JD Vance on Principles & Values

Sub-sections under Principles & Values:
• Trump Campaign
• Other issues under Principles & Values

People have gotten rich and powerful off of American decline

No inconsistency in loyalty to Constitution and to Trump

Censorship is bigger threat to democracy than Donald Trump

TW: Democracy is bigger than winning an election. You shake hands and then you try and do everything you can to help the other side win. To deny what happened on January 6, the first time in American history that a President or anyone tried to overturn a fair election and the peaceful transfer of power. And here we are four years later in the same boat. When this is over, we need to shake hands and the winner needs to be the winner. This has got to stop. It's tearing our country apart.

The real threat to democracy is censorship, not Jan. 6

VANCE: We're focused on the future. I believe that we actually do have a threat to democracy in this country, but it is the threat of censorship.

WALZ: Donald Trump refused to acknowledge that he lost this election.

VANCE: For years in this country, Democrats protested the results of elections. Hillary Clinton in 2016 said that Donald Trump had the election stolen because the Russians bought, like, $500,000 worth of Facebook ads.

WALZ: January 6th was not Facebook ads. Donald Trump is still saying he didn't lose the election. I would just ask that: Did he lose the 2020 election?

VANCE: Tim, I'm focused on the future. Did Kamala Harris censor Americans from speaking their mind in the wake of the 2020 COVID situation?

WALZ: That is a damning non answer.

VANCE: It's a damning non answer for you to not talk about censorship.

Excluding God violates fundamental Founder principles

A: Strongly Agree

Q: Individuals and businesses should be required to provide services even if it would violate their moral and/or religious beliefs.

A: Strongly Disagree

Q: What should be the relationship between the church and the state?

A: From the founding of this Nation, churches have formed an integral part of our civic engagement. John Adams famously said, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." I worry that as our society drifts further and further from God, America is drifting further away from the Constitution and Democratic Republic our founders gave us. Our founders allowed state establishments of religion. Excluding God violates this fundamental principle.

Churches integral to civic engagement since the founding

Candidate Profile Questionnaire: RELIGIOUS LIBERTY:
• Q: What should be the relationship between the church and the state?
  A: From the founding of this Nation, churches have formed an integral part of our civic engagement. John Adams famously said, "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious People. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." I worry that as our society drifts further and further from God, America is drifting further away from the Constitution and Democratic Republic our founders gave us. Our founders allowed state establishments of religion. Excluding God violates this fundamental principle.
• Q: Religious liberty is at risk in the United States and deserves the highest level of protection in the law?
  A: Strongly Agree.
• Q: Individuals and businesses should be required to provide services even if it would violate their moral and/or religious beliefs?
  A: Strongly Disagree

2020 election was stolen by very powerful people

As Ohio's Republican primary continued, Vance explicitly claimed that "I think the election was stolen from Trump.

Vance told Youngstown's The Vindicator newspaper in October 2021 that "there were certainly people voting illegally on a large-scale basis," though that is not true. And though Vance said the election in Ohio was "pretty gold standard," he also said "I think it's probably true that Trump won by a larger margin in Ohio," though there is no basis for questioning Trump's certified 8-point margin of victory there.

Vance said in July 2021 that "I think Josh Hawley did the right thing" in objecting to the certification of some Biden-won states.

Failure to thrive comes from lack of personal responsibility

Rather than sink into a familiar pattern of sporadic employment, drugs and violence, he joined the Marines for four years and served in Iraq before going to Ohio State University. There, he gained a degree in political science and philosophy. He gained admission to Yale Law School, where he began his memoir, published in 2016 just as Donald Trump was making his ultimately successful pitch for the US presidency.

While the book does not mention Trump, some commentators described it as a window into a conservative white working class often overlooked by Ivy League-educated coastal elites. Profoundly conservative, Vance put the blame of the hillbillies' failure to thrive on culture and a lack of personal responsibility, rather than systemic issues of economics and policy.

Memoir made into popular Netflix film in 2020

While Vance was no Trump loyalist--and was sometimes harshly critical--he repeatedly said he understood the reasons for his popularity.

Met wife at Yale Law School as his "Yale spirit guide"

Recruited to run for Senate by GOP Tech billionaires

In 2019, he set up his own venture capital operation, Narya Capital, with backing from PayPal founder Peter Thiel, a sometime libertarian and rare Republican in Silicon Valley.

In early 2021, Mr Thiel gave $10m to a committee seeking to recruit Mr Vance as a Senate candidate to succeed Rob Portman, who had announced he would not be seeking a third term in 2022. In July 2021, Mr Vance officially entered the race.

The announcement came with an abrupt change in tone regarding former President Trump, with Mr Vance apologising for previously calling him "reprehensible" and repeating Mr Trump's claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election. In April, Mr Vance secured a much-coveted endorsement from Mr Trump.

US most prosperous nation, our leaders let it decline

Public policy views aligned with Catholic social teaching

Leaders conspire to make life harder for normal Americans

Willing to wade through a little crap to save this country

Critical of Trump in 2016, enthusiastic supporter in 2020

Wokeness will make everything boring and ugly

"Wokeness will make everything boring and ugly," he wrote.

OpEd: Vance explains the economically precarious white voter

Vance's influence has been everywhere this campaign season, shaping our conception of what motivates these voters. And it is already playing a role in how liberals are responding to Donald Trump's victory in the presidential election, which was accomplished in part by a defection of downscale whites from the Democratic Party. Appalachia overwhelmingly voted for Trump, and Vance has since emerged as one of the media's favorite Trump explainers.

Attended Trump hush money trial in NYC

My best guess is that he's campaigning hard to be the vice presidential pick for Trump. He was among several Republicans that attended Trump's hush money trial in New York City yesterday as Michael Cohen took the stand and Vance made several tweets on X. He says the trial is psychological torture.

He dissed key witness and former Trump fixer, Michael Cohen. And then he says that district attorney Alvin Bragg is keeping supporters away from outside of the courthouse. [Vance said], "We started in Trump Tower with a beautiful view of Central Park and then came to a dingy courthouse with people like Alvin Bragg. And he says Trump is expected to sit for six weeks and listen to the Michael Cohens of the world."

Known as the "Trump Whisperer" for explaining his support

"Trump was just talking about real issues," said Vance. "And whether you agreed or disagreed with the president I think most people recognized that he actually identified something real in our country, which is that a lot of the communities feel like they've been left behind, because they have been left behind."

2016: Trump makes people I care about afraid

2016: Trump reprehensible; 2020: evolved to support Trump

CNN uncovered old tweets in which Vance had called Trump "reprehensible" in relation to his policies on "immigrants, Muslims etc." In another tweet from 2016, Vance said he would vote for an independent candidate, Evan McMullin, rather than Trump or Hillary Clinton. In early 2016, Vance wrote in USA Today that "Trump's actual policy proposals, such as they are, range from immoral to absurd."

Vance gave a penitent interview [this week]: "I ask folks not to judge me based on what I said in 2016, because I've been very open that I did say those critical things and I regret them, and I regret being wrong about the guy," Vance said.

Trump speaks to my people, who are really struggling

A: The simple answer is that these people--my people--are really struggling, and there hasn't been a single political candidate who speaks to those struggles in a long time. Donald Trump at least tries.

The two political parties have offered essentially nothing to these people for a few decades. From the Left, they get some smug condescension, an exasperation that the white working class votes against their economic interests because of social issues. From the Right, they've gotten the basic Republican policy platform of tax cuts, free trade, and economic growth. Trump's candidacy is music to their ears. He criticizes the factories shipping jobs overseas.

Teflon Don: Trump's "blunders" are relatable and refreshing

I love, and am terrified of, Donald Trump

A: Well, I think the speech itself was a perfect microcosm of why I love and am terrified of Donald Trump. On the one hand, he criticized the elites and actually acknowledge the hurt of so many working class voters. After so many years of Republican politicians refusing to even talk about factory closures, Trump's message is an oasis in the desert. But of course he spent way too much time appealing to people's fears, and he offered zero substance for how to improve their lives. It was Trump at his best and worst. My biggest fear with Trump is that, because of the failures of the Republican and Democratic elites, the bar for the white working class is too low. They're willing to listen to Trump about rapist immigrants and banning all Muslims because other parts of his message are clearly legitimate.

Trump is cultural heroin: you feel better for a little bit

A common thread among Trump's faithful, even among those whose individual circumstances remain unspoiled, is that they hail from broken communities. These are places where good jobs are impossible to come by. Where people have lost their faith and abandoned the churches. Where too many young people spend their days stoned instead of working and learning. [These are,] in the aggregate, a social crisis of historic proportions. There is no group of people hurtling more quickly to social decay. No group of people fears the future more, and exposes its children to such significant domestic chaos.

Trump's promises are the needle in America's collective vein. What Trump offers is an easy escape from the pain. Trump is cultural heroin. He makes some feel better for a bit. But he cannot fix what ails them, and one day they'll realize it.

Endorsed by Donald Trump/MAGA after presidency.

Endorsements by Donald Trump, implying support of Trump's agenda and electoral style. The phrase `Make America Great Again` was popularized in Trump`s 2015 book Time to Get Tough:Making America Great Again. It is the campaign slogan embroidered on the ubiquitous red caps seen at Trump rallies (which after Trump`s presidency, became known as `MAGA rallies`).