They call it the Veepstakes. Well, some people do at least – starting as far back as Earl Wilson’s column in the May 13, 1952 edition of the Evening World-Herald from Omaha, Nebraska. After the Republican and Democratic nominees for president are locked in, they’ll name their vice-presidential candidates, and sure enough, this year’s Republican Veepstakes are the hottest thing on the odds board the politics betting sites.
We’ve already introduced you to the +325 favorite at BetOnline (find out more with our BetOnline Review), South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem. But as ideal a candidate as she may appear to fans of Donald Trump, second favorite Tim Scott (+450) might be the smarter choice – at least for Trump.
Who Is Tim Scott?
Tim Scott is the junior U.S. senator from South Carolina (where Lindsey Graham is the senior senator), having taken office in 2013 after two years representing the Palmetto State’s 1st District in the lower chamber.
Scott (age 58) and Noem are both fifty-somethings from deep-red states, but aside from that and their politics, the two candidates couldn’t be much more different. Scott is an African-American male who worked in the financial sector before seeking office, even starting his own insurance agency: Tim Scott Allstate. He doesn’t have a drop of American Heartland blood in his body.
Where Do Scott’s Politics Align With Trump’s?
Almost everywhere. I could give you an itemized list like I did with Noem, but it would be a cut-and-paste job; suffice to say that Scott is anti-tax, anti-Obamacare, pro-drilling, anti-LGBTQ, anti-abortion and anti-migration.
There are some slight differences between Scott and Trump. Back in January 2018, when Trump was about to end the North American Free Trade Agreement, Scott was one of 35 GOP members (including 22 senators) who asked Trump to keep NAFTA, albeit in “modernized” form. Instead, Trump tore up the agreement, and the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement was eventually launched in July 2020.
Scott was also a proponent of keeping the U.S. military in Afghanistan, an effort that was dramatically scaled down after Trump signed a deal with the Taliban in February 2020. This would eventually lead to current president Joe Biden’s decision to withdraw the remaining forces in 2021; Biden and the Democrats were the ones who suffered the political blowback, much to Trump’s delight.
The tragic events rapidly unfolding in Afghanistan lie at the feet of President Biden. A hasty withdrawal without proper planning or protections for Americans & our allies in the region demonstrates a clear failure of leadership.
(1/2)
— Tim Scott (@SenatorTimScott) August 15, 2021
Will Scott Become Vice President?
Probably not. While Scott is one of the most experienced and well-liked candidates in the Republican Veepstakes, and would obviously help Trump pick up African-American voters, he’s not the same kind of firebrand as Noem. Scott doesn’t inspire much confidence that he can hold his own in a debate versus current Vice President Kamala Harris.
Then you have this interesting March 7 story from The Washington Times, where GOP strategist/blogger Ryan Girdusky says that Trump’s veep shortlist is actually down to three names: Katie Britt (who just gave the Republican response to Biden’s State of the Union address), J.D. Vance and Marco Rubio.
What Are the Odds?
This is interesting more for who’s not on the list: Noem and Scott. Girdusky claims to have received the dirt from “very top people” that two leading favorites aren’t on Trump’s list, but look at the odds at BetOnline for the names he does include:
- J.D. Vance +3500
- Katie Britt +6500
- Marco Rubio +12500
These aren’t front-runners by any means. Even independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has shorter odds at +3000 as we go to press. But while Trump’s campaign has already called this shortlist claim “trash,” some GOP insiders say it makes sense – or at least it did before Britt’s very strange performance during her State of the Union rebuttal.
Even with that, you might find some dark horse value in these three names. Vance would be a strong MAGA Republican candidate for the 2028 U.S. election, once Trump’s second and presumably last term would be over; Britt is essentially a younger version of Noem, and rumor has it Rubio was one of Trump’s preferred veep choices in 2016.
In the meantime, while the Tim Scott odds don’t look very appealing, at least he’d be a “safe” Veepstakes candidate for Trump to choose. The gap between Scott’s favorable and unfavorable ratings at FiveThirtyEight is quite small at plus-0.7% unfavorable, compared to plus-10.7 for Trump himself, and plus-11.7 for third favorite Vivek Ramaswamy (+650). Trump could do worse – much worse.
