Many networks, struggling to prognosticate about Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate, quickly threw together focus groups which offered their snap judgments about how Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz performed. Finally, however, CNN has come through with its own full-fledged poll showing which one of them bested the other in the views of nationwide voters, and given the sample of the poll, it wasn’t particularly close.
The mainstream network dedicated its full coverage to the CBS-hosted debate, putting big-name anchors like Jake Tapper, Anderson Cooper, and Dana Bash in panels and the spin room to hype up the first and only debate between Vance and Walz. Similarly, CNN rushed to get a poll out to viewers just minutes after it concluded at 11 p.m. ET, and just one hour later their data showed what many felt in their guts: Vance gave the best performance of the night. The 51-49% result in favor of Vance was even skewed five points in favor of Democrats.
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The poll of registered voters who watched the debate was outlined by CNN’s David Chalian, who said viewers claimed to be “likely voters.” The survey comprised roughly “a third Democrat, a third Republican, and a third independent” voters with a 5-point oversample of Democrats, which tips the baseline in Walz’s favor. Not surprisingly, pre-debate predictions giving Walz a shot in the arm fell flat: 54% of viewers thought Vice President Kamala Harris’s running mate would do best, a number which eventually fell to the 49% outcome. Vance, meanwhile, was predicted to do best by just 45% of viewers. “Vance bested expectations, Walz underperformed expectations,” Chalian explained.
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Many observers expected Tuesday’s debate to be a bare-knuckle brawl between two running mates who have served as attack dogs, more or less, for their running mates since being picked. Sen. Vance has been the more vociferous of the two, accusing Walz of “stolen valor” after reports surfaced that he ran for Congress in 2005 on a brief military title that had already been rescinded. During the debate, Vance questioned Walz’s affiliations with China, where he has deep connections and which Walz admitted was a “knucklehead” move to not better explain.
Walz has taken a more lowkey approach, branding Vance and former President Donald Trump as “weird” for allegedly probing into the private lives of Americans. The line took on a brief life of its own among online liberal supporters. However, the showdown turned out to be more respectful than was anticipated. Walz at one point acknowledged that Vance feels just as much sympathy for the victims of school shootings as he does. Similarly, the Democrat did not open his answer on immigration with an accusation that Sen. Vance perpetrated stories about Haitian migrants in Springfield, Ohio eating dogs and cats though eventually made his way around to it in a follow-up answer.
