The Brutal Tim Walz Tactical Error That Cost Him the Debate

Americans hate Sen. J.D. Vance. All sorts of polling shows it in all sorts of ways. Vance sports a favorability rating of negative 11 points, according to recent polling from CNN, a historically terrible figure. (The lowest vice presidential candidate favorability in the modern era prior to Vance went to Dan Quayle, who in 1988 notched a minus three). According to a different, recent poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, half of registered voters have a somewhat or very unfavorable view of Vance, a number that has tracked steadily up the more voters have heard from him.

Those very same polls show the Democratic vice presidential candidate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, on the opposite end of the spectrum. Between Vance, Vice President Kamala Harris, and former President Donald Trump, Walz is routinely the most liked of the four. The aforementioned CNN polling has his favorability at plus four points.

This would seemingly make for a very obvious debate strategy: point out all the things that make Vance so reviled at every possible opportunity, hammer Vance for his unpopular policies, and be merciless with his less-than-winning personality.

Instead, Walz did the opposite. In 90 minutes debating Vance, the phrase that Walz uttered seemingly more than any other was some version of agreement with Vance’s perspective and policy: “I agree with a lot of what Sen. Vance said”; “I’m in agreement with him on this”; “I don’t think Sen. Vance and I are that far apart.”

Walz, perhaps, was trying to introduce some Minnesota Nice onto the debate stage. But the effect was jarring, and a head-scratcher strategically.

On housing, Walz was quick to apply the seal of agreement with Vance. On the child tax credit, and various pro-family policies like paid leave, he claimed that he and Vance shared the same basic vision. On economic policy, he saw it like Vance. On immigration, they had some things in common. Most shockingly, he claimed that he and Vance were not that far apart on gun control, an issue that Vance has handled so poorly that it created its own crisis cycle for the Trump-Vance campaign when he recently called school shootings a “fact of life.”

One of Democrats’ greatest advantages in this election cycle is Vance’s brutal and historic unpopularity in the eyes of American voters. His addition to the Trump ticket has been an out-and-out millstone around the neck of the former president.

And yet Walz repeatedly insisted throughout the debate that he and Vance weren’t so different after all. He assured potential voters that he and Vance shared the same feeling of heartbreak and empathy on issues like school shootings, while almost nothing in Vance’s policy record or public comments indicate such. (Vance also said more than once that he agreed with Walz, though it is obvious why he would do that, especially when he was trying to evade scrutiny for some of his most objectionable positions.)

That approach from Walz made the governor seem defensive, despite entering the event with about as lopsided an advantage as one could imagine in such a polarized political environment.

And that dubious tactic was bad for another reason, too: Each time Walz said he agreed with something Vance said—be it a diagnosis of a political problem or a policy prescription—Vance immediately came across sounding as though he actually held a moderate position on the issue in question.

Of course, Vance is anything but a moderate. He’s far, far to the right on a number of issues, so much so that he’s struggled even running in favorable Republican environments, like the 2022 Ohio Senate race, which Vance won by just 6 points despite the Republican governor winning his race by 25 points.

Vance’s unpopularity is in large part due to his embrace of out-there positions. Democrats have worked tirelessly to keep up that assessment of him as an extremist. Look no further than this messaging guidance from the national party in late August: “More Evidence That JD Vance Is Too Extreme to Lead.”

The one person who seemed to miss that memo was Tim Walz, who spent the night somehow avoiding opportunities to attack the most loathed vice presidential candidate in modern American history. Instead, he went to great lengths to make Vance seem like a potential hunting pal.

That was not lost on those watching. According to a group of undecided voters from Michigan gathered by CNN, they left the debate thinking better of both candidates. Given how little voters thought of Vance before this debate, that is a clear net loss for Harris-Walz. Indeed, in CNN’s instant poll of voters following the debate, Vance eked out a victory 51–49. But more tellingly, 54 percent of voters going into the night had expected Walz to win compared with just 45 percent for Vance. That is, in no uncertain terms, an unequivocal loss for the Harris-Walz ticket, and a massive missed opportunity with only a month left to go.

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