JD Vance will never be the GOP Obama

JD Vance sees himself in a former president. In a recent on-stage conversation about his memoir “Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith,” the vice president was apparently inspired when talking about how this politician was a “political genius” and “peacemaker” who pulled America out of an unpopular war. “Young senator, writes some bestselling books,” he said, ticking off a number of shared qualities. “It kinda sounds like JD Vance.”

The vice president was talking about Richard Nixon. But it’s understandable if readers first imagined the face of Barack Obama. As Vance gears up to run for president in 2028, he’s clearly trying to position himself as the GOP’s answer to the 44th president, who remains the most popular political figure in the country.

Vance will likely never say this out loud. It’s possible, though unlikely, that he’s unconscious of it. But following his recent book tour, it’s hard to ignore how much the vice president fancies himself to have the charisma, demeanor and even the wife required to be the GOP’s answer to Obama. 

Vance’s public arrogance certainly suggests he believes himself equal to the former president in both intellect and charm. In this, he’s utterly deluded, nor it is it clear that Republican voters, despite the persistent bitterness over Obama’s continued popularity, would even want a candidate who possesses these traits. Vance may well end up bumbling his way into the Republican nomination, giving him a real shot at the White House, but it would only be because the GOP has a dearth of contenders to replace Donald Trump.

Between his camera-hogging and social media addiction, Vance is ubiquitous. This serves to conceal how thinness of his political resume. Besides his victory as Trump’s running mate, he has won only a single election: the 2022 Ohio Senate race, an easy victory in a mostly-red state. He skipped the line of career politicians, not by beguiling ordinary Republican voters, who aren’t impressed with Ivy League degrees or his tendency to pontificate like a wannabe philosopher-king instead of a baby-kissing politico. It was because of money from tech billionaire investor Peter Thiel and other Silicon Valley types who seem to equate being rich with being learned. 

For tech bosses like Thiel, having a Barack Obama of their very own is an appealing prospect. On paper, Vance seems to check all the boxes. Humble background but an Ivy League education? Check. Gorgeous, accomplished wife who was induced to set her career aside for her husband’s ambitions? Check. A talented wordsmith who writes his own books, and with a bestselling memoir penned before he considered running for office? Check. Youth appeal, down to listening to actual pop music and an agility with 21st century slang? Check. 

Sadly for Vance, in politics, as in art and sex, it’s less about your stat block and more about your ability to execute. Like any cheap knock-off, with Vance the ruse becomes clear at even a cursory examination. The vice president’s long list of Obama-esque attributes read like ill-fated attempts at parody in the real world.  

When it was published in 2016, Vance’s first book, “Hillbilly Elegy,” got a similar glowing reception to the one Obama received when his debut, “Dreams from My Father,” was published in 1995. Although both authors were only 32, they had lived unusual enough lives to justify memoirs. But while Obama’s tome remains beloved for its nuance and grace, Vance’s book has soured with time as many critics and readers come to recognize the shallow Appalachian stereotypes and conservative agenda it contains. “Hillbilly Elegy” was turned into a 2020 film by Ron Howard, but it is mostly remembered as an embarrassment. 

The contrasts become worse in looking at Vance and Obama’s second books, both of which were more obviously written with an eye toward running for higher office. Obama’s “The Audacity of Hope,” released in 2006 less than four months before he announced his candidacy for president, is an exemplar of the form, with authentic autobiographical details that remind readers the book was not primarily the work of a ghostwriter. Vance’s “Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith,” released in June, has mostly raised questions about whether the vice president cares for anything but his own ambition. His high-minded rhetoric about his conversion to Catholicism sounds hollow in light of his willingness to spread racist lies about immigrants and rebuke Pope Leo for opposing war. In a passage a more compassionate editor might have removed, Vance reveals the higher power he seems to actually worship. Of hearing Thiel speak for the first time in 2011, Vance writes he saw the man who would become his patron as “[p]ossibly the smartest person I’d ever met.” 

Obama endeared himself to voters, especially younger ones, by coming off as the cool college professor who manages to sound erudite without being condescending. A former community organizer, he used youthful slang and pop culture references with the same ease he played pick-up basketball games. Vance’s efforts to seem hip come across as forced, as if he has never met a fellow millennial and can only approximate their lingo and cadence from reading old magazine reviews of movies like “Clueless.” 

When it comes to relatability and authenticity, perhaps no better example of the differences between the two men can be seen in their marriages. Both have beautiful wives with impressive careers of their own. Michelle Obama and Usha Vance were arguably more accomplished than their husbands were at the start of their political careers. Both women were openly wistful about having to leave that behind for one spent supporting their husbands in Washington, D.C.

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The difference is that the Obamas appear to like each other and, especially in the early years of his presidency, had palpable chemistry that induced romantic fantasies. The Vances, however, can’t seem to shake off suspicions that they loathe each other, no matter how many smiles they flash at the camera. It doesn’t help that the vice presidents constantly runs down his wife in speeches, comments he tries to play off as jokes, but which are too hard-edged to sell as jovial. 

Vance has admittedly been getting better in interviews and speeches in recent months. He managed to get through his entire book tour, including a stint on “The View,” without clips of his awkward behavior going viral. That may seem like a low bar, but this is the man whose time on the campaign trail in 2024 is mostly remembered for his angry “cat lady” obsession and an unfortunate incident in which he attempted to seem normal (and failed) while ordering donuts.

Vance will never have Obama’s easy charm. But if he keeps practicing, he might start being read by Republican voters as person-shaped enough to shrug his way into the nomination. 

Ultimately, Vance has erred in a way Obama was smart enough to avoid. The vice president tied himself to another politician whose stink rubs off on everyone around him. Obama’s political talents helped him rise quickly through the Democratic ranks, but his best asset was that he was able to plausibly run as an anti-war candidate, while his opponent for the 2008 Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton, couldn’t escape her early support for the Iraq War.

Nearly two decades later, the public is yearning even more for an outsider uncorrupted by the failings of the Washington political establishment. Vance, however, didn’t have the foresight to see what should have been obvious: that Trump would make easily avoidable mistakes, like the Iran war, which has resulted in historic disapproval numbers that could well taint everyone who associates with him.

No amount of slang or smug chuckling will be able to get Trump’s stank off the vice president.