Listening from the People’s Paradise that is Australia this morning to a radio interview with two people on opposite sides of the US election. One was the spokesperson for a particular group, while the other was introduced in the form of John XYZ, chair of something I didn’t catch, and ‘a policy surrogate for the Republican campaign’. Topic was American Muslims, but that’s irrelevant.
I am fairly sure I’ve never heard the term policy surrogate, at least applied to a person.
Is this an actual thing, and what are they expected to do? Most of what he said was defending prior inconsistent Trump statements,rather than articulating policy.
The Democrat and the interviewer were all over him, and his best was nowhere near good enough. Why would a party allow itself to be represented by a (not being unkind) second-rate informal spokes-guy?
American citizen who has lived abroad continuously since 1995 here - like you, I am puzzled by the term. I could swear I never heard it until this election. In fact, I was thinking of posting a question about it on the SDMB, but you got to it before I did. I will be interested to read the answers you get.
Trump’s campaign has a reputation for putting ‘allies’ out there who are not ready for prime time. They tend to get their asses handed to them when trying to defend his statements and policy proposals against real politicos and newsies.
A surrogate is a substitute or deputy. A policy surrogate is someone who stands in for, or represents, the candidate in relation to matters of policy, or in relation to a particular policy. So Trump’s policy surrogate, say, can speak for Trump in relation to policy matters (or particular policy matters) but can’t speak on the subject of (and shouldn’t be asked about) tiny hands, abusive behaviour, Trump’s tax returns, why Hillary Clinton is described as “crooked” or what the polls are showing.
A fairly basic requirement for being a policy surrogate is that you should be able to explain and defend the policy. The Trump campaign may have a deficit of people talented in this department. Or the policy may just be inexplicable or indefensible.
This Atlantic article discusses policy surrogates (warning: Adblock blocker). It’s a broad and multifarious term, and isn’t restricted to official spokespeople or policy experts.
Yes, of course - as a vocabulary matter, I am familiar with the term. But my question is - have all elections cycles used surrogates so much, or is this a new thing? I could swear the term never came up in previous elections.
It seems its an attempt to provide a slight polish to what was the previously unnamed caravan of various partisan supporters, leeches, shills and celebrity loud-mouths [on both sides] who emerge at every election.
I wonder how much its self-elevation, because it doesn’t seem to be doing the candidates any great favours.