What does the vice president do besides awkwardly pat his spouse on a podcast? The VP is an understudy.
If the president dies, quits, or gets impeached and removed, the vice president becomes president. The president can also temporarily make the VP the president, which has only happened during colonoscopies. Kamala Harris was once the first acting female U.S. president for 85 minutes while Biden was unconscious.
But here’s the VP’s actual power. They’re in the president’s cabinet. They’re on the National Security Council. They’re on the Smithsonian’s Board of Regents. They can nominate candidates to the naval, military, and Air Force academies.
They’re the president’s most trusted senior advisor. Sometimes that means interacting with world leaders. Other times it means going to a funeral the president doesn’t want to attend.
But the VP’s most under-appreciated power is being Senate president. They can interpret rules and run meetings and even cast a tie-breaking vote.
They preside over non presidential impeachment trials, potentially their own, although that job is usually delegated to the president pro tempore who runs the Senate in the VP’s absence. They also preside over joint meetings of Congress, like counting and certifying the electoral votes—even if they’re a candidate.
And lastly, the VP is responsible for initiating the 25th amendment to remove the president, which has never happened yet. What’s unique isn’t that vice presidents are often strange, uncomfortable people, but that they exist in both the legislative and executive branches simultaneously.
Ben Sheehan is a political commentator and digital creator. He specializes in civics education, which is showcased in his latest book, What Does the Constitution Actually Say?: A Non-Boring Guide to How Our Democracy Is Supposed to Work. Check out his Substack, Politics Made Easy.
