Description
Book SynopsisDo Presidential running mates actually matter? In the first book to put this question to a rigorous test, Christopher Devine and Kyle Kopko draw upon an unprecedented range of empirical data to reveal how, and how much, running mates influence voting in presidential elections.
Trade ReviewRichard Nixon once famously claimed that vice presidential candidates cannot help presidential candidates, they can only hurt. In
Do Running Mates Matter? Professors Devine and Kopko exhaustively test this and numerous other claims regarding the importance of vice presidential candidates in the electoral process. While others have worked at various aspects of this question over the past few decades, this work is a data-driven yet highly accessible scholarly tour de force. A must-read for students of the presidency and presidential elections."—
Jody Baumgartner, coauthor of
The American Vice Presidency: From the Shadow to the Spotlight "Running mates matter, but in unexpected ways. Devine and Kopko provide the most comprehensive, multimethod examination of running mates to date. They convincingly demonstrate that the largest impact is from an evaluation of presidential candidates’ decision-making process in the selection of vice presidential candidates."—Janet M. Box-Steffensmeier, Vernal Riffe Professor of Political Science, Ohio State University
