'Feckless dolts': Analysis suggests 'albatross' J.D. Vance signifies larger Trump problem

2024 GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump was clearly in damage-control mode when he defended his running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), during a late July interview with Fox News' Laura Ingraham.

Vance has been drawing widespread criticism for angrily railing against "childless cat ladies" during 2021 and 2022 interviews and saying that Americans who don't have biological children should be "punished" with higher taxes. On Ingraham's show, Trump insisted that Vance doesn't really hate people who don't have kids — he just "loves family" and "feels family is good."

In an article published by The New Republic, journalist Robert Schlesinger argues that "albatross" Vance is symptomatic of a large problem for Trump: the former president's tendency to surround himself with "feckless dolts."

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"Vance has had a rough go since joining the Trump ticket, as the media and Democratic opposition pore through his record, surfacing peculiar policy ideas like higher taxes for childless Americans and more voting power for those with offspring — the two key planks in his agenda to eliminate the national scourge of 'childless cat ladies," Schlesinger explains. "He later clarified that he's 'got nothing against cats,' but remains contemptuous of women without children.…The early polling on Vance certainly suggests he's on course to join Sarah Palin on the short list of genuine albatross selections."

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Schlesinger adds, "CNN's Harry Enten crunched the numbers and found that Vance is the only vice-presidential nominee since at least 1980 to emerge from the nominating convention with net-negative approval ratings. It's gotten so bad for Vance that Republicans, and even Vance's new boss, are openly second-guessing his selection."

Vance, Schlesinger emphasizes, "has become an inescapable reminder that Trump — who built his reality TV profile as the 'You're fired!' guy — has terrible judgment in hiring."

Schlesinger goes on to cite some examples, from former National Security Adviser Mike Flynn to former 2016 campaign manager Paul Manafort.

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"Hitting a PR rough patch is not in itself fatal in Trump World," Schlesinger explains. "It can be a veritable badge of honor. But drawing attention for views odd even in the culture-war right is bad; that Vance is pulling the spotlight from Trump is worse…. If Trump does dump Vance, he will make clear that his latest bad hire has one thing in common with all the others — it wasn't Trump's fault.

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