– Opposite rake wins – VG

At 3 pm on Thursday, there will be a debate between Republican Vice President Mike Pence and Democratic vice presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

The US media describe it as the most important since the first vice-presidential debate in 1976. US researcher Hilmar Mjelde from the University of Bergen agrees.

– Both Harris and Pence can quickly become presidents of the United States. And the next president will be tasked with rebuilding America and the West after the ravages of the pandemic, he says.

Therefore, Mjelde believes that the two candidates must appear as credible leaders, showing good experience and radiant authority. A credibility Pence already has, he notes.

– He has also been a deputy to Congress and governor. So Harris has more to prove tonight, says the investigator.

– The Opposite Trump Rake

However, Mjelde does not think the debate will have a significant impact on support. Candidates for the vice presidency can reassure nervous supporters, he explains.

The American researcher is also sure that there will be a more civilized debate than between Biden and Trump.

– Pence is the complete opposite of Trump: religious, polite and careful. Both Harris and Pence can come up with “witty lines”: Harris has made a name for himself through viral moments at Senate hearings. Pence had his own radio show in the 1990s and is greatly underrated as a communicator.

– How much do you think the outbreak around Trump will affect the debate?

– The pandemic in general will be a big topic. Pence must defend the Trump administration. Trump and Pence have a “good cop / bad cop” division of labor; Pence delivers the most serious version of Trump’s message and will defend Trump strongly. He knows that total loyalty is the only way to stay within the president’s circle, says Mjelde.

– An uninteresting debate

Author, Minerva commentator and American expert, Jan Arild Snoen, thinks the debate itself is not that important.

But who will be vice president may be unusually important this year, because both presidential candidates are very old and Trump now has a recent medical history, he says.

At the same time, Snoen is clear that it is Team B that is standing and that these debates generally do not have much to say for American voters. His job will be primarily to support presidential candidates.

However, he expects much more civilized conditions than during the chaotic debate between Trump and Biden.

– In fact, this is likely to be a more informative discussion. But put in the foreground, it will be an uninteresting debate. So much happens almost every day that there’s hardly room to pay attention to it, says Snoen.

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– I can’t afford to take risks

The adviser to the think tank Civita and the American expert Eirik Løkke agree that the debate will be very important due to the age of the candidates, the state of Trump’s health and the questions about Biden’s health.

Løkke believes that we can expect a more realistic debate than between the presidential candidates, but predicts that it will be even.

– I think they’ll stick to the script. Because Biden clearly leads the polls, Harris can’t afford to take chances. Pence is known to be moderate with a calm temperament, but he needs to win back voters and probably needs to be more aggressive than he usually is, he says.

The American expert is convinced that the outbreak around Trump will shape the debate on two levels:

– First, the catastrophic political handling of the pandemic. Second, the personal handling of Trump and the team around him, which has been a disaster, says Løkke.

– The eruption fulfills all the prophecies.

NTNU professor Espen Moe from the Department of Sociology and Social Sciences believes that tonight’s debate may be voters’ only chance to get real information.

Especially since it is not yet clear whether Donald Trump will be virus-free for the upcoming presidential debates on October 15-22.

– The debates are still the most important. Let’s say there is no more because the president has the crown; in that case, it’s a disaster for Trump that he’s seven to eight percentage points behind the polls. I doubt Pence can catch up with a single performance, but if the president’s status changes, he is potentially the next president of the United States, Moe says.

The professor believes that the debate will undoubtedly revolve around the crown outbreak in the White House. Finding a balance will be crucial for Harris, he notes.

– On the one hand, the eruption fulfills all the prophecies about the administration in office; the irresponsible handling of the president. On the other hand, it can seem in bad taste to forcefully wield the crown when the president is ill, Moe says.

“Republicans want to spin the outbreak as if Superman Trump survived the crown, that the healthcare system works, that as a society it is possible to live with the virus, and that Democrats must stop politicizing the virus,” he says.