FARMVILLE, Va. — Mike Pence on Tuesday offered the Republican Party a glimmer of what 2016 might have looked like had they nominated a conventional candidate to face Hillary Clinton.
The Indiana governor, in his only vice presidential debate, was everything Donald Trump was not in the first debate with Hillary Clinton and generally has not been on the campaign trail since the general election began: calm and in command; courteous but firm. Trump’s thin-skinned bombast and unorthodox style were a hit in the GOP primary, but are why he trails a flawed Democrat with five weeks to go.
Trump still has time to turn things around, beginning Sunday evening in St. Louis, when he and Clinton meet for their second debate, this one in town hall style. But if Trump wasn’t under enough pressure to improve over his disastrous first faceoff, Pence’s sterling performance against Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine only ups the ante.
Falling short of the standard Pence has set for debating just a few days after Republican voters saw what was possible could leave them dispirited — especially those rank-and-file who are not part of Trump’s base but have come around to him reluctantly out of party loyalty or dislike of Clinton.
The problem for the New York businessman is that it was unclear that he or his team had a plan to improve his game, even as they celebrated Tuesday evening on the tiny campus of Longwood University and enjoyed a much-needed shot in the arm.
“Mr. Trump is very good at focusing on debate prep. He is looking forward to the next debate and I think Hillary Clinton is going to have her work cut out for her again. We did well in our last debate,” David Bossie, Trump’s deputy campaign manager, told reporters in the spin room following the vice presidential debate.
“Donald Trump was effective in the [first] debate,” Bossie added. “He is not a career politician and that’s really what showed.”
Pence’s winning performance was built partly on style; he was more likable than Kaine and refused to let his Democrat opponent bait him into discussions that would be politically advantageous. In CNN’s snap poll, Pence beat Kaine 48 percent to 42 percent.
But that meant that Pence took a pass on directly defending Trump when Kaine raised the issues on which the GOP is most vulnerable, while also choosing to completely mis-state Trump’s positions, particularly on foreign policy.
The Clinton campaign moved to exploit Pence’s strategy immediately following the vice presidential debate — either by pointing out their differences on key issues or charging that Trump is so extreme, even his running mate declined to stick up for him.
“I think he was smooth,” Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta conceded. “But I think he had a job to do, which is to try to reassure people that Donald Trump is fit to be president and he never really tried to do that.”
Pence raised eyebrows when he made the standard Republican case for U.S. foreign policy regarding Russia. Pence said the U.S. needs to confront strongman Vladimir Putin and reassert U.S. influence abroad after years of allowing Moscow to gain the upper hand.
The problem is that Pence’s Russia policy is diametrically opposed to Trump’s Russia policy. Trump has praised Putin as a strong leader, suggested the U.S. might not confront Russin aggression in Europe even if Washington was bound to do so under NATO, and indicated his approval of Russia’s invasion and annexation of portions of Ukraine.
Ditto Pence’s Syria policy. The governor suggested support for U.S. military intervention in Syria for humanitarian reasons; again, a proposal Trump opposes.
On both counts, Pence claimed that he and Trump were in lockstep and that the nominee had simply been misunderstood. But even Trump’s campaign had trouble explaining what the nominee’s position was in light of Pence’s statements during the debate.
“I think Mr. Trump has been very clear on where he stands when it comes to Syria, and while I appreciate your efforts to create a divide between the two, we have a very unified ticket,” Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller said. “Mr. Trump has been very clear in not wanting to get involved in the Syrian civil war.”
Trump could face uncomfortable questions about these issues from Clinton, and exactly who is running the show in his campaign, in the next debate. Yet another challenge for a candidate that has his share and doesn’t have much time to make the necessary improvements.
