MSNBC's Joe Scarborough said Donald Trump must be eating his heart out after watching his running mate outperform him in the vice presidential debate.
J.D. Vance entered his debate against Tim Walz with historically bad favorability ratings, but the "Morning Joe" host was impressed by his face-off and said he appeared much younger and more capable than Trump had last month during his debate against Vice President Kamala Harris.
"You had J.D. Vance, you had the elitist, the guy who went to an Ivy League school and smoothly, knew to answer the questions smoothly, and knew how to work the format," Scarborough said. "I think most people would say he did much better last night stylistically. You never know how things will come across. When I saw the CNN poll that came out last night, it showed that 'Midwestern nice' really worked for Walz. Tim Walz's favorability jumped up 15 points, has a 59 percent favorability rating after the debate, a 22 percent favorability before the debate. I don't care where are you, you have to look at the numbers."
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"There's something viewers liked, that undecided voters and registered voters liked, about Tim Walz," he added.
Vance, on the other hand, entered with a minus-11 favorability rating but cut that to minus-three, and Scarborough was surprised by his performance.
"He showed a side he has not shown before and that is he tried to be more likable, he tried to be more agreeable," Scarborough said. "The people who knew him before he decided to be a Trumper said he was a nice guy, a charming guy, and he tried to show more of that last night because it's almost as if he got a sense that this election may end and he doesn't want to completely tie himself to Donald Trump. He's 40 years old, he has a future. While Trump likes going to war nonstop against everybody, you got to say J.D. Vance decided, 'You know what? I'm going to try to salvage my political career, even if Donald Trump goes up in flames.'"
"No doubt this morning, there's going to be be consternation in Mar-a-Lago because everybody is saying J.D. Vance should talk to the rest of the campaign and Donald Trump should shut up," Scarborough said, "because J.D. Vance is so much better at this than Donald Trump. It's not even a close call."
Contributor Donny Deutsch followed up a few minutes later, saying that Trump no doubt would be troubled by the chatter around the breakfast buffet at his private resort.
"This morning in Mar-a-Lago, what's going on is people are going up, as they're getting their Danish and Bundt cake at Mar-a-Lago, saying, 'Vance was great last night, wasn't Vance great?' " Deutsch said. "That's going to bother him, that's going to really bother him that he was better than Donald Trump, that he could litigate the case better than Donald Trump."
"He's going to be very dismissive of J.D. Vance in the coming weeks," Deutsch added, "but Donald Trump is not happy with himself because J.D. Vance showed himself to be a better candidate."
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