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Ahead of his first and likely only national debate of the presidential cycle, JD Vance prepared for the event at his home in Cincinnati and virtually on Zoom. He recruited Republican Rep. Tom Emmer of Minnesota to play his opponent in mock sessions. And he brought in Donald Trump’s campaign strategist Jason Miller and his own wife, Usha, to help, people familiar with the debate said.
But in his words, he doesn’t need to get ready.
"We have well developed views on public policy so we don't have to prepare that much,” Vance said in a Teamsters press call on Wednesday morning. "We feel a lot more confident and frankly, you don't have to prepare if you don’t have to hide what you say.”
His statement was in many ways exactly why Republicans — and especially Trump — continue to support him: He’s pithy, plainspoken and gets spirited with the media. And unlike Trump, he stays relentlessly on message and is known as an agile debater.
“It will be the first time a lot of Americans see him, and I think they're going to be very impressed with him, especially answering questions in that format,” said Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, a close ally to Vance who was also in the running to be Trump’s running mate. “I mean, he's been answering the questions he's going to get asked at that debate now for years, certainly in his whole time in the Senate and as a public figure.”
Vance is only in his second campaign, after his successful run for Ohio Senate in 2022. But the Yale Law School alumni and author of "Hillbilly Elegy" has already gained a reputation as a strong communicator and policy whisperer for the Trump campaign, as well as the torchbearer for the MAGA movement. In addition to regularly taking media questions for the campaign, he often joins cable news networks and Sunday shows — sometimes before unfriendly questioners — to defend Trump’s policies.
On the campaign trail, Vance has said answering questions from reporters — he often holds press conferences during his rallies to highlight how few media appearances Vice President Kamala Harris has done — has prepared him most for the Oct. 1 debate in New York. He spent most of this week on the campaign trail, with rallies in North Carolina, Michigan and Pennsylvania.
“What me and Donald Trump are going to keep on doing is going everywhere and talking to everybody,” Vance said when asked how he is preparing during a rally in Charlotte, North Carolina on Monday. “We talk to the hostile media, we talk to the friendly media, we talk to the national media, we talk to the local media and we do it because we think the American people deserve leaders who try to earn their vote instead of expecting it to be given to them.”
Yet Vance’s rollout onto the national political stage has hardly gone smoothly.
Since former President Donald Trump tapped him to be his running mate in July, resurfaced clips have gone viral of the Ohio Republican grumbling about the country being run by “childless cat ladies.” He was criticized for arguing that childless couples should pay more in taxes. And he drew rebukes from GOP moderates after he pushed a conspiracy that Haitian migrants were eating pets in Springfield, Ohio. (Vance has since defended his “childless cat ladies” comment as sarcasm.)
Vance continues to poll well among GOP voters, with 57 percent of registered Republicans viewing him favorably in a recent AP-NORC poll. But the poll also exposed some weaknesses, including that Democrats are more negative toward Vance than Republicans are of Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, 80 percent to 61 percent. Independents also view Vance more negatively than Walz, with 43 percent disliking Vance compared to 30 percent for Walz.
Vance plans to attack Walz during the debate over his record as governor — specifically on his handling of the Minneapolis riots in the aftermath of George Floyd's murder, according to one person familiar with the debate strategy who was granted anonymity to speak about the preparations. Vance, as he has done on the campaign trail, will also grill Walz over his 24-year military service after the Minnesota governor said in 2018 “weapons of war, that I carried in war” when explaining why he changed positions on supporting an assault weapons ban when he ran for governor. Harris’ campaign said Walz misspoke.
The person also said that Vance will also attempt to undercut Walz’ image as a moderate (he famously flipped a Minnesota seat) by painting him as a liberal, pointing to some of his the socially progressive policies he signed as governor like a bill that requires students of all gender identities to receive menstrual products, the person said.
It’s a similar strategy Vance used during his debates against former Rep. Tim Ryan in 2022. In his previous Senate debates, Vance effectively brought immigration policy and the economy into the spotlight. He tied Ryan to Nancy Pelosi, then Speaker of the House, painted Ryan as a “too liberal” congressman and questioned Ryan on what he had accomplished over his two decades in Congress.
“Tim Ryan says that he believes in reasonable solutions,” Vance said during his last Senate debate. Turning to the congressman, he said, “Well Tim, what were you doing on those reasonable solutions in your 20 years in Washington DC?”
And he’s made the same argument about Harris: “Kamala, day one was 1400 days ago, what the hell have you been doing the whole time?” he said at a rally in Michigan on Wednesday — a line he has used throughout the campaign, specifically when talking about Harris’ day one promises. The Harris-Walz campaign did not respond to requests for comment.
“A lot of people know him. They know his story,” Rep. Jim Banks (R-Ind.), a close ally of Vance, said. “If they didn't read the book, they watched the movie, and maybe they're going to see him in person for the first time or speaking for the first time.”
Meridith McGraw contributed to this report.
