JD Vance is doing a fine job of what Trump needs to do, but seemingly can't.

Presidential nominees pick their running mate for a variety of purposes — to improve their chances in a key state or region (Kennedy-Johnson); to reassure a key portion of their party (Johnson-Humphrey and Trump-Pence); to add gravitas to the ticket (Bush-Cheney); to appeal to a demographic group (Mondale-Ferraro); or to double-down on an ideology or image (Clinton-Gore).

Donald Trump’s selection of JD Vance looks like a classic ideological double-down. In his current incarnation, Vance is as MAGA as it gets.

There was a time when vice presidential candidates were often picked for another purpose — to serve as an attack dog against the opposition, while the presidential candidate remained largely above the fray. Eisenhower-Nixon is one example. Nixon-Agnew is another although, believe it or not, the main reason for Agnew’s inclusion was to reassure the liberal Rockefeller win of the GOP.

The best example is probably Barry Goldwater’s selection of the relatively obscure (and long forgotten) William Miller. Goldwater is said to have picked Miller because he liked the way the congressman got under Lyndon Johnson’s skin.

Nowadays, presidential candidates have little desire to stay above the fray, and Donald Trump has none. He’s his own attack dog. Thus, it doesn’t seem likely he selected Vance for that purpose.

But Vance is turning out to be an attack dog, par excellence. And because his attacks are more focused and less petty than Trump’s, he’s filling a gap in the ticket.

From what I’ve seen of Vance on C-SPAN, he’s doing a fine job of branding Kamala Harris and Tim Walz what they are — far-left radicals. Vance has been especially merciless when it comes to Walz. He’s hammering the Minnesotan for the policies he inflicted on his state, some of his far-left positions, and his misleading statements about his military service.

At his rallies, Vance also solicits questions from the media, while pointedly noting Harris’ unwillingness to meet the press. From what I’ve seen, Vance answers questions adroitly, though it will only take one major slip up for this strategy to backfire.

The problem for the Republican ticket is that Vance is only second fiddle. As much as presidential nominees agonize and calculate before they select a running mate, the vice presidential nominee almost never plays a big part in determining the outcome of an election.

Vance isn’t going to get the attention Trump gets (unless he slips-up badly). So it’s really up to Trump to brand the Harris-Walz ticket effectively.

From what I’ve seen, Trump isn’t doing this. Where Vance cites chapter and verse, Trump’s attacks are conclusory — and that’s when they have any real substance at all.

For example, Trump told Fox News that “this is a ticket that would want this country to go communist immediately, if not sooner.” Harris and Walz are lots of things, most of them bad. But they are not communists. Calling them that just makes Trump look dopey (to borrow Bill Otis’ description) to everyone but his ardent supporters.

Trump needs to present sharper, more focused attacks, if he can.

But even if Trump does this, his message may not break through because of where he’s presenting it. He’s not in the swing states. Instead, as Erick Erickson complains, he’s doing live stream interviews with “influencers” whose influence, if any, is largely confined to people who already favor Trump.

It’s still a good while before Election Day. But people will start voting in Pennsylvania, for example, soon. Meanwhile, the Democrats’ will have a big audience for their convention, at which they will roll out Harris and Walz in a form bearing almost no relationship to reality.

Thus, the task of effectively defining the Democratic ticket is too urgent to be left to JD Vance alone. Erickson writes:

Trump should barn storm the swing states and do local media.  Right now, Trump is having J.D. Vance do the leg work.  But the signs say Trump on top, not Vance.  People are voting for Harris or Trump, not Vance or Tim Walz.  The 500,000 Americans who will decide who our next president is are not going to watch Trump do a livestream with a Twitch influencer.  They are tired from a long day. 

They trust the long news anchor on their local news station who has been behind the anchor desk for thirty years.  That guy or lady, they think, is fair and one of us.  If Trump does an interview with that person, the swing voters in the swing states will pay attention.  An interview with Elon Musk on a platform most Americans do not use does not get the same return on investment. . . .

The national press hates Donald Trump.  The local press wants the ratings.  They will ask tough questions, but they will be the local, trusted faces.  Trump has stories to tell.

Every state is affected by illegal immigration and fentanyl.  Every state has higher grocery and gas prices than when Trump was President, and most have higher crime rates.

If Trump wants to win, he must reset, and he can do that locally in swing states.

Erickson is right about the need for Trump to “storm the swing states.” He’s also right about the importance of local media.

My question, though, is whether Trump is capable of talking coherently and persuasively to anyone other than a MAGA supporter at a rally, a friendly “influencer,” or a Fox News show host. His performance in the debate with Biden and in his speech at the GOP convention suggests to me that he is not. Instead, Trump seems wedded to gratuitous insults and “shorthand” that seems at times like a private language understood by only his followers.

Alienating a “trusted” local news answer and baffling his or her audience is not a path to victory in swing states. Unless Trump can clean up his act — and wants to — maybe he’s better off leaving those local interviews to JD Vance, after all.