Pennsylvania and Michigan and Wisconsin, those Midwest states,” Ohio delegate Charlie Frye, 53, told AFP at the convention.
Notably, Trump is not considering only of the presidential election.
Ohio is the scene of a hotly challenged battle for the state’s other senate seat, held by a Democrat, and Vance’s momentum could help the Republican challenger — and in the process help the party recover control of the upper chamber of Congress.
