The three women anchoring MSNBC’s coverage of the vice presidential debate were not impressed with Vice President Mike Pence’s performance Wednesday night.
“I think the one thing that it could do is cement Donald Trump’s biggest problem,” Joy Reid predicted. “His biggest problem is with suburban women. And every woman who has been repeatedly interrupted in a meeting, who has ever not been allowed to finish a sentence, who had a man refuse to follow the rules and just blow past whatever the norms and the guard rails are supposed to be, when then you attempt to do the same they are mowed down.”
Reid said that Pence was just doing a “softer version” of what President Trump did the week before in his first debate with Joe Biden. “He repeatedly interrupted her and he also repeatedly interrupted the other woman in the room, the moderator who seemed to lose control of him,” she said. “And he continually demanded Kamala Harris answer his questions. She wasn’t there to answer his questions. She was not there to do whatever it is that Mike Pence told her to do.”
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If Pence’s job was to “get white suburban women to consider maybe not abandoning” Trump, Reid said, “This did not help.”
“The women are gone,” Nicolle Wallace said. “The problem tonight is that Vice President Pence appeared flaccid and anemic and that’s going to hurt him with men. I mean the only people they have in their coalition after last week's barn burner from Trump were the grievance voter that is a very vocal and animated part of the Trump base. This will not land well with them.”
Rachel Maddow agreed, calling Pence “very low energy, drone-y, talking points-y, condescending, unappealing, and, as you say, flaccid.”
“Here is the other thing that’s on voters’ minds, what if Trump takes a turn for the worse and this guy takes over?” Wallace added. “He has to look presidential and he just looked limp and lame.”
