Joe Biden and Donald Trump have long since clinched the presidential nomination of their respective parties. Thus, attention has turned to the question of whom Trump will select as his running mate.
Based on conversations it claims to have had with Trump insiders (why Trump insiders still talk to the mainstream media, I don’t know), the Washington Post reports:
Donald Trump’s perfect vice president looks the part: attractive and telegenic. They [sic] are ideally Black or a woman, though that’s not required. And they are most certainly not taller than Trump himself.
That last criterion, if accurate, excludes Tom Cotton. Whether Cotton wants the VP nod, I do not know.
Trump wants someone he sees in person but doesn’t see too much, his advisers say. He does not necessarily want a successor as the leader of the MAGA movement; he would prefer that the Republican Party duke it out for his endorsement in four years, one adviser said. He wants a No. 2 who has won in the past. And he wants someone who will never contradict his false claims about the outcome of the 2020 election.
But more than anything, he wants someone who can help him win.
What presidential candidate doesn’t?
Missing from this recitation of qualities is any requirement that the running mate hold conservative views or, indeed, substantive views similar to those Trump professes. That’s not unusual, though. Presidential candidates of all stripes usually try to balance their ticket, rather than selecting an ideological soulmate.
Neither of the two arch-conservative GOP nominees of my lifetime — Barry Goldwater and Ronald Reagan — picked a hardcore conservative running mate. Both William Miller and George H.W. Bush were conservative, but not to the degree that Goldwater and Reagan were. Miller voted for a string of civil rights laws that Goldwater opposed. Bush was from the establishment wing of the GOP and opposed Reagan’s economic proposals, labeling them voodoo economics.
The Post provides a list of those it thinks are under serious consideration by Trump. They are: Governors Doug Burgum of North Dakota, Kristi Noem of South Dakota, and Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas; Senators J.D. Vance (Ohio), Katie Britt (Ala.), Bill Hagerty (Tenn.), Marco Rubio (Fla.) and Tim Scott (S.C.); Reps. Byron Donalds (Fla.) and Elise Stefanik (N.Y.); Kari Lake, who lost Arizona’s gubernatorial race in 2022 and is running for the Senate this year; Vivek Ramaswamy; and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Of those on the list, only one jumps out as easily meeting all the requirements and preferences Trump allegedly has in mind: Kristi Noem.
She’s attractive and telegenic, female, and not as tall as Trump. She has won political races and certainly will not contradict Trump’s claim that the 2020 election was stolen. (Does she believe that claim? I don’t know. But the requirement, according to the Post, is only that she not contradict it.)
And Noem could help Trump win. In part, that’s because she is attractive, telegenic, and female. I was present for a speech Noem gave last year. It convinced me that she’s an exceptionally talented politician.
Noem could also help Trump because she compensates for one of Trump’s liabilities — the charge that he placed his covid policy in the hands of Dr. Fauci. This charge might cause some conservatives to reject Trump in favor, perhaps, of Kennedy.
However, Noem was one of the few governors who did not place her state on an extended lockdown. Thus, she might help keep a chunk of alienated conservative/libertarian voters in the fold.
The Post is somewhat dismissive of Noem (which may be telling, in itself):
The former president has polled advisers, donors and even Mar-a-Lago Club members on Noem but has also questioned whether she has too much “baggage.” Some of his closest advisers were put off recently when she appeared to film an infomercial-style video for a Texas dental clinic that fixed her teeth.)
It’s difficult for me to imagine that Trump, of all people, would be put off by someone doing an infomercial-style video.
In suggesting that Noem best meets the standards Trump allegedly is applying, I don’t mean to suggest that I prefer her as the nominee. Given my foreign policy and national security views, I would rather see Rubio or Stefanik get the nod. But I doubt that Trump wants to share the spotlight with Rubio, and Noem strikes me as a more talented campaigner than Stefanik.
Are there others on the list who meet all of Trump’s alleged requirements and preferences? Among the blacks, Tim Scott, maybe. Among the women, Sanders and Stefanik, maybe. But not to the degree that Noem does.
The three people on the list I would least like to see on the ticket are Lake (a former Obama supporter), Ramaswamy (an unbearable upstart), and Kennedy (no one’s idea of a conservative). None has “won in the past., so if this matters to Trump, he won’t select any of them. Indeed, I would be quite surprised if he did.
After her less than stellar response to Biden’s State of the Union Address, Katie Britt also seems like a suboptimal selection.
Anything the Post writes about Trump should be taken with at least a grain of salt. However, in my opinion, the parts about what Trump is looking for in a running mate ring largely true.
So does this:
Knowing Trump likes reality TV, Miller has suggested the campaign build suspense and drama around his selection.
“This is ‘The Apprentice: 2024 version,’” said Terry Sullivan, a Republican consultant who managed Rubio’s 2016 presidential bid. “Donald Trump is nothing if not a showman, and he loves this process and he’s going to drag it out and get as much media coverage and goodwill and leverage it as much as humanly possible.”
And why not? For the next few months, this is the only 2024 horse race in town.
I too think Kristi Noem would be a great pick, though there is one potential fly in her ointment. There are rumors she had an extramarital affair with Corey Lewandowski while she was the South Dakota congresswoman. Whether that disqualifies her in this day and age is debatable, I love it that Paul puts [sic] after a "they" the Post uses to refer to one person. This is bad enough when they is used to refer to a person of unknown gender, but it is also used when it refers to an identified person. The usage is grating and often confusing. If the Post insisted on using they, it could have easily reworded the prior sentence to refer to all potential vice presidential candidates. Jim Dueholm
I think there is still a double standard in US politics. An affair for a woman might be disqualifying even when the chooser is a philanderer himself . I personally would be excited about Rubio but as someone who votes for the GOP other than for Trump, I am not the target audience.