Can a Vice President Harm a Reelection Campaign?

Nikki Haley is not going to win any awards for subtlety when it comes to raising doubts about the president’s reelection bid.

In speaking about Joe Biden’s age last month, Haley said: “I think that we can all be very clear and say with a matter of fact that if you vote for Joe Biden you really are counting on a President Harris, because the idea that he would make it until 86 years old is not something that I think is likely.”

She’s not the only Republican to go after Vice President Kamala Harris. After calling Biden “142 years old,” Sen. Ted Cruz ridiculed the notion of Harris confronting Chinese President Xi Jinping or Russian President Vladimir Putin in the event that she is elevated to the presidency.

It’s the specter of Biden’s age — the actuarial data that looms over his candidacy — that throws the “Harris” question onto center stage. There’s no question the vice president will face serious scrutiny in 2024, and fairly or not, she’s struggled to win over Washington and much of the public. Particularly if the GOP sees Harris as a weaker figure than Biden, the attacks on her as a potential president will only increase.

There are reasons to doubt the Biden campaign will be able to fend off such an assault, but it can look to at least one comforting fact: Throughout American history, attempts to make a running mate the target of a presidential election have usually been ineffective.

You can find an example — one that shows how dramatically the question of age has shifted — by going back to 1956. President Dwight Eisenhower had suffered a serious heart attack in 1955, and for months it was unclear if he’d seek a second term the following year. After he announced his reelection bid, the New York Times noted: “Because of his age — he will be 66 in October during the campaign — Mr. Eisenhower had pointed out, even before his heart attack, that no president ever had lived to be 70 while still in the White House.” (That’s right, the idea of a 66-year-old president was a bit unsettling back then.)

For Democrats, that meant the polarizing vice president, Richard Nixon, was a more tempting target than the grandfatherly general who won World War II. It’s why Democratic National Committee Chair Paul Butler said the campaign would “focus our guns” on Nixon because “the American people have a sense of sportsmanship and decency that does not seem to fit in with Mr. Nixon’s record.” (Four years earlier, allegations he had a “slush fund” of donor money had threatened Nixon’s place on the ticket until a nationally televised speech saved his career and made “Checkers” the most famous political dog since FDR’s Fala.)

The Democrats’ anti-Nixon focus was so effective in 1956 that the Eisenhower-Nixon ticket was held to a mere 457 electoral votes and 15-point popular vote win.

It was hardly the last time a campaign sought to make an issue of a vice presidential candidate’s fitness for office. In 1968, when Nixon running mate Spiro Agnew began inserting his foot in his mouth on repeated occasions, Hubert Humphrey’s campaign aired a TV ad where the words “Agnew for Vice President?” were shown accompanied by hysterical laughter. “It would be funny if it weren’t so serious,” the ad concluded. Nixon and Agnew won, albeit narrowly.

Dan Quayle’s stumbling entrance on the national stage in 1988, and his deer-in-the-headlights performance during the vice-presidential debate — “Senator, you’re no Jack Kennedy,” opponent Lloyd Bentsen jabbed — are vividly remembered by the political class. But the George Bush-Dan Quayle ticket won an 8-point popular vote plurality and 426 electoral votes.

So, does this mean that running mates have no impact on the presidential vote? It’s a question that armies of political scientists have tried to answer, with conflicting results.

A 2010 Stanford study concluded that Sarah Palin, whose initially impressive debut as John McCain’s running mate collapsed in a fog of confusion and historical ignorance, cost the ticket more than two million votes. The study cited a Newsweek column noting her performance “sent wavering Democrats, independents and moderate Republicans scurrying to Sen. Barack Obama.” However, two years later, a study from the University of California, Irvine, found almost no impact on the vote.

Even where the vice-presidential choice proved disastrous — when Sen. Tom Eagleton was forced off the 1972 Democratic ticket after reports of his past mental health issues emerged — it’s hard to measure its impact when George McGovern ended up losing 49 states.

Still, Democrats have reason to worry that 2024 might be different.

The answer lies in a single number: 8. It’s the first digit of Biden’s age, and one that carries outsized significance. Biden may be only four years older than Donald Trump, but as much as any verbal glitch on Biden’s part, it defines him as an unequivocal member of the Really Old. It’s one reason why that new Washington Post-ABC poll found that: “Today, 63 percent say he does not have the mental sharpness to serve effectively as president, up from 43 percent in 2020 and 54 percent a year ago. A similar 62 percent say Biden is not in good enough physical health to be effective.” Numbers for the soon-to-be 77-year-old Trump are materially better.

With Biden’s political foes — in the GOP and on Fox News — ready to highlight any sign of physical or mental decline, the focus on Harris as a president-in-waiting will be intense.

Harris’ supporters assign her low approval ratings to the politically thankless areas she’s been assigned like border policy; to the misogyny and racism she faces as the first Black woman to be vice president; and to insufficient cover from the White House. Her critics argue that she is simply not ready for prime time.

But unlike past running mates, Harris is burdened not just by doubts about her, but the doubts about her senior partner. It’s a burden heavier than any of her predecessors had to carry.