Using a varirable for padding parameter

I'm looking to use a variable for the padding parameters but always seem to get an error reading "No exact matches in call to instance method 'padding'"

ForEach(allGames) { theGame in
     var the_pad: [Edge.Set] = [.horizontal]
     if theGame.name == "Game1" {
          var the_pad: [Edge.Set] = [.horizontal,.top]
     }
     HStack{
          ...
     }
     .padding(the_pad)
}

This is the code without all the stuff in HStack (which has no problems), to keep it simple

This is for a menu and the top item gets cut off at the top hence it needs padding but the other menu items have better spacing without it.

Yes, I got it to work using an if-else statement and 2 different HStacks, but I'm trying to learn and I'm wondering what I'm doing wrong.