Moustafa Bayoumi: ‘A civil encounter with no overwhelming winner’
The first question the vice-presidential candidates were asked in their debate was, frankly speaking, bonkers: “Would you support or oppose a pre-emptive strike by Israel on Iran?” The vast majority of the globe is waiting for the United States to exercise real global leadership and bring, at a bare minimum, temporary calm to the eastern Mediterranean region. But CBS apparently felt it wiser to ask the candidates whether they supported escalating the war now or escalating the war later.
The candidates slung arrows of blame at each other before settling on essentially the same answer. And that was basically the leitmotif of this rather odd debate: we, two diametrically opposed candidates standing before you, actually agree on a lot, including how completely different we are.
This debate will probably be recorded as a mostly civil encounter with no overwhelming winner. Over the course of the contest, the Republican, JD Vance, was as slick as a CEO’s lawyer, emitting almost snake-oil salesman energy, while the Democrat, Tim Walz, was predictably folksy, exuding an overly talkative teddy bear vibe. But on substance, both men tended to agree on a number of points ranging from the need to fortify our border crossings (at the expense of legitimate asylum seekers) to promoting affordable housing to protecting the Affordable Care Act.
Significant differences nevertheless did emerge, the most important of which was about reproductive health. While Walz spoke powerfully about the need to protect the right to abortion, Vance found ways to quietly blame immigrants for gun violence, border insecurity and the housing shortage.
But the debate will be forgotten by next week, if only because the world is currently a powder keg, and no one seems ready to challenge these two candidates about finding a real path to peace, justice and security for all.
Moustafa Bayoumi is a Guardian US columnist
Ben Davis: ‘Vance made extremist Trumpism sound moderate and reasonable’
Vice-presidential debates rarely affect the election or move voters. Even by those standards, this one was a non-event. Vance and Walz seemed to be competing with each other regarding how friendly and agreeable they could be, and each avoided taking shots where they could have obviously landed. Vance was nimble, if smarmy, showing his background as a debater and a lawyer. Walz was nervous at the start but settled in once the questions got to areas he focuses on as governor, like housing and agriculture.
One of the most notable aspects of the debate was the framing by the moderators, accepted dutifully by the candidates. It was taken as a given that Israel’s wars on Gaza and Lebanon and its expansionist ambitions are morally just. It was taken as a given that the United States should have a bellicose foreign policy in the Middle East. It was taken as a given that immigrants are hurting the economy and spreading crime. The moderators even framed a question around the notion that building new housing could harm the economy. That these ideas are considered unbiased and non-partisan is an extremely bleak sign for the country’s near future.
The second notable thing is what Vance’s positioning and rhetoric says about the Republican party. Vance saw his primary task as shaping Trump’s often nonsensical and entirely personally motivated ideas into a coherent, explicable political program. But Vance went beyond explaining away Trump’s comments, into introducing Trumpism as an full-scale ideology, and not just one explicated by the Claremont Institute and the Heritage Foundation and aimed at the dark corners of the internet.
This project – nationalism, protectionism, welfare chauvinism and a sort of communitarian-sounding social conservatism – floundered two years ago with candidates like Blake Masters or Vance himself. Vance was able to maneuver it to sound almost moderate and reasonable. There was no talk of birth rates or skull shapes. Even his outrageous defense of Trump’s attempted coup was couched in soft, compromise-oriented language. This is insidious, because in nearly every answer he gave, the core premise was still that white Americans are under attack by a nebulous other.
Ben Davis works in political data in Washington DC
Lloyd Green: ‘90 minutes that won’t move the needle’
Walz and Vance clashed for 90 forgettable minutes. The debate likely won’t move the needle but may leave Kamala Harris and Donald Trump both feeling vindicated in their selection of running mates. Vance channeled a smarter and more disciplined version of his would-be boss. He whitewashed January 6 and the absence of Mike Pence from the stage. Once upon a time, the senator from Ohio compared his running mate to Hitler – not anymore.
Walz was clearest and most impassioned when it came to abortion and healthcare. On that score, he wisely framed abortion as a matter of personal autonomy, one between a woman and her physician. Vance couldn’t run from the supreme court’s decision in Dobbs. On election day, the end of Roe v Wade may cost the Republican party a win.
When it came to healthcare, Trump’s line on “concepts of a plan” won’t die. Walz also reminded Vance that he once dinged the 45th president as unsuitable for office. Regardless, Vance’s thumbnail biography probably appealed to blue-collar voters without four-year degrees. He also spun his mother’s history of substance addiction into a story of upward arc and personal redemption. Betting markets pegged Vance as the winner of the evening.
In the end, Walz and Vance delivered little material for late-night talk shows or SNL to spoof. Their debate was more about policies than personas. The race is a dead heat with about 35 days to go.
Lloyd Green is an attorney in New York and served in the US Department of Justice from 1990 to 1992
Arwa Mahdawi: ‘Trump and Vance may have the last laugh’
The night started off with a uranium-enriched bang, with the CBS moderators asking the candidates whether they would commit to a pre-emptive strike by Israel on Iran. As an opening question, it speaks volumes about how war-mongering even “reasonable” sections of American society are. Why not ask how the candidates would de-escalate the crisis? Why jump straight into baiting both candidates into endorsing a catastrophic nuclear war?
Vance and Walz both did their best to avoid answering this question and rattled off their favorite talking points instead; Vance started waxing lyrical about his mother, who had a drug addiction. Trump, meanwhile, started going nuclear on Truth Social. “Both young ladies have been extremely biased Anchors!” Trump wrote on his social network two minutes into the debate.
While Trump was being his usual unhinged and sexist self, Vance was being surprisingly normal. On superficial optics alone, he was the clear winner of the night. There has (quite rightly) been a lot of emphasis on Vance’s weird and incel-like viewpoints. Amid all that, one can forget how slick and polished he can be – and he certainly reminded us of that in this debate.
Walz, on the other hand? Oh, dear. The media training the governor of Minnesota obviously had managed to train all the midwestern charm out of him. This wasn’t the lovable and empathetic high school coach we have come to know. Walz got better later into the night – particularly when he pushed Vance on whether Trump lost the 2020 election, a question that Vance dodged – but he was largely robotic and charmless, a man out of his depth.
Look, VP debates don’t tend to have much impact on elections. But this was something of a wake-up call. The Trump-Vance campaign may seem like a joke but there is a very real chance they could have the last laugh in November.
Arwa Mahdawi is a Guardian columnist
Bhaskar Sunkara: ‘Vance gave a slightly stronger performance’
We’ve come a long way from the libertarian 1990s, when both Bill Clinton’s new Democrats and Bob Dole’s Republican party were firm believers in free trade, couldn’t care less about manufacturing jobs, and found bipartisan agreement on shrinking the welfare state.
Instead, we just had a vice-presidential debate where both candidates brought up social-democratic Finland as a positive example; Walz declared himself a “union man”; and Vance foregrounded the bread-and-butter concerns of millions of Americans. The candidates repeatedly went out of their way to identify areas of agreement on issues like housing and childcare.
Of course, there was also a lot of bipartisanship not to like in the debate: war-mongering towards Iran, sycophantic support for Israel, the unwillingness of candidates to say that America is a nation of immigrants who create far more value for our nation than they take away.
Still, both hopefuls were at their best talking about domestic issues. Vance spoke about the fraying American dream, economic anger and the loss of hope in many communities. But his solutions – industrial policy, manufacturing, domestic energy production – sounded close to the program Joe Biden embarked on in office. Vance praised the “blue-collar Democrats” who raised him – implying that Republicans are now the true party of the working class – but almost every Democrat stood with Biden’s union-backed agenda, and almost no Republicans.
The biggest problem for Vance, who overall gave a slightly stronger performance, with fewer stumbles than Walz, is he has to tie his ideas to the contradictions of Trump’s economic program and his legacy of billionaire tax cuts. When Trump first ran for office, Vance hyperbolically called him “America’s Hitler”. When Trump left office, Vance was closer to the mark, privately calling him a “fake populist”.
Tying himself to a potential administration bound to offer nothing but deregulation, mismanagement, and handouts for the rich makes Vance that kind of populist, too.
Bhaskar Sunkara is the president of the Nation, founding editor of Jacobin and author of The Socialist Manifesto: The Case for Radical Politics in an Era of Extreme Inequalities
LaTosha Brown: ‘Vance was a chameleon’
The debate underscored a stark contrast between Waltz and Vance. Walz played the role of “the coach”, bringing receipts, sharing practical solutions and demonstrating real experience in addressing pressing issues. Walz showed that he knows how to govern – standing firmly with Kamala Harris’s vision and focusing on delivering tangible benefits to everyday Americans. His grounded explanations and proven record painted him as a steady, trustworthy leader ready to solve problems, not just win arguments.
On the other hand, JD Vance lived up to his reputation as a bit of a chameleon. He shifted positions throughout the debate to make himself more palatable. At one point, he flat-out lied about never supporting an abortion ban, a claim contradicted by his past actions. He refused to give a clear answer about who won the 2020 election and downplayed the January 6 insurrection as merely a protest. As Walz put it, Vance’s response was a “damning non-answer”.
Vance appeared cut from the same cloth as Donald Trump – willing to say anything to win, regardless of the truth. The debate made clear that voters face a choice: between Walz, whose authenticity and steady leadership reflect readiness to govern, and Vance, whose evasiveness shows a fixation on power over principle.
LaTosha Brown is the co-founder of Black Voters Matter
