Toby, Josh and Donna get stranded in Indiana when they miss the departing motorcade on the campaign trail. Donna loses her patience with her two travel companions, who keep debating Ritchie vs. Bartlet and not worrying about the issues and the people. Qumar decides to blame Israel for the downing of Qumari Defense Minister Shareef's plane, daring the U.S. to admit that they're responsible. A sleep-deprived Sam staffs the president while Josh is stranded in the midwest. Mallory O'Brien shows up to tell Sam she broke up with her boyfriend. C.J. tries to find a new Big Brother for Anthony Marcus, who has been getting in trouble since his old Big Brother, Simon Donovan, died. Although Charlie doesn't really have the time, he finds himself stepping into Simon's shoes. Abbey is criticized when she responds to a question about her medical license suspension by saying she's just a wife and mother. Bartlet interviews a number of unsatisfactory secretaries, and then finally ends up hiring Debbie Fiderer. Bartlet finds out Debbie was fired from the White House personnel office because she sent Charlie to interview as Bartlet's assistant instead of following her boss's nepotism. Bartlet meets with the first U.S. Congressman of Asian descent. A number of large companies declare bankruptcy and the Dow drops like a stone. Bartlet puts off a photo-op with a man who has shook hands with every president since Hoover because the man shook hands with Hoover the day before the Great Depression started. 44 people are killed when two pipe bombs go off in a midwest university swim arena.

Bartlet and his staff go on a two-day retreat to practice for the upcoming debate. Bartlet worries that he's going to lose him home state of New Hampshire in the election. Sam is still pushing for more Democratic efforts in districts that Democrats usually lose. Sam finds out that Horton Wilde died from his heart attack. Israel attacks Qumar and Bartlet tries to find a peaceful way to keep Qumar from striking back, but he eventually takes Leo's advice and uses force. Josh turns to Amy for help with how to phrase a debate answer about supporting U.S. families. Toby, who has finally gotten his now ex-wife pregnant with twins after years of fertility experiments, is trying to convince his ex-wife Andy to marry him. Bartlet and his staff remember when they were first in office, and some of the mistakes they made, like nominating a man for attorney general who spoke out in support of racial profiling. We see how Donna was duped by her West Wing predecessor into believing that there was a missile silo under the White House, but when Josh made fun of her Donna got her revenge.

Bartlet sends forces into Kundu and they take over the airport in the capital city, Bitanga. Nzele, the president of Kundu, captures two U.S. Marines and makes outrageous demands for their return. Bartlet tells Nzele to stop the slaughter of innocent people or he'll send in troops for real. Jean Paul, Zoey's new boyfriend, continues to get under the skin of both Charlie and the President. As the west wing prepares to go to California to help support Sam's campaign, the Republicans announce their tax plan, and Sam is horrified when he finds out that Bartlet delayed the announcement of his own plan so as not to disrupt Sam's campaign. Toby and Charlie are arrested after defending Toby's pregnant ex-wife's honor. Donna is photographed meeting with a Communist leader. When it becomes clear that Sam's campaign manager is running the campaign like it's already been lost, it's decided that Toby should take over. Will tries to start managing his speech-writing staff, but they hate him so much that they all quit and leave him with a staff of young inexperienced interns... who are almost all named Lauren.

Toby is put in a tight position when an old friend says he wants to blow the whistle on his chemical company that has been causing cancer for years and lying to the EPA. Will purposely invites a reprimand from the White House when he speaks out against ignoring global warming after a glacier melts in Alaska and destroys a town. Charlie refuses to stop pursuing Zoey when she asks him to leave her alone because he's making Jean-Paul jealous. Abbey is forced to present a fake award to a contentious woman from Marblehead, MA, when the woman, Marion Cotesworth-Haye, threatens to boycott the Daughters of the American Revolution reception at the White House due to the fact that one of Abbey's ancestors was a privateer. Donna is put in the awkward position of having to follow a DAR and her date at the reception because the Secret Service doesn't trust her date in the White House. Amy has a tough first day as the First Lady's chief of staff when Abbey gives her the impossible task of convincing the president to veto his own foreign aid bill because an anti-abortion gag order has been attached to it. Amy can't get anything to stay on the walls of her office... including her door.

As Air Force One returns from a trip to the Phillipines, an indicator light fails and the pilot is unsure whether or not the front landing gear is working. C.J. starts by trying to lie to the press on board that there's a fuel leak, but when an F-16 fighter jet does a fly-by to try to get a visual on the landing gear, her story is blown. She resorts to cutting off the phones in press room. Eventually, the problem is fixed when the pilot simply recycles the landing gear. Josh tries to negotatiate money for Chesapeake Bay cleanup, but the bill gets lost in the politics of the Republicans wanting to get rid of the liberal Congressman in their midst who is working with the White House. The Black Caucus refuses to support the Peacekeeping in Kundu bill if the White House doesn't investigate reintroducing the draft. Bartlet considers not recertifying Colombia as an ally in the war against drugs, but his choice is taken away by a silly deadline. Five soldiers are killed by friendly fire in Kundu due to a computer error. Donna feels like she can be more useful.

A lawyer named Joe Quincy interviews for the position in the Counsel's Office vacated by Ainsley Hayes, and Josh is surprised to find out that there is yet another Republican applying for this position. The President, on Leo's advice, tries to negotiate the return of a crashed American spy plane in Russia by deciving the Russian president, but ends up being truthful instead. The West Wing goes into lockdown after three shots are fired from the sidewalk into the Press Room. The staff plays poker. Zoey tells Charlie that she's going to France for three months with Jean-Paul. C.J. insists that she can make an egg stand up on end on the Equinox. The staff finds out that Will is in the Navy Reserves as a JAG lawyer, and he is working on a ridiculous case involving a meteor mistaken for a North Korean missile bound for Connecticut.

On Joe Quincy's first day in the White House Counsel's Office, he barely has time to settle into his basement steam-pipe office before C.J. assigns him to track down the legality of an unusual press leak. Joe follows the vague path from a science reporter to a gossip columnist to a socialite to the Vice-President, and realizes that the Vice-President has been having an affair and bragging to his lover about classified things. The Vice-President chooses to resign rather than weather the storm. A bird follows Donna and taps on windows. Will tries to come up with counter-ads for the Republicans' ads regarding fuel emmissions.

Josh starts making a list of possibilities for a new vice-president, and really wants to put Leo at the top of it. Amy Gardner begins to wonder if Donna has romantic feelings for Josh. The military is high alert because five possible Bahji sleeper agents have disappeared and they fear for the safety of the Pacific Northwest U.S. Danny finally finds a connection between the U.S. and Shareef's death, but C.J. and Leo convince him to hold off on the story for three days until they secure the Northwest. Toby buys Andy her dream house and proposes to her, but she turns him down flat... and then goes into labor with the twins. Will helps the President put together a last-minute speech for Zoey's Georgetown graduation. Zoey and Charlie are both surprised when the other remembers to show up at the National Arboretum to drink champagne after her graduation... a promise they made eachother four years earlier. Later, at a techno club, Zoey tries to call off her trip to France with Jean Paul, but Jean Paul has spiked her drink with ecstasy and she can't concentrate. Zoey goes to the bathroom and disappears, leaving a dead secret service agent behind.

The news of Zoey's kidnapping travels fast, and a ransom note arrives demanding the release of Bajhi prisoners in Pakistan and the removal of U.S. troops from Qumar. Fitzwallace prepares an attack on Bahji camps in Qumar while the president realizes that he must turn the executive power of the U.S. over to the Speaker of the House, a Republican, since there is no current Vice-President. Speaker Glenallen Walken makes his presence immediately known in the oval office. Toby quickly learns what it means to be a father when his twins, Huck and Molly, are born.