Washington Wednesday: VP debate and swing state margins

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s Wednesday the 2nd of October.

This is WORLD Radio and we’re so glad you’ve joined us today. Good morning, I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher.

Before we get going here, I’ve got to say the outpouring of prayer and support for us at WORLD is … just humbling. You see those floodwaters rolling in, the waters rising … and you start to wonder, what does the future hold? But God provides … in his providence he moved your hearts … and you have given generously, extravagantly …

I talked yesterday with our CEO Kevin Martin and he told me, straight up, taking together what you’ve sent in and what you’ve pledged … Kevin said, that’s enough to get us through … more than enough … we don’t need more to get past this critical moment.

So we’re not asking for anything further, we’re taking down the banner. The emergency situation, for us, we’re confident now we’ll get through it.

So thank you for standing with us!

MAST: Time now for Washington Wednesday.

Today, what tight races in Pennsylvania may signal about the 2024 election.

But first, takeaways from last night’s Vice Presidential debate.

Joining us now to talk about it is Christopher Devine. He researches vice presidential candidates and teaches political science at the University of Dayton.

That’s quite the specialty. Christopher, good morning!

CHRISTOPHER DEVINE: Good morning. Good to be with you, Lindsay.

MAST: Christopher, was there a standout moment for you in this debate? And if so, what was it?

DEVINE: You know, it's funny that often gets negotiated in the days that follow. It might depend on what major networks choose to cover. It might depend on social media and what people are talking about. Perhaps the Trump-Vance campaign will point to Tim Walz being really unable to answer a question that kind of got to his honesty in that case about whether he was there for the Tiananmen Square massacre in June of 1989, which they might also say points to other inconsistencies and things that he said on various issues over time. Basically question his character. From the Harris-Walz campaign, I think they may point to a moment that happened toward the end of the debate where the 2020 election in January 6 came up, and Tim Walz asked J. D. Vance directly whether Donald Trump had lost that election. And Vance deflected to another issue, and the response for Tim Walz that that was a damning non answer. So either one of those could be the moment, maybe both of them.

MAST: Let's talk strategy a little bit. What was Vance's strategy? Do you think last night and how successful was he in achieving his goals?

DEVINE: Yeah, I think J. D. Vance's strategy, pretty clearly, was to broaden his appeal and to broaden the appeal of the ticket. You know, just to give a little context here, this race is neck and neck. It really could go either way. But J. D. Vance as a candidate is not doing particularly well. His unfavorable ratings are a good bit higher by about 10 points than his favorable ratings, which is very low territory for modern vice presidential candidates, well below Tim Walz, who's slightly popular, slightly more favorable than unfavorable. So I think he was trying to---actually, it's funny that the first question that he got, he went second after Walz answered one. And he started not by answering the question, but taking about a minute detour to, I would say, reintroduce himself to the American people, do a very quick version of his biography. So between that and then the way that he talked about certain issues, you know, abortion could be one example we might get into where he clearly was trying to appeal beyond the immediate base of the party, maybe reach out to – people who, you know, frankly, I think at times, Donald Trump has struggled to reach, out to people who are more undecided voters. So he was trying to broaden the ticket’s appeal, I would say.

MAST: On the flip side, what was Walz's strategy last night, and how successful was he in achieving his goals?

DEVINE: When it came to criticizing the other side, really saying what was wrong with the possibility of electing the opposing ticket, Tim Walz is first out of the gate on that, or at least was a little more aggressive early on in the debate. So, I think he was trying to remind people of what might have concerned them about the Trump presidency and what they might fear about a second term from him, while also speaking positively to Kamala Harris's accomplishments as vice president and what she would do in a Harris-Walz administration.

MAST: This seemed more like a debate than some of the other so-called debates that we've had in the past, but the role of moderators and rules has been a running theme this election cycle. Your thoughts on how those affected last night?

DEVINE: Yeah, Lindsay, you know, I do think it's really strange that CBS went out of their way to say in advance they weren't going to fact check. And then we did have a fact check, and that was specifically in regards to Springfield, Ohio, not far from where I am here in the Dayton, Ohio area. You know, fact checks are complicated there. I don't know if there's any perfect way to do this, but I will say, if you're gonna announce what you're gonna do about it beforehand, why not stick to it? So, I do think that was strange. 

Now, I do want to address a larger point. I have to say, this is one of the more substantive debates that I've seen in recent years, and they were actually pretty nice to each other. This was not full of character attacks and things like that. They challenged each other and they challenged the veracity of what the other was saying at certain times, but it never felt spiteful in the way that some other debates in recent years have. They were talking about issues and so many times, anybody who was listening last night would have noticed this very often, believe it or not, the candidates were saying, "I actually kind of agree with part of what he just said." You know, J. D. Vance was doing that to Tim Walz, Tim also doing that to J. D. Vance. They were saying nice things about each other. And I have to say, I think that matters in an age where many of us are concerned about the polarization, about people being at each other's throats, about not being able to see any good in someone who disagrees with you. We actually saw that last night of people talking in a civil, respectful way. Frankly, I think there are a lot of people who were watching last night's debate who are going to say, "Man, I wish either those are the presidential candidates or the presidential candidates would act like those guys did."

MAST: What effect will last night's debates have on the polls and when will we know who won, at least in the eyes of the voters?

DEVINE: Yeah, you know, we don't tend to get decisive wins in this. Of course, there will be polls afterwards, and they might tilt one way or another. I have to say I think probably J. D. Vance won it if we're going to score this thing. Vance is relatively unpopular, whereas Walz is slightly popular. He's actually, according to recent polling, the most popular of the four candidates, not by a lot, but he is okay. And so going into this debate, there was room for J. D. Vance to move up, and there was room for Tim Walz to move down. And I suspect that's what you're going to see, probably some shift in the polling and what people think of these VP candidates. People are going to see some things in J. D. Vance that they like more than what they've seen before. They'll have trouble with some of the things from Tim Walz, especially on the honesty issues. So, you only see a little movement there. But is that going to affect the people at top of the ticket? Is that going to affect how folks are voting? You know, our research on this shows that what people think of the VP candidate doesn't have a lot of effect on how they vote. People are much more focused on the presidential candidate, and they're looking for what the VP candidate will tell them about the person at the top of the ticket. I think probably people watching will look at either of those running mates and say they're at least fairly credible, if not quite convincing as potential vice presidents, so that might work in favor of the presidential candidates, but if there are problems people have, it might actually have a little, just a marginal effect in bringing one candidate or another down.

MAST: Christopher Devine researches vice presidential candidates and teaches at the University of Dayton. Christopher, thanks for staying up late to discuss the debate with us!

DEVINE: Thank you, Lindsay, it was a pleasure.

CAROLINA LUMETTA: With less than five weeks to go until Election Day, the presidential candidates are keeping their eyes on Pennsylvania…and its 19 electoral votes. Here’s former President Donald Trump at a recent campaign rally.

DONALD TRUMP: We got to take our country back from these horrible people because if we win Pennsylvania, we win the whole thing. It's very simple.

Vice President Kamala Harris is also driving home a sense of urgency.

KAMALA HARRIS: And we know ours will be a tight race until the very end…

Recent statewide polls have Trump and Harris in a dead heat, either evenly tied or with less than one percentage point between them.

LAUREN CRISTELLA: The margin in the last two presidential elections has been about 1% or less. So we're really talking about maybe tens of thousands of Pennsylvanians deciding who the next president is.

Lauren Cristella leads the Philadelphia-based Committee of Seventy. That’s a nonprofit working on voter education and training election workers. In 2020, about half of Pennsylvania voters mailed in their ballots…thanks to a law passed the previous year allowing no-excuse mail-in voting. That law is still on the books, and it could lead to delays counting mail-in ballots this year.

CRISTELLA: And so our election officials aren't allowed to open those ballots until 7 a.m. on election day. And this is why the whole country, if not the whole world, will be waiting in Pennsylvania to know how the election, the presidential election is gonna go because we can’t start that process until 7am, it’s going to take days.

Since the last election, the margin between registered Democrats and Republicans in Pennsylvania has shrunk. Meanwhile, the number of unaffiliated voters is growing. With recent elections decided by 1% of the vote, that unaffiliated group could make all the difference…and not just for the presidential race.

In the 2022 midterms, Democrat John Fetterman flipped Pennsylvania’s Republican Senate seat. That gave Democrats a one-seat majority in the upper chamber. Now Fetterman’s colleague, Senator Bob Casey Jr., is up for reelection.

CASEY: I wanted to talk today about what this race is about. It’s about the work that I’ve done as a United States senator delivering for our commonwealth and delivering in particular for Bucks County.

Casey is vying for a fourth term in the Senate, but polling shows him neck and neck with his Republican opponent, Dave McCormick.

MCCORMICK: Gas is up by almost 50%, groceries are up by 22%, rent is up by 23%...

Both candidates place the economy at the center of their campaigns. Casey pitched his record in Washington during a Kamala Harris rally back in August…

CASEY: I'm leading the fight in Washington against corporate greed calling out “greedflation.”

McCormick on the other hand blames Democratic leadership for high inflation. He’s a former hedge fund CEO, and his campaign is seeking to tie Casey to the Biden administration’s record on the economy.

MCCORMICK: We created a site to help you see this, bobflation.com. [laughs] I want you to check it out. It allows you to calculate how your lives have changed as result of what Bob Casey and Kamala Harris and Joe Biden have done.

In 2022, Donald Trump endorsed TV personality Dr. Mehmet Oz instead of McCormick in the race against John Fetterman. This time, McCormick has the former president’s backing.

TRUMP: David will be a warrior for your Commonwealth. He will be a warrior. Total warrior.

But voters appear gridlocked on opinions of McCormick and Casey. In the latest Monmouth poll, equal shares said they trusted the candidates on both the economy and immigration. Overall, Casey leads McCormick 48 percent to 44 percent, according to The Hill’s poll released yesterday.

NICHOLAS: Anytime you're an incumbent and you're below 50, that's a danger zone … I think Bob Casey, for the first time in his elected lifetime, has a real race on his hands.

Chris Nicholas is a veteran Republican consultant in the state. He expects to see narrow results and challenges in November.

CHRIS NICHOLAS: So in Pennsylvania, we have a law that says if the final margin between two candidates is less than a half of 1%, the state will automatically pay for a recall, a recount if the losing candidate wants it. So I think we could be in a in a season of what I call recount city once we get to the early part of November.

Reporting for WORLD, I’m Carolina Lumetta.

WORLD Radio transcripts are created on a rush deadline. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of WORLD Radio programming is the audio record.