Trump says Vance is ‘doing really well’ amid reports of second-guessing

Would former President Donald Trump, GOP presidential nominee, pick a different running mate if he knew he’d face Vice President Kamala Harris rather than President Joe Biden? He says no, at least publicly.

“No, I would do the same thing,” Trump said when asked by a reporter on a Tuesday afternoon conference call. “He’s doing really well. He’s really caught on.”

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) was selected as Trump’s vice presidential pick less than one week before Biden exited the race, and some pundits suggest he might have picked someone else if he’d known.

“Most striking thing I heard from Trump allies yesterday was the second-guessing of JD Vance—a selection, they acknowledged, that was borne of cockiness, meant to run up margins with the base in a blowout rather than persuade swing voters in a nail-biter,” The Atlantic writer Tim Alberta posted on X.

Vance was seen as a nod to the Rust Belt that could help Trump win the states of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Ohio, as a policy maven and, at 39 years old, a bridge to a new MAGA generation. But his ability to bring in new voters to the Trump campaign, such as suburban women, has been questioned.

Some were hoping Trump might pick a woman such as Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) or former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, but in the end, he chose the young acolyte in Vance. During his first solo rally, Vance suggested that Harris lacks gratitude for the United States.

“No politician is perfect, certainly not me,” Vance said. “But you deserve to be led by people who are grateful, who are grateful for the community they came from, who are grateful for this country and its boundless opportunities, who are grateful for the service of our vets, and the people who put their lives on the lines from police and firemen on down.”