What Vance’s most recent debate says about his chances against Walz

By Washington Examiner
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Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) has been prepping behind the scenes for more than a month for the vice presidential debate against Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN).

This is only Vance’s second run for public office, meaning he has limited experience in formal debates ahead of his Oct. 1 showdown against Walz. Two years ago, Vance ran for Senate against longtime Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH), and the pair participated in two televised debates, held Oct. 10 and Oct. 17, 2022.

The Senate showdown at the Stambaugh Auditorium in Youngstown offers clues about Vance’s debate style and preparation for his biggest stage yet. It was a testy exchange throughout, but one that saw Vance through to a win on election night, where he drew 53% of the vote to Ryan’s 47% in what has become a reliably red Ohio.

Marc Clauson, a politics professor at Cedarville University in Ohio, praised Vance’s precision on the debate stage and predicted he’ll be a formidable opponent for Walz.

“He’s sharp on his feet,” Clauson said. “He’s a competent speaker and debater. He’s articulate with his words, his sentences. When he makes an argument, you can follow it. It’s very logical.”

Vance should attack Walz over the vagueness of Vice President Kamala Harris’s campaign, Clauson said, challenging the Minnesota governor to define his stance on key topics and pointing out when he doesn’t. Vance has Rep. Tom Emmer (R-MN) playing the role of Walz in his debate prep.

Here are some of the debate tactics Vance demonstrated in 2022 that he may seek to replicate on Tuesday at 9 p.m. at the CBS News vice presidential debate in New York City.

Vance makes youth vs. experience case

Vance vs. Ryan was something of a youth vs. experience matchup. Vance was then 38 years old and a first-time candidate. He was known for his Hillbilly Elegy memoir about growing up poor in Appalachia.

Ryan was still relatively young at age 49, but had been in the House of Representatives for 20 years and therefore carried the mantle of experience. That will also be the case when Vance, now 40, faces Walz, who is 60 years old and has enjoyed long tenures as a member of Congress and two-term Minnesota governor.

Things got heated more than once during Vance’s encounter with Ryan and often on topics that are still relevant two years later, such as immigration, inflation, and abortion.

Inflation came up first, with Ryan saying he knew how much pain people were in and blaming a bipartisan consensus for sending good-paying jobs overseas. Vance countered by saying the recently passed Inflation Reduction Act would actually raise inflation and claiming Ryan “votes with [then-House Speaker] Nancy Pelosi and [President] Joe Biden 100% of the time.”

Vance ties opponent to national Democratic Party woes

Vance’s effort to tie Ryan to Biden and the national Democratic Party is something he’ll likely try against Walz. The tactic set off many tense exchanges.

“If you want to run against Nancy Pelosi, move back to San Francisco and run against Nancy Pelosi,” Ryan said, bringing up Vance’s time at a venture capital firm. “I know you’re not here a lot, but what we’ve been working on in this community and in Ohio are the jobs of the future.”

Then it was Ryan’s turn to tie Vance to national figures, calling him former President Donald Trump’s “asskisser.” Vance said Trump was joking when he made the remark but added that he’s proud to have his endorsement, then tried to turn things back around by saying Ryan’s “entire campaign is based on sucking up to the national Democratic establishment.”

This tactic became a theme for Vance, who often attempted to turn attacks back around on his opponent, a skill he could try again to deploy against Walz.

Vance paints Democrats as abortion extremists

In 2022, abortion access was a major general election issue in the immediate aftermath of the Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade that summer, which sent abortion decisions back to the states.

Ryan went on offense over abortion policy, saying Vance wanted a national abortion ban and calling abortion restrictions “the largest government overreach in the history of our lifetime.”

Vance used the turnaround tactic again, saying Ryan is an extremist on abortion because he supports the procedure “without limits, up to 40 weeks of pregnancy.” But interestingly, Vance also expressed support for a 15-week ban.

“I think it’s totally reasonable to say you cannot abort a baby, especially for elective reasons, after 15 weeks of gestation,” Vance said. “No civilized country allows it; I don’t want the United States to be an exception.”

He may take a different stance during the vice president debate, as Trump has emphasized that abortion decisions should be made at the state level. If anyone brings up a 15-week ban, it will probably be Walz.

Vance draws on family to defend immigration stance

When Vance was asked about the opioid crisis, something that hit Ohio particularly hard, he pivoted a bit to focus on illegal immigration, which he said was leading to illicit drugs flooding the country. Ryan agreed that the United States needs a stronger border and more Border Patrol agents and accused Vance of hypocrisy for trying to host a fundraiser with a “pill pusher.”

“J.D. Vance, with all due respect, is a fraud,” Ryan said, unleashing one of his harshest attacks of the night. “You have two faces — one for the camera, and one for your business dealings.”

On the issue of crime, Vance tried to paint Ryan as soft, something he’ll surely repeat against Walz, who was governor during the 2020 George Floyd protests that turned violent in Minnesota.

“[Ryan] supported ending cash bail, and we know, just in this community, a guy who was let out on nominal bail, who went and got a gun and went and murdered somebody in this community,” Vance said, “because we don’t have the proper policies in place to ensure that violent criminals go off [to jail] for a long time.”

One of the most controversial debate topics came near the end when Vance was asked about the great replacement theory, which a moderator described as the idea that “whites are in danger of being replaced by nonwhites as a majority if the flow of nonwhite immigrants isn’t stopped.” The moderator asked Vance, “Who are these invaders and how are they coming into this country?”

Vance did not shy away from the question.

“The primary way they’re coming into the country is through Tim Ryan and Joe Biden’s wide-open southern border, to the tune of about 2.5 million people,” Vance said. “[Democratic leadership is] very explicit about that. They say that they want more and more immigration because if that happens, they’ll ensure that Republicans are never able to win another national election.”

Vance added that the insecure border also brings in fentanyl and sex trafficking and said, “It’s not about whites or nonwhites,” but the remarks got a sharp rebuttal from Ryan.

“I think it’s nonsense,” Ryan said. “I think it is grounded in some of the most racially divisive writings in the history of the world, and this is who he’s running around with talking about replacement theory. There’s no big grand conspiracy. This is a country who’s been enriched by immigrants from all quarters of the world.”

Vance said he is married to a legal immigrant and has biracial children and that “you can believe in a border without being a racist. You can believe in the country without being a racist.”

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Clauson, the professor, said when Vance faces Walz, he should avoid polarizing topics like the Haitians-eating-pets claim that caused such a dustup in the presidential debate and instead focus on what matters most to voters.

“He needs to stick to the issues of the economy, crime, immigration, and foreign policy,” Clausen said. “He’s much more likely to do that than Trump would be. Trump is easy to get off track. I think Vance stays on track really well.”

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