Hello and welcome to this day in esoteric political history from Radiotopia.

My name is Jody Avergan.

And welcome to Vep Steaks Week or Vep Week or I don't know. We'll still workshop the name.

We'll come up with something.

Vep Week is kind of fun to say or annoying. We'll find out.

But look, as you know, listeners, this is an election year here in the United States, and from time to time through this election season, we're going to do some of these special series, we're going to take a week or so, but a few episodes, and kind of try and track the typical rhythm of an election cycle.

And yes, 2024 is anything but a typical election cycle, but it is still an election year.

There are still lots of interesting election-related stories

from the past that can kind of help us understand this moment. So if you recall

earlier this year we did Hangers-on Week which is our look at various primary candidates who hang around in the

nominating process.

Later in the summer and into the fall, we're going to talk about the conventions and we're

going to talk about advertising and we're going to talk about October surprises. but right now we want to talk about this window where the primaries are over,

the hangers on have maybe faded away a little bit.

It's not quite time for the conventions or big policy debates. So something

that often fills the void, especially in the last 30 or 40 years or so, is the so-called

veep stakes. Speculation over who will be the

vice presidential pick of the presumptive nominee endless debate over what kind of

nominee would best serve the ticket and whether a vice presidential pick really matters at all. So welcome to

Veepe Stakes Week, our look at some notable vice presidential scuttlebut here as always I'm trying

to say the word scut a lot more on the show here

New Year's resolution as always Nicole Hammer of Vanderbilt and Kelly Carter Jackson of

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