The Vice-Presidential debate is in the books.
It provided a clear verdict as to who came out on top.
And a famous pollster revealed J.D. Vance won over these key voters.
J.D. Vance uses the debate to sell himself to voters
Ever since Donald Trump named J.D. Vance as his running mate, the media began smearing him as “weird,” a “creep,” and a “misogynist.”
The lies and hit pieces helped drive down Vance’s approval numbers with the general public.
That’s why the debate turned into such an eye opening performance.
Right off the bat, Vance used his first answer to reintroduce himself to the public, leaning into the biography that made his Hillbilly Elegy book a bestseller and Netflix movie.
Vance recounted the compelling details about his upbringings in a house where his mother battled opioid addiction and his father left.
JD Vance introduces himself in his opening statement of the vice presidential debate.
“I know that a lot of you are worried about the chaos in the world and the feeling that the American dream is unattainable.” pic.twitter.com/5YQvYiXywt
— The Daily Signal (@DailySignal) October 2, 2024
Vance also repeatedly talked about his three daughters in warm, fatherly terms that undercut all the memes on social media and biased coverage in the press about how Vance is the leader of some new Right incel movement out to send women back to 1950.
From that point on, Vance would pivot every answer to lambaste Kamala Harris’ responsibility for the open border, surging inflation, and chaos in foreign affairs.
Pollster tells CNN that swing voters praised J.D. Vance
Pollster Frank Luntz appeared on CNN and told Sara Sidner that Vance came out of the debate looking like a million bucks.
Luntz explained that the Vance who showed up at the debate stage – an affable, well informed and polished communicator – ran counter to the picture the media painted of Vance.
“In terms of Vance, they were shocked that the Vance that they’ve seen up to this point was not the JD Vance of last night: measured, thoughtful, emotional, willing to agree with his opponent, not divisive,” Luntz began.
The dominant takeaway from across the political spectrum was that Vance emerged as the best salesman for the Trump Presidency and Trump agenda, and that included Donald Trump.
“The language that they used to describe him tells me that he has been misused on the campaign so far, that he would be far better communicating Donald Trump’s agenda, and vision, and purpose than the attack dog kind of strategy that they’ve been using up to now,” Luntz added.
Luntz said 12 of the 14 voters in his focus group picked Vance as the winner of the group, which Luntz said was one of the most overwhelming wins by a candidate in a debate over the course of his professional career.
“I have to tell you, only twice in my career have I had such an overwhelming movement towards one candidate,” Luntz said to Sidner. “That’s how significant yesterday was, not that they were critical about Governor Walz, that they were so shocked at how emotive Senator Vance was.”
Vance won the debate on substance.
But the key to Vance’s performance, according to Luntz, was Vance’s presentation.
Luntz said members of his focus groups described Vance as “battle-tested,” “very intelligent,” “in control,” “sincere,” and “authentic.”
A CNN poll after the debate found that 51 percent of viewers listed Vance as the winner of the debate.
That same CNN poll also found Vance improving his favorable numbers by 19 points.
Vance didn’t win the debate so much by what he said, but how he said it.
