Vance has a new media strategy: Drown them in boos

TRAVERSE CITY, Michigan — JD Vance had built a human wall of supporters behind him, and the press here was about to pay for it.

Inside an open-air barn at the Northwest Michigan Fairgrounds, Vance, who favors questions from local reporters before national ones at his events, called on the Traverse City Record-Eagle reporter, who identified himself as the “hometown” scribe.

Before he even got his question out — a relatively anodyne one about housing costs — the reporter endured a hail of boos as the Republican vice presidential nominee smiled.

“We’re having fun,” Vance told the 65-year-old staff writer Peter Kobs, who knew many of the people in this venue. “You’re allowed to ask your question; they’re allowed to tell you how they think about it. That’s OK. This is America.”

The scene — Vance taking questions from the press while a mass of supporters, bedecked in Trump-Vance merch and hoisting campaign signs, jeer the questions and cheer the Ohio senator’s responses — has become a prominent feature of Vance’s rallies. In North Carolina days earlier, Vance faced a question about whether Donald Trump’s campaign still endorsed the scandal-ridden Republican gubernatorial candidate Mark Robinson. A woman behind Vance lifted her hands and then shot her thumbs down at the question as others behind her rained boos.

“It’s sort of like the Greek chorus in an Aeschylus play,” Kobs told POLITICO minutes after the rally, adding that he is immune to such attacks after a career in journalism that has led to at least five death threats. “The Greek chorus is there to amplify and, you know, put emotion in it. But hating the media is a juvenile approach to politics.”

Kobs said he had interviewed some 20 people in the room beforehand — people he knew from the community — and all were polite. “It’s the herd mentality,” he said of their sudden transformation.

For Vance, a historically unpopular vice presidential nominee according to multiple polls , the bit of political theater is a way to stack the deck in his favor, insulating him from potentially tough questions after an early run of critical media coverage of his past comments about women and families, among other things.

“It gives him more support,” Charity Domres, a 50-year-old postmaster who had stood behind Vance and did her fair share of booing, said of the stagecraft. “Builds him up. More confidence.”

Even a month ago, in the earliest days of his candidacy, Vance did not employ what Kobs called his “Greek chorus.” At an Aug. 7 Michigan event in front of the Shelby Township Police Department in suburban Detroit, Vance took questions as he was flanked by stoic and silent local law enforcement officials. Among the questions: what Vance made of Trump saying the vice presidential pick doesn’t alter the election outcome (“most people are voting for the top of the ticket,” Vance said, before pivoting to attacking his Democratic counterpart, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz).

There were more friendly questions, too. A Fox 2 Detroit reporter, noting that Vance had been criticized for being "too serious," tossed a softball: “What makes you smile? What makes you happy?”

“Well, I smile at a lot of things, including bogus questions from the media, man,” Vance said, as the officers behind him stared off into the middle distance. Vance laughed — a response the man who played him in debate prep with his Democratic opponent Tim Ryan during the 2022 Senate campaign has said is Vance’s acknowledgment that “something is absolutely true that he needs to defuse.” The Detroit network in its own coverage described Vance’s response as “icy .”

But then, by at least Aug. 27 , Vance orchestrated for himself fresh backup: the full tableau of a human wall behind him.

“Everytime Vance goes out there, like back in that August Shelby Township event, it was like this Jeb Bush, please-clap moment,” said Jeff Timmer, a senior adviser to the anti-Trump Lincoln Project and the former executive director of the Michigan Republican Party. “He was so bad without a supporting cast, they had to kind of wrap him in this bubble wrap. That’s what the people backing him there are doing. It’s bubble wrap to protect them from smashing his head.”

Aside from the messaging benefit, there are, of course, the optics.

“I don’t think it’s a bad idea,” said David Urban, a former senior Trump campaign adviser. “It’s kind of a built-in mini traveling town hall … It’s a nicer backdrop than having nothing.”

Vance’s chorus often acts as his anger translator, registering displeasure with reporters’ questions before Vance even responds.

The format of the events “allow us to drive our message home, to provide a stark contrast to Kamala and Tim, who are hiding from any tough scrutiny from the media,” the Vance campaign said.

At this particular stop in Traverse City, Vance took five questions from Michigan outlets and one from a national reporter, the majority of which drew uniform negative reaction from the crowd. Topics spanned Michigan’s auto industry and what Vance was doing to prepare for what a reporter from Michigan News Source described as a “difficult debate” against Walz, a question that drew laughter and, again, some occasionally deafening catcalls.

“It feels a little hostile,” said Robert Schwartz, a “Haley Voters for Harris” Republican who attended the Traverse City event. “I would say it’s important for the candidates to be able to answer questions. So I think that’s a good thing. But using our independent media as a prop to get boo lines? Most Americans rely on the media to ask these questions.”

Even as he operated with his own protective cheer section, Vance’s stump speech here, billed as remarks about how “Trump is dedicated to supporting and rebuilding the auto-industry,” centered on criticism of Vice President Kamala Harris seeking her own friendly media terrain.

“The journalist that she's doing this interview with, of course, is a person who's already endorsed Kamala Harris,” Vance said of Harris’ recent sitdown with MSNBC’s Stephanie Ruhle. “I don't think she's gonna get that many tough questions.” He later added that she is “so terrified of the American people that she runs from the media instead of answering their questions.”

Vance has indeed sat for far more interviews and taken more questions from both friendly and unfriendly outlets than Walz, Harris’ running mate. A spokesperson said he’s done more than 115 solo interviews to Walz’s zero.

“JD is totally unafraid of taking adversarial interviews with the mainstream media and more than just about anyone in politics, he is extremely effective at defending his positions and laying down attacks against Kamala Harris,” said Rep. Jim Banks of Indiana, a close Vance ally who has campaigned with him in Pennsylvania. “His willingness to engage with the media has become a huge net-positive for the entire Trump team.”

Kobs, the local staff writer, did not mind the collective brushback pitches from the hometown crowd. “If they boo us, that actually means they're paying attention to us,” he said. “So in some ways, there's a silver lining here.”

Vance, in this case, agreed with the premise of Kobs’ question, but quickly pivoted his answer to immigration.

“You can hate the Record-Eagle,” Kobs said. “But if your candidate's saying it is a valid question, then they think, ‘Okay, well, maybe there's something to this.’”

Of Vance’s strategy of taking far more questions from local reporters than national ones, Kobs gushed.

“It’s great,” Kobs said. “Because, quite frankly, inside the Beltway is largely a lot of bullshit. We live lives with our neighbors here. We don't live lives surrounded by embassy parties and jumbo shrimp buffets.”

Mia McCarthy contributed to this report.