Trump Has Made Two Perfect VP Picks

Donald Trump has made two vice presidential picks. In 2016 he chose Mike Pence, and in 2024 he chose JD Vance. Each of these picks was brilliant in its own right.

2016: Mike Pence

During the 2016 Republican primary, Trump faced significant resistance from within the Republican party for having a morally objectionable character, for not being a principled conservative, and for not having enough requisite understanding of politics to successfully run an administration. However, Trump emerged from a hotly contested primary ahead of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, two highly respected figures within the Republican establishment.

For the general election, Trump understood that he had to consolidate his support among rank-and-file Republicans as well as mobilize the working class vote which constituted much of his grassroots support. Trump’s personal appeal to the working class voters meant that choosing a person to help consolidate the traditional Republican base was essential. Specifically, Trump was faring poorly among social conservatives, especially evangelical Christians so his selection of vice president needed to alleviate their concerns.

Enter a calm, even-tempered evangelical Christian and governor of Indiana (a half-century Republican stronghold only broken by Obama’s 2008 landslide). Mike Pence’s selection enabled Trump to consolidate support from evangelicals, a critical demographic required for any Republican to secure the presidency. Pence also helped eschew some concerns of the Republican establishment.

2024: JD Vance

After a failed 2020 campaign, Donald Trump spent the next four years consolidating his gains among the working class of all races and forming a new tenuous coalition with big tech. I think that Trump’s brand alone would have won him the presidency. However, he needed an articulate and ideologically aligned right-hand-man for a few reasons. The first being as an insurance policy. I truly think that Trump made his decision after he was shot in Butler. He knew he needed to pick someone who the opposition was more afraid of than himself at least on the policy level (Trump’s brand is obviously stronger than Vance’s). The second reason was to have a chance at securing his legacy through selecting the next Republican ticket.

Vance, a converted Never Trumper military veteran who understood the plight of the working class but also had connections to the new tech right fit the bill perfectly.

Trump was probably going to win the Electoral College just due to the unpopularity of the opposition, but I believe that Vance delivered the popular vote. Vance helped turn out a few hundred thousand more working class voters and provided intellectual permission for the tech right to vote Trump.

It is clear from the first five months of this administration that Trump is willing to elevate and include his vice president in important decisions. Vance is the clear favourite for the 2028 Republican nomination. If Vance wins in 2028, Donald Trump will have entirely reshaped the Republican coalition such that the 2012 party will look nothing like the 2032 party. Trump will have transformed the GOP from an uptight party of the white free-market business elites into a party of the diverse working class and anti-globalist interests.

Trump has single-handedly sent the Democrats into the wilderness by stealing the once-reliably Democratic working class from the left. Trump spoke to the working class realization that the bipartisan policies of the last 40 years have shipped the American Dream overseas. Meanwhile, the Democrats over-indexed on intersectional, racially motivated politics after the dominant Obama coalition defined the last decade. In doing so they alienated wide swaths of the exact multi-ethnic coalition that they relied on. It turns out all those Juans and Mateos just want the same thing as all the Joes and Marks: an America made Great Again.