More detailed policies and fewer made-for-TV zingers during Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate offered less opportunity for members of Congress to go after Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) or Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) immediately. 

The candidates’ Midwestern niceness and civil rhetoric underscored a contrast with the more tense and bombastic showing on display just weeks earlier between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump.