VP Stakes: Why J.D. Vance May Have the Edge
VP Stakes: Why J.D. Vance May Have the Edge
Marine Training, Ivy League Pedigree & "Hillbilly Elegy" Branding Makes this OH-born-and-bred First-Term Senator an Ideal VP Pick from a Rich Field
When it comes to picking the VP candidate, the Republican Party is an embarrassment of riches.
Donald Trump told Maria Bartiromo on Sunday, February 4, (a lifetime ago given all the news since then1), that his most important consideration in selecting his Vice Presidential running mate, is who could step into the presidency should he no longer be able to fulfill his duties as commander in chief after he is elected on November 5, 2024 and is sworn into office on January 20, 2025 as 47th President of the United States, as polls indicate is all but assured.
This is, of course, the person who would also be groomed to sweep into the presidency on January 20, 2029, after 47’s successful second term, serving as president potentially until Jan 19, 2037.
For weeks, if not months, I have had my eye on Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH), as the ideal candidate to serve as Donald Trump’s Vice-Presidential running mate — even before I knew all the particulars of his background.
Call it my sixth sense, gradually informed by many positive points on the curve including his Marine training and service; Ivy League pedigree, earning a Yale law degree in 2013; then punching his ticket at a corporate law firm, after which he sought tech gold in San Francisco, serving as a principal at Mithril Capital, Peter Thiel’s venture capital firm; then wrote his book; then ran for and won his Senate seat in 2022 — counterintuitively a difficult year for Republicans because they did not play their cards right post-Dobbs. (As St. Thomas More said and I am paraphrasing, ‘there are limits to the law’s ability to bring personal moral behavior into conformance with the moral code.’)
Born August 2, 1984, Vance, at age 40, would be the youngest person to assume the Vice Presidency. Then, all things being equal, he would serve as president from age 44 to age 52.
Perfect!
Even more perfect is the fact that he knows to the core of his being the devastation wrought by the hollowing out of the America’s Midwest industrial base, having grown up poor, raised by a single Mom and grandmother, because of it, as immortalized in his book, Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis, made into a Ron Howard-directed motion picture. It was a long way from Mayberry! And, of course, one of Trump’s big agenda items, besides restoring America’s energy dominance, is to restore America’s manufacturing base, all of which will help ensure America’s national security since economic and military strength are integrally bound up.
Yup. The guy has all the right stuff and, like Trump, has great branding.
And the Democrats know it, which George Stephanopoulos’ ill-treatment of him when he cut short a TV interview, brought home — in spades. Not only that but the point Vance was making highlighted how highly intelligent he is. To wit, as he told Stephanopoulos:
“The Constitution says that the Supreme Court can make rulings, but if the Supreme Court ― and look, I hope that they would not do this ― but if the Supreme Court said that the president of the United States can’t fire a general, that would be an illegitimate ruling and the president has to have Article 2 prerogative under the Constitution to actually run the military as he sees fit.”
And now, Vance has been given a prime speaking spot at CPAC.
All the pieces falling into place.
That J.D. Vance’s wife and children are Asian is a lovely grace note.
I’m grateful I don’t have to pick the VP candidate. Such a rich field.
But Vance has that extra something.
Mary Claire Kendall is author of Oasis: Conversion Stories of Hollywood Legends, published in Madrid under the title También Dios pasa por Hollywood. She recently finished writing a book about the life of Ernest Hemingway viewed through the prism of faith due to be published in late 2024.
On Tuesday, February 6, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit’s three-judge panel ruled that former president Donald Trump does not enjoy broad immunity from federal prosecution for his official acts, and could be charged for numerous alleged crimes, notably his alleged crime of “insurrection,” under a civil war era law, putting him on track for the c. 700 years in jail his political enemies wish for him—never mind that federal judges and members of congress enjoy such immunity.
That evening Nikki Haley lost to “none of the above” in the Nevada primary.
On Thursday, Feb. 8, the turning point of the Biden presidency arrived when the U.S. Supreme Court took up the case of Colorado refusing to grant ballot access to former President Trump for the presidential election on November 5, and all nine justices essentially gave that notion a big thumbs down, with the respective ruling due shortly.
That charade was topped off by an even greater spectacle when Special Counsel Robert Hur’s report essentially declared that, while Joe Biden likely did the crime in his classified-docs-gate, he would not do the time because the hearts of the jury would melt when they laid eyes on the enfeebled president, (who, oh, by the way, has the sole power to authorize nuclear warfare). With Hur throwing out this case, it begs the question why Special Counsel Jack Smith seeks to throw the book at Trump for docs he actually had the authority to retain, as many former presidents have done without consequence, which Hur duly noted. Only difference being, these former presidents were not asked to return the classified documents. Oh, and they were given SCIFS; not so Trump.
Suffice it to say, the plot is thickening.
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