2024 U.S. elections JD Vance

What to Know About J.D. Vance -NYT
Hillbilly Elegy (film)
55 Things to Know About JD Vance – Politico

Donald Trump’s pick for vice president made a 180-degree turn from fierce critic to bulldog surrogate for the former president.
Opioid of the Masses
To many, Donald Trump feels good, but he can’t fix America’s growing social and cultural crisis, and the eventual comedown will be harsh. By J. D. Vance (2016)

Ian Bremmer: How did JD Vance, who once called Trump “America’s Hitler,” become his VP pick?
because Vance is really smart, very aligned with Trump. He’s very, let’s say, situationally ideological and wants to win

14 September
Vance’s media strategy takes a turn
He was Trump’s policy whisperer to key voting blocs. Now, he’s fueling rumors that Haitian immigrants in Ohio are eating cats and dogs.
(Politico) Since Vice President Kamala Harris rose to the top of the Democratic ticket and became former President Donald Trump’s opponent, Sen. JD Vance has conducted over 70 media hits, sat down with liberal podcast hosts and conservative commentators alike, appeared on all five Sunday shows and regularly engaged with reporters.
But his effort to reach out to a wider array of voters now faces a setback. Vance and Trump both claimed that Haitian immigrants in Springfield, Ohio, are eating pets — a move that has alarmed some Republicans who want the campaign to focus on their opponent Harris and the state of the economy, a top issue for both parties ahead of November.
JD Vance’s Catholicism helped shape his views. So did this little-known group of Catholic thinkers
(AP) … His conversion also put Vance in close touch with a Catholic intellectual movement, viewed by some critics as having reactionary or authoritarian leanings, that has been little known to the American public until Vance’s rise to the national stage as the Republican vice presidential nominee.
The professors and media personalities in this network don’t all agree on everything but most go by “postliberal.” Vance has used that term to describe himself, though the Trump-Vance campaign did not respond to questions about where Vance sees himself in the movement and whether he shares some of the beliefs promoted by many postliberals.
Catholic conservatives of the past have seen big government as a problem rather than a solution, the postliberals want a muscular government.
They envision a counterrevolution in which they influence government bureaucracy and institutions like universities from within, replacing entrenched “elites” with their own and acting upon the “common good.”
… “What is needed … is regime change — the peaceful but vigorous overthrow of a corrupt and corrupting liberal ruling class and the creation of a postliberal order,” wrote Patrick Deneen, a prominent author in the movement, in his 2023 book, “Regime Change.”
Vance has signaled his alignment with some of what Catholic postliberals advocate. He’s said the next time his allies control the presidency or Congress, “we really need to be really ruthless when it comes to the exercise of power” and said Republicans should seize institutions, including universities “to make them work for our people.”

9 August
We Mapped JD Vance’s Inner Circle
Silicon Valley donors, MAGA allies, and political operatives: The networks behind Trump’s VP pick.
(Politico)… Vance’s inner circle already bears the imprint of Trump’s influence, with a handful of advisers and staffers who have one foot in Vance’s camp and one foot in Trump world. But unlike Trump, Vance is deeply plugged into the New Right intellectual circles that have been driving the political debate within the conservative movement since 2016, and he looks to a core group of these writers, academics and right-leaning policy wonks for informal counsel and advice. Thanks to his days as a venture capitalist, he is also closely tied to the right-most flank of Silicon Valley and its techno-libertarian ideologies — some of which have been branded as “weird” by his new opponent, Democratic vice presidential pick Tim Walz.

8 August
The Post-liberal Catholics Find Their Man
As vice president, J. D. Vance would elevate their disdain for American liberalism to the highest levels of government.
By Damon Linker
(The Atlantic) This group of Catholic intellectuals—which includes Patrick Deneen of Notre Dame, Adrian Vermeule of Harvard Law School, and Sohrab Ahmari, a founder and an editor of the eclectically populist magazine Compact—is known for its sweeping attack on classical liberalism. It claims that a long list of contemporary problems (rising rates of economic inequality, drug addiction, suicide, homelessness, childlessness) can be traced back to moral-philosophical errors made centuries ago by the American Founders and their ideological progenitors. In place of our polity’s commitment to individual rights, autonomy, and pluralism, the post-liberals aim to create a society unified around the common good, which is itself fixed on a theological vision of the Highest Good.

4 August
Sofa so bad for JD Vance as Trump’s VP pick faces swirling speculation
(The Guardian) Vance enters the final 100-day stretch of the election season as one of the most unpopular running mates in recent history. According to a CNN analysis, Vance is the least liked non-incumbent vice-presidential nominee since 1980.
… Critics have dug up his past comments supporting a nationwide abortion ban and attacking women without children. In a clip from 2021 that has circulated widely over the past two weeks, Vance told the former Fox News host Tucker Carlson that the US was managed by “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too”.
JD Vance’s Marine buddies back his service over his politics
(WaPo) Critics call his about-face on Trump an affront to the military’s most basic values. His friends say attacks on his service are out of bounds.

2 August
“Testament to Donald Trump’s strength”: JD Vance credits Trump in Biden hostage deal
Vance, in a stretch of imagination, explains how Trump was responsible for Biden’s deal to free Russian hostages
(Salon) Simone Biles wasn’t the only American doing gymnastics today: JD Vance jumped through hoops to give his running mate undue credit for President Joe Biden’s deal to release four American hostages held in Russia, including Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich, and journalist Alsu Kurmasheva.
The Ohio Senator and vice presidential candidate, who’s proven to be a liability for Trump since he joined the ticket, was asked about the hostage deal in an interview with CNN in Arizona on Thursday.
“We certainly want these Americans to come back home. It was ridiculous that they were in prison to begin with,” Vance said. “But we have to ask ourselves, why are they coming home?”
The Ohio Senator, who acknowledged that the Biden administration’s successful negotiations were “great news,” then made a bold suggestion that former President Trump should be owed credit.
“I think it’s because bad guys all over the world recognize Donald Trump’s about to be back in office, so they’re cleaning house. That’s a good thing, and I think it’s a testament to Donald Trump’s strength.”
A true millennial, JD Vance posted his whole life — and his dog’s — online
People are scouring the vice-presidential nominee’s internet history for clues about his past.
JD Vance, Donald Trump’s newly minted running mate, has posted his life on the internet for nearly two decades.

31 July
The Mystery of JD Vance Is Unraveling
By Thomas B. Edsall
JD Vance embodies the pros and cons of political competition in a divided America. He helps and he hurts.
In Vance, Trump clearly sought as his running mate someone young enough, aggressive enough and engaging enough to mobilize a collection of millennials, working-class Midwesterners, families wrecked by opioid abuse, a subset of Ivy League lawyers, Marines, crypto bros, conservative progressives and centrist liberals, among others — an emerging populist coalition designed to beat Trump’s adversaries by nibbling at, or even swiping away huge chunks of, the traditional Democratic electorate.
His obvious talent notwithstanding — and despite his early stumbles — it’s too early to know whether Vance will turn out to be a boon or a bust for the Trump campaign.

30 July
Murkowski slams Vance’s ‘childless cat ladies’ comments as ‘offensive’ to women
Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) hit her party’s own vice presidential nominee, Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), for what she called “offensive” comments about “childless cat ladies.”
“If the Republican Party is trying to improve its image with women, I don’t think that this is working,” Murkowski told POLITICO, calling Vance’s comments unfortunate, unnecessary and “offensive to many women.”

28 July
Inside the powerful Peter Thiel network that anointed JD Vance
A small influential network of right-wing techies orchestrated Vance’s rise in Silicon Valley — and then the GOP. Now the industry stands to gain if he wins the White House.
(WaPo) For Thiel, Vance’s presence on the ticket is the payoff on a prescient bet placed a decade ago, when he embraced the Yale Law School graduate with Rust Belt roots as his protégé — joining a roster that included Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg and OpenAI founder Sam Altman.
Especially after the publication in 2016 of his memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” Vance impressed Thiel’s rarefied Silicon Valley set with what they saw as an omnivorous intellect, mild manner and outsider story of growing up working-class in Ohio — a narrative that resonated after the 2016 election, as tech elites sought to understand how their obsession with building the future was leaving so many Americans behind.

26 July
What’s in a name? Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance has had many of them
(AP) Over the course of his 39 years, Vance’s first, middle and last names have all been altered in one way or another. As Vance is being introduced to voters across the country as Donald Trump’s new running mate, his name has been the source of both curiosity and questions — including why he no longer uses periods in JD.

Republicans are already souring on JD Vance
“I’m a little surprised they didn’t vet him as thoroughly as they should have,” said one GOP strategist.
(Politico) Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro bluntly questioned whether Trump should have picked Vance, saying on his show: “If you had a time machine, if you go back two weeks, would [Trump] have picked JD Vance again? I doubt it.”
Other Republicans also wondered aloud if the Trump campaign had truly anticipated the tidal wave of resurfaced comments, book writings and remarks that would come with picking a 39-year-old, recently elected senator who had grown up online and was firmly seated on the right of the Republican Party.
“Of the people that were mentioned as finalists, he had the most risk, because he had never been vetted nationally,” said Bill McCoshen, a Republican strategist in Wisconsin.

27 July
Politico Playbook: The JD Vance remorse parade
By Rachael Bade, Eugene Daniels, Ryan Lizza.
THE VANCE CATFIGHT —The WSJ editorial board is joining the pile-on over Sen. Vance’s comments about “childless cat ladies.”
In a tough piece posted last night, Paul Gigot and colleagues call the comment “the sort of smart-aleck crack that gets laughs in certain right-wing male precincts” but that “doesn’t play well with the millions of female voters, many of them Republican, who will decide the presidential race.”
They see the speed and breadth of the coverage of Vance’s remark as evidence “that this is Mr. Vance’s first big cultural impression, and not a good one.”
They are unimpressed with Vance’s efforts to clean things up on Megyn Kelly’s podcast yesterday (“he wasn’t at all apologetic”), and they come away with this surprising conclusion about the episode: “One possibility is that at some level Mr. Vance really doesn’t respect people who make different life choices.”
And then they move on to attack some of Vance’s other past ideas. His proposal that families without children should pay higher taxes is “bad policy” and “bad politics” and would amount to using the tax code “as a political and cultural weapon against people who don’t share his values.”
The editorial gives voice to what’s been a quiet murmur we’ve been hearing from some corners of the right all week: Does DONALD TRUMP regret picking Vance?
The cliche in politics is that the first rule for a running mate is do no harm. Vance already started off “as the least liked VP nominee (non-incumbent) since 1980 following his/her party’s convention,” CNN numbers guy Harry Enten said recently.
Theoretically, Trump could replace Vance if he wants, Business Insider notes. But Trump so far has stood by his man. “He’s doing a fantastic job,” Trump said on Thursday.
JD Vance is giving Republicans buyer’s remorse
Americans on both sides of the political divide are talking about the candidate’s stumbles.
(WaPo) Is there anyone in America who hasn’t heard in recent days what JD Vance said in a 2021 interview with Fox News’s Tucker Carlson? The best-selling author of “Hillbilly Elegy,” who was embarking on a U.S. Senate race in Ohio, asserted that Democrats — including Vice President Harris, whom he called out by name — are “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”
… Trump surely doesn’t enjoy being asked, as he has, whether he regrets his impulsive choice of a Mini-Me as a running mate. “He’s doing really well,” the former president has insisted. “He’s really caught on.” And in one sense, that is true. Vance is giving people a lot to talk about.

25 July
Paul Krugman: JD Vance’s ‘Cat Ladies’ Riff Has Serious ‘Handmaid’s Tale’ Vibes
You may have heard about JD Vance’s “childless cat ladies” riff. But even if you have, it’s worth revisiting the full quote — and reminding yourself of what it says about the movement that may wind up in charge of this country after this year’s election.
In 2021, while running for the Senate, Vance explained what he saw as one of the biggest problems facing America: It’s being run “by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.” He name-checked, among others, Vice President Kamala Harris. …
As I see it, one of the great virtues of modern America is the freedom it offers its citizens to decide for themselves how to live their lives — a freedom, ironically, that Republicans used to tout all the time. And I see the increase in women’s freedom, including the protection of their right to decide whether to have children, as something that benefits all of us — men included.
But there are many people like Vance who want to limit or even take away that freedom.
“We are not going back” has already emerged as perhaps the key slogan of Harris’s presidential campaign. But depending on how this election turns out, we may indeed be going back — way, way back.

24 July
J. D. Vance’s Radical Religion
How might the Republican V.P. nominee’s conversion to conservative Catholicism influence his political world view?
(New Yorker) … He became a Catholic in 2019, and since then he has aligned himself with conservative-Catholic currents of thought that have already had profound effects on the Supreme Court—and, through the Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade, on American life broadly. Should Vance become the Vice-President, Justices Clarence Thomas, Samuel Alito, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett—all conservative Catholics—would have a Catholic ally of like mind in the executive branch. (President Biden’s Catholicism leans progressive, and is more devotional than doctrinal.) For now, Vance’s presence on the ticket represents the union of Trumpism and a movement that sees Catholicism as the embodiment of tradition, stability, and a top-down ordering of society, which would be enshrined through regime change. That’s a lot of symbolism to lay on a commitment of faith that a thirty-nine-year-old man made just five years ago, but Vance’s embrace of Catholicism is deeply bound up with his stated belief that religion has the power to shape the country.

20 July
Sean Speer: The rise of JD Vance and the reshaping of the Right
(The Hub) … I encountered Vance again months later at a National Review event in Washington where he spoke about the pros and cons of a conservative message focused on personal responsibility and how conservatives might reconcile their free-market thinking with the working-class people that he wrote about. At the time, his focus on “forgotten people and places” was unique in conservative circles but his political orientation was not. He was, like me, a rather conventional conservative.
I’ve continued to follow his own extraordinary political trajectory due in part to this past connection, and in part because his personal transformation into a leading conservative populist and now Trump’s vice-presidential candidate has reflected broader changes in Anglo-American conservatism. Although he may now be the most significant figure in the conservative realignment, he’s by no means the only one.

19 July
What is Catholic Integralism?
Mathew Schmalz,Professor of Religious Studies, College of the Holy Cross
(The Conversation) Since his nomination as the Republican candidate for vice president, focus has intensified on JD Vance’s religious beliefs and how they connect to his politics.
Vance is a convert to Catholicism and seems to have the same policy positions that many American Catholic conservatives hold: opposition to abortion, support for the traditional family, skepticism regarding liberal immigration policies and efforts to combat climate change, and advocacy of economic tariffs.