The Sunday Story: Let The Veepstakes Begin

in November to decide who will be our next president. But after just two primaries, Republicans

seem to have made their choice. Former President Donald Trump. And that's because he's winning

pretty decisively and there just doesn't seem to be a path for any other candidate, i.e.

Nikki Haley, who's the only one left in the race. And, you know, anything can happen.

I always have to say that. But it looks like former President Donald Trump will most likely

get the GOP nomination. Now attention is turning to the next big mystery of this campaign season.

And that's who Trump is going to pick to be his vice president. I'm Aisha Roscoe and this

is The Sunday Story. Today, we're turning to our colleagues on NPR's Politics Podcast

for a little insight. Here we go.

and getting a beer with me, Mara, and Sarah, because today we're talking veepstakes.

The presidential primary is not over, but for most Republicans, it is. Donald Trump

is the likely nominee and he's already indicated that he knows who his running mate will be.

We of course have no idea who it's going to be here on the NPR Politics Podcast, but we

non-alcoholic cocktail, and let's get into it. So Mara, what are generally the calculations

that a nominee puts into deciding who their running mate should be?

bring a constituency or a state to a ticket. Sometimes candidates looked at it in a completely

opposite way. Remember, Bill Clinton picked Al Gore, another young, centrist Democrat

from the middle of the country, Arkansas and Tennessee. He wanted to reinforce his brand

as a kind of new generation, new Democrat politician. But most of the time, candidates

pick a VP to either make up for some deficiency that they have or to reach a constituency

that they don't feel confident in getting.

seen as making up for the deficiency that he might have with the evangelical base or

with people that were concerned about his socially conservative credentials. I don't

think that that part of the base has those concerns about Donald Trump anymore. He doesn't

have to worry about base support.

both right around 80 years old. And so whoever their VPs are, we know who President Biden's

is. But whoever Trump's pick is could very likely, if Trump is elected, have to step

in in some capacity. So that's on people's minds. So he might want someone younger.

Even a lot of Republican voters express concerns about his temperament. They say they kind

of like it, but they also are concerned about it sometimes. So he may be under pressure

to pick someone with a track record that suggests more stability or moderation. But that, of

course, is assuming he would bend to that pressure, which I would not assume, you know,

to remedy someone's deficiencies. You have to convince them that they have those deficiencies.

So I'm sure those conversations with political advisors are interesting. He is, of course,

an older white male. Now, that's not something Republicans are as inclined to be worried

about. But he does like to claim that his policies are good for women, good for people

of color. And picking a candidate based on those criteria might insulate him from some

of the criticism around those issues and also, you know, at least help him make the argument

to general election voters that he cares about women or people of color.

has no problems with his base or evangelicals. But the New Hampshire exit polls showed that

he does have problems with independents and moderates. And he did very poorly among those.

He did great among regular Republicans. So the question I have is, you know, Donald Trump

often acts as if he believes in the political version of the cable news business model,

which means you don't have to have a large audience or even an expanding audience. You

just have to get the people that are your audience to watch you 24-7. In other words,

he always seemed to value intensity and devotion among his base, trying to get more voters.

And if that's what he believes, that it's all about getting a really enthusiastic group

of supporters, then maybe he would go for somebody that is just as MAGA as him.

which really set the tone that he's on the march to the nomination. But there was a lot

in New Hampshire that suggested big red flags for a general electorate. And the question

I also have with Trump is that, you know, traditionally, you win the nomination and

you appeal to a broader part of the electorate. He doesn't seem like a candidate that is particularly

well-positioned to do that.

specifically with, like, suburban women or people that... The point that Nikki Haley

has made in the primary race, that it's just chaos. And that was the thing we heard a lot

about Trump in 2020 for people at turn-on. They were tired of the chaos, a stabilizing

force potentially on the ticket. But whether you can sell that to voters is a big question

mark.

less and less. It's hard for me to think of a vice president recently who actually

brought a state. And also, Trump is such a dominating character. And he is the definition

now of the Republican Party that I can't imagine that his vice president would make a huge

amount of difference.

I had with kind of a low-level Trump advisor during the 2016 campaign cycle, who said,

you know, most candidates appeal to the middle and then sort of bring in the fringes. Trump

appealed to the fringes and brought in the middle. And so, you know, I think the question

is, is he willing to try to appeal to the middle with his vice presidential pick?

direction is that he still maintains, and as recently as his victory speech in New Hampshire

earlier this week, that the election was stolen. He falsely claimed that he won millions

more votes. He still campaigns as if he were the legitimately elected president of the

United States. He was not. But in order to appeal to that middle, that people are tired

of the chaos, people are tired of that part of Trumpism, you'd almost have to pick a vice

president who could go out there and say that Joe Biden was the duly elected president of

the United States in 2020. And I don't see a world in which Donald Trump wants to campaign

with somebody who would say that.

think the way that a lot of Republicans are navigating this is to sort of, yes, sort of

check the box and say, yes, I accept the results of the 2020 election, but still to sort of

cast doubt on on the system or the process or to say, you know, something I hear from

both politicians and a lot of voters is this idea that, well, something was off and a sort

of vague idea that something was off, even though review after review, we cannot say

enough has confirmed, including reviews by Republican election officials, that the results

were valid and there was no significant anomaly in the voting. But I think this idea that

just there must be something going wrong here somewhere is this vague idea that Republican

voters have. And I think that politicians can get away with Republican politicians can

get away with saying that to sort of speak to that gut feeling that a lot of voters have

without outright denying the results of the election.

names in the beefsteaks.

And we're back, and Sarah, let's talk about some of the names that could likely be on

a Trump running mate list. I think one of the places that nominees tend to look to,

at least historically, is their field of rivals from the primary campaign. So who among

there might stand out on this list?

New Hampshire. We saw two of his former rivals, Vivek Ramaswamy and South Carolina Senator

Tim Scott, standing there with him. They've endorsed him, as has Florida Governor Ron

DeSantis, who was not there that night. And they certainly seem to want the job, especially

if you listen to Tim Scott and the way he interacted with Trump.

No, that's why he's a great politician.

there was a vacancy in the Senate. It sure sounds like he wants the job based on the

way he and Trump were talking about Haley.

in that moment. If there was any doubt Tim Scott is auditioning for vice president, it

seemed pretty clear the night in New Hampshire. But, Mara, that does raise the question of

Nikki Haley because, look, she seems to fit the bill of everything we just discussed.

She appeals more to independence to women and to the center. She doesn't deny that Joe

Biden was lawfully elected the president of the United States. And she represents a wing

of the party that has soured on Donald Trump. But these two people don't seem to like each

other very much.

ticket with Donald Trump and he wins, that is about one of the fastest routes to possibly

becoming president because he cannot serve a second term. So I think any ambitious politician,

especially in the Trump Republican Party, would find a way to grovel or kiss the ring

as Trump sometimes says, bend the knee and get on the ticket.

Right now, there seems to be a lot of animus. Trump even accused her of giving a victory

speech when she lost. Hmm. Who else has done that? But, yeah, it seems kind of far-fetched,

although on paper and according to all the old historical rules, she would be the perfect

vice presidential pick because she does bring him something. She brings him something that

he doesn't have now, which is strong support among independents, moderate Republicans.

wiggle room here or has she carved out a place, like I think of former Governor Ron DeSantis,

just doesn't seem like he's going to be any potential vice presidential list for many,

many reasons. But has she acknowledged this possibility? Does she talk it up or down in

any way?

in the sense that she's going after both Trump and Biden in the same breath and in pretty

much every campaign speech. I mean, her whole pitch right now is that she's a quote unquote

better choice than either Trump or Joe Biden and also that she could beat Joe Biden. So

she's really trying to sell herself to moderate voters in the Republican Party who don't want

Trump and also to appeal to people who may be uneasy about Biden for whatever reason.

So yeah, I think she's given herself room in the sense that, yes, she's attacked Trump,

but she's not just attacking Trump. She's also said that she would ultimately support

him if he's the nominee, even if he were convicted of a crime. So she said that. My bigger question,

Sue, is if Trump would ever warm back up to her because he's clearly angry, as Mara was

just saying. Trump recently said that people who donate to Nikki Haley's campaign would

be permanently barred from MAGA world, essentially. Nikki Haley seems to be leaning into that.

Her campaign just tweeted out a picture of a T-shirt that says barred permanently and

says get yours now. So they're having fun with that.

the nominee has to kind of like the person that's their running mate. It has to be a

least part of the rationale why Hillary Clinton tapped Virginia Governor Tim Kaine in 2016.

She just said she really liked him on a personal level. I think that was true between Barack

Obama and Joe Biden back in 2008. And who knows, right? Who knows how he feels about

her if he could change his mind. Although he also, Mara, tends to make decisions if

he thinks it's politically beneficial for him.

beneficial for him. She's a woman. She's a person of color. She brings these disaffected

Republicans perhaps back into the fold. There are a lot of reasons to pick her. She would

have to show him, of course, you know, he does have these auditions. Remember, Mitt

Romney had a particularly humiliating one. She'd have to show him that she was ready

to, as he puts it, bend the knee and maybe, you know, go back on a lot of the criticism

she made of him and be a good deferential vice president.

Hill. And I would say that if you were putting names out there, a couple of names come to

mind specifically. Obviously, we referenced Tim Scott in the Senate, but in the House,

Nancy Mace, a Republican from South Carolina, is someone whose name gets thrown out there.

And also Elise Stefanik, a Republican from New York, a member of House Party leadership

and someone who has very methodically and very diligently worked to establish herself

as one of Trump's strongest allies on Capitol Hill.

I'm proud to be the first member of Congress to have endorsed President Trump for re-election,

the first. And I would be honored to serve in a Trump administration in any capacity.

seems to be campaigning for the job pretty openly.

president is I do think that Republicans want to put up a strong candidate for two reasons.

One, Donald Trump is a one-term president if he runs again. So whoever he picks as vice

president is going to be seen as a likely 2028 nominee. And that person is going to

be going up against potentially in debate. We don't know if there will be debates, but

if there is a debate against Vice President Kamala Harris.

And there is a real hunger among Republicans to not just campaign against Joe Biden, but

to campaign against Kamala Harris as sort of the de facto president. And I think you

can see the argument for putting up a woman, someone who has a bit of an attack dog reputation,

I think Trump has called her a killer, which is one of the finest compliments he can pay

a politician. And I think the Kamala Harris factor should be noted here.

I think you can expect to hear them do it a lot more, how about on a daily basis, is

that because Joe Biden is 81, because he's called himself a transitional figure, that

they will be saying Kamala Harris is the real nominee, the real candidate, because Biden

will not serve out his full term and she will become the president. Therefore, she's

the real nominee.

needing to be pro-Trump enough, but not too pro-Trump, and justifying her support for

him by saying she doesn't want Kamala Harris as the president.

A Trump nomination is a Biden win and a Kamala Harris presidency.

wiggle room if it's someone we don't mention at all in this conversation, I think there

is room in this political moment and for Trump for sort of a wild card pick in that the driving

force of his campaign is that he needs to shake up Washington, that Washington needs

to be broken up, that he is the ultimate outsider, that he's disruption to the norm.

And picking a governor, a senator, a House member just feels so typical politics as usual.

I personally am doubtful that Trump thinks that he needs a strong running mate.

I think that Trump thinks he's a strong nominee.

So the ability to pick someone from maybe the business world or someone from a military

background or somebody we're not really thinking about seems more possible in this political

moment than it has to be in past elections, where it always seemed pretty clear the universe

of people that it was going to be.

He's younger.

He's also a person of color and his background is from the business world and he's also clearly

looking like he wants to be close to Trump.

But what's interesting is, first of all, I doubt Trump would pick anybody who was a bigger

celebrity than him or had the potential to overshadow him.

But remember, he made a lot of picks just the way Sue was describing.

Tillerson, Mattis, you know, he picked people that he thought from the business world, military

people, and they all didn't work out so well.

Well, this is probably the first of many veepstakes conversations because historically, the nominee

announces their vice president right around the nominating conventions in the summertime.

But again, with Trump, you never know.

It could be any day now.

That is it for us today.

I'm Susan Davis.

I cover politics.

I cover the presidential campaign.