A political shape-shifter for VP

Opinion editor’s note: Editorials represent the opinions of the Star Tribune Editorial Board, which operates independently from the newsroom.

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Now that former President Donald Trump has chosen Ohio Sen. JD Vance as his running mate, let’s remember why Trump needs a new person to fill this spot.

Mike Pence was Trump’s vice president during Trump’s first term in office, serving ably in what can be a difficult-to-navigate role. There were few, if any, gaffes on the affable Indiana Republican’s part. He didn’t overshadow his boss but also managed to project a calm capability in an administration marked by tumultuous turnover, a remarkable feat.

Pence’s only mistake: not doing Trump’s bidding in a harebrained and dangerous last-ditch effort to overturn the 2020 election. For that, the Jan. 6 insurrectionists threatened to hang him. While Pence’s courage served his nation at a crucial moment, it also apparently disqualified him from serving a second time on the Trump ticket.

Pence’s political exile strongly suggests a key attribute that Trump valued in his second vice presidential pick: personal loyalty, no matter the stakes or circumstances. Vance — a first-term U.S. senator, venture capitalist, author and military veteran — emerged Monday as Trump’s choice from a shortlist that included North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio.

The Star Tribune Editorial Board is disappointed that Burgum wasn’t tapped. Despite our disagreements with him on reproductive health care and other social issues, he has business leadership experience and a lack of bombast that spurred confidence in his capabilities.

A native of Arthur, N.D., (population 328), Burgum is a self-made technology executive who could have left his cold, thinly populated home state for Silicon Valley but commendably chose to enter public service later in life. He’s also a real estate investor who’s helped breathe new life into downtown Fargo, and is well-versed in technology, agricultural, trade and energy policies. His quiet-spoken expertise could have helped blunt Trump’s ill-advised economic proposals, such as a tariff plan that a conservative think tank expert said recently is “economically ignorant, geopolitically dangerous, and politically misguided.”

Vance and Rubio were far-distant second choices, in our opinion, despite both having compelling life stories. Vance detailed his family’s Appalachian roots and dysfunction in the bestselling book “Hillbilly Elegy.” Rubio is the son of Cuban immigrants, with his father having worked as a bartender and his mother as a maid.

Despite these highly public life narratives, there are deeply unsettling questions about who they are and what they stand for. Both Vance and Rubio are political shape-shifters who opposed Trump in 2016 but morphed into sycophants. Because Vance won the VP nod, the focus should be on his journey to this dubious reality.

According to a 2021 Politico story, Vance told interviewer Charlie Rose in 2016 that “I’m a Never Trump guy. I never liked him.” Vance also publicly called Trump “noxious” and “reprehensible,” according to the same story, and once tweeted “My god what an idiot” about the former president.

While political views can change, going from opinions as strong as that to joining the Trump ticket is remarkable. Nor are Vance’s changing stances limited to Trump. He’s also swapped positions on important policies when it’s politically convenient.

An example from a July 12 article published in The Hill: “During his campaign for Senate, Vance applauded the overturning of Roe v. Wade and supported Texas’s ban on abortion, which does not allow exceptions other than cases where the mother’s life is at risk,” The Hill reported, and quoted Vance as saying “Two wrongs don’t make a right” in 2021.

Now, however, Vance’s position echoes Trump’s: “Vance has more recently praised and echoed Trump’s position that states can make their own abortion laws, and said he’s always believed that there needs to be exceptions for rape, incest and the mother’s life,” according to The Hill.

Stances that have remained a constant are also deeply problematic. Vance has an especially disturbing position on aid for Ukraine, the nation invaded by Russian dictator Vladimir Putin. “Vance entered the Senate … as one of only a handful of Republicans who openly opposed U.S. financial support for Ukraine,” according to Politico. During a 2022 interview with right-wing political operative Steve Bannon, Vance reportedly said: “I gotta be honest with you, I don’t really care what happens to Ukraine one way or another.”

Throwing Ukraine to the wolves is a position mindbogglingly out of sync with this nation’s long history of protecting democracy from empire-minded authoritarians. Putin needs to be stopped, not aided and abetted. Shockingly, Vance told Politico that he considers undermining U.S. aid to Ukraine among his most significant early accomplishments in the U.S. Senate.

Perhaps the most discomforting detail about Vance is this: When asked by an interviewer in early February, “what he would have done if he had been vice president on Jan. 6, Vance said in no uncertain terms that he would have done what Trump had asked and demanded that contested states submit alternative slates of electors to the House of Representatives,” Politico reported in March.

Vance should be pressed about this repeatedly in the upcoming campaign. In the Ohio senator, Trump appears to have found someone whose loyalties lie not with the nation, but with Trump himself. Vance’s addition to the ticket inspires little confidence and further deepens concerns about our democracy’s future.