No. of Recommendations: 9
Come on man, if trump is going to claim he knows nothing about project 25, you don't pick Vance. IF trump is going to claim he's pro choice up to 12-14 weeks, you don't pick Vance. He should have dumped Vance last week and BEGGED Haley to help him reset. Who told Harris she isn't black? IF trump really believes Harris is low IQ, dumb as a rock, a DEI classic case, he should be willing to debate Harris in Joy Behar's bedroom, 5 days a week, no?
All VP picks come with baggage, downsides, and positions that don't match up with the top of the ticket. That just comes with the territory. Trump chose Vance for one of the same reasons that Harris chose Walz - he didn't want to create an internal division within his supporters by picking someone they might have a problem with.
Dumping Vance for Haley would eliminate some of the Vance pain (boy, is he unpopular for a Veep pick!), but it would come at a heavy cost. Not only does that three-week flip look indecisive and admitting a mistake (which goes against the Trump brand), but you then alienate the huge part of the base that wants Vance (and thinks the liberal media are treating him unfairly) and doesn't want Haley.
As for Harris not being black, it's what I talked about upthread - Trump doesn't have an attack line on her, and he's just fishing around to see what his supporters will respond to. Trump thinks it's a little weird for her to identify as both Black and Indian (and to talk about one or the other at times)....maybe his base will think so, too? No? Okay, let's move on to something else. Maybe we call her dumb? A DEI pick? Is any of that working the way "Lock Her Up" or "Crooked Hillary" or "Build the Wall" did?
As for the debate, Trump is a TV guy. He knew the visual of him split-screening with Biden would be great for him no matter what the format. He knows the visual of him split-screening with Harris in a silent room and no ability to interrupt will be bad for him. He's a dominance kind of politician ("Strong and wrong" beats "weak and right"), and there's no way for him to project dominance in the format he agreed to when Biden was in the race. The debate would be bad bad bad for him. Maybe it's not as bad for him as skipping the debate, but it's probably the right move on his part to try not to have that exact debate.
