JD Vance Controlled the Debate — Until the End

It took JD Vance 10 seconds to show his hand.

The first question of the vice presidential debate was whether he would support a preemptive strike on Iran. His answer began: “I was raised in a working class family.”

For a moment, you might have thought Vance was imitating Vice President Kamala Harris’ “I come from a middle-class family” mantra. But the intention was broader. All through the debate, Vance — with some of the worst approval ratings of any vice presidential candidate — was determined to soften his edges and offer himself as a reasonable guy, looking for common ground.

Vance acknowledged a difference of opinion with Tim Walz but repeatedly asserted that they agreed on finding solutions. He was at pains to say that some of Walz’s views, on housing, for instance, might be sensible. He expressed surprise and sympathy when he learned that Walz’s son had been present at a shooting. He kept his sharpest attacks sheathed, never criticizing Walz for allegedly inflating his military career. On the issue of abortion, Vance — who in the past has embraced hard-line restrictions, including a national abortion ban — noted that his state of Ohio had adopted a more liberal position, one he disagreed with. That, he argued, was the way to resolve the conflict.

It is a strategy that required preparation, shaped by the obvious conclusion of former President Donald Trump’s campaign that the public was rejecting the initial version of the candidate, with his contempt for childless cat ladies and his eagerness to “create” stories that stirred up hostility toward immigrants. But there was another aspect to Vance’s performance, and one that stood for much of the debate in contrast to Walz: For weeks, Vance has been participating in a series of interviews, often in forums that were less than hospitable. By the time of the debate, he’d been well versed in answering, deflecting and, in some cases, dissembling about key issues in the campaign.

The Democrats’ campaign chose a different path for Walz, as well as his running mate — essentially avoiding tough environments. And it showed. At times, Walz seemed unprepared either to defend himself (such as his whereabouts during the Tiananmen Square protests) or to summon the most effective lines of attack against Vance and Trump. For example, he noted briefly that the Republican governor of Ohio criticized Trump and Vance for demonizing Haitian immigrants, but it was almost a passing thought and he didn’t mention the GOP ticket’s outrageous, unsubstantiated claim that pets were being eaten. It was a muddled presentation of the powerful point that the state’s GOP governor said his own party’s candidates were endangering lives.

Perhaps the most damning argument against Trump and Vance — the large number of conservatives, Republicans and former Trump administration officials who were endorsing Harris and who saw Trump as a mortal threat to the country — was raised briefly and then dropped.

Walz did manage to land some real blows, including when he asked Vance point blank whether Trump had lost the 2020 election and Vance dodged. Walz was right to call it “a damning non-answer,” and that clip is already getting plenty of play. The moment could have come earlier in the debate, but the Harris campaign will surely take it.

Otherwise, Walz’s strongest moments came when his experience in Congress and as governor gave him the tools to marshal familiar arguments about gun control and health care. Vance’s notion that Trump saved the Affordable Care Act — a howler worthy of SNL’s pathological liar Tommy Flanagan — let Walz evoke the memory of John McCain saving Obamacare from Trump’s destruction. He was similarly on firm ground by raising the danger of Trump abandoning protections for those with preexisting conditions. (Vance did score one point on heath care: When Walz was explaining why insurance pools had to be broad, Vance asked if Harris intended to revive the individual mandate — a red flag for young people.)

I’ve thought for some time that the argument for Harris and Walz to engage in more contentious interviews was less a matter of obligation to voters — candidates can run campaigns they choose to run — and more of a tactical mistake. The more a candidate is exposed to the tougher questions, the more likely that candidate is to shape a more persuasive argument. (I’m still waiting for Harris to give a considered explanation for her many changed positions other than “I grew up in a middle class family” and “I haven’t changed my values.”)

The debate demonstrated that point. It likely does not change the contours of the race — vice presidential debates never do — and it clearly did not alter the fundamental reality that Trump is a uniquely unqualified and unfit candidate for president.

The fact that Harris will be sitting down for a “60 Minutes” interview and Trump will not may also go a long way toward ending the excessive caution that — at this debate at least — showed that a campaign can be too cautious for its own good.

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