JD Vance failed to reject Trump’s lies about the 2020 election. He can’t be trusted to protect democracy.
But there was only one question on which the vice presidency—the job for which these two men are competing—really matters. That question was whether they would certify the results of the next presidential election. And on that subject, Vance gave a non-answer that instantly disqualifies him: He refused to acknowledge that Donald Trump lost the 2020 election.
In February, Vance went on ABC’s This Week and made it clear that unlike Mike Pence, he would have collaborated in Trump’s scheme to block the certification of electoral votes on January 6, 2021.
Three months later, in an interview with Ross Douthat of the New York Times, Vance defended Trump’s scheme and explained how a vice president could have executed it.
Vance dismissed the argument that courts had already rejected Trump’s allegations of election fraud.
When Douthat suggested that pursuing Trump’s scheme “would have pushed America into a crisis,” Vance refused to concede that the scheme was illegal.
In short, Vance made it clear that he believed 1) Congress could second-guess and override election results submitted by states; 2) politicians, not judges, should decide these matters; and 3) any scheme could be rendered presumptively constitutional by inventing a new interpretation of the Constitution. As a Yale Law grad, he surely knows better.
In February, Vance reaffirmed that position. On This Week, he declared that some Supreme Court rulings constraining presidential power could be rejected as “illegitimate.”
THIS IS WHY THE FINAL EXCHANGE of Tuesday’s debate is so important. Vance was given an opportunity to dispel concerns that he would use the vice presidency to overturn another election. He declined that opportunity. In fact, he refused to admit that Trump lost the 2020 election.
In the final minutes of Tuesday’s debate, Walz asked Vance a simple question about Trump: “Did he lose the 2020 election?”
Vance refused to answer. “I’m focused on the future,” he replied. He changed the subject: “Did Kamala Harris censor Americans from speaking their mind in the wake of the 2020 COVID situation?”
“That is a damning non-answer,” said Walz.