Vance Throws Trump Under the Bus

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2:19Ben Meiselas:Vance is throwing Donald Trump under the bus, Marco Rubio under the bus, Pete Hegseth under the bus. J.D. Vance is going in for the kill shot right now. Let me show you what went down. J.D. Vance went on Joe Rogan's podcast at the same time that the Wall Street Journal leaked out, likely through Rubio or Hegseth, that Donald Trump was planning on escalating the war in Iran, perhaps sending ground forces to take over Karg Island, which would be an absolute disaster, perhaps blowing up Pickaxe Mountain, perhaps invading the coast of Iran. And so J.D. Vance goes on Joe Rogan, and he basically just throws Donald Trump and throws other cabinet members under the bus.

3:06Ben Meiselas:And J.D. Vance just kind of goes there right away, And he starts talking about the Epstein files and how he believes that Donald Trump and the Trump regime really screwed up the way they handled the Epstein files. And it was really bad at what they did. And then J.D. Vance, you know, he even says, you know, later on when he was interviewed separately by CNN, of course, we're going to support the midterm results. We're not going to challenge them when you know Donald Trump's going to completely challenge them and all that. And then you had separately Trump regime people, Rubio Hicks and others, then leak out as well.

3:44Ben Meiselas:And MS Now got the exclusive right after J.D. Vance went on Rogan, that J.D. Vance would always arrange for his elementary school son to be flown in a military helicopter for golf lessons across town. and how the Secret Service is fed up with the Vance family using the Secret Service and helicopters and all of the cars and all of the accoutrements that come with the Oval Office in order to help J.D. Vance's family. And this leaked as well. The frustration over J.D. Vance making last minute ask the Secret Service has boiled over to the point that agents have made custom coins and stickers to mock the frequency of the vice president and his family last minute travel using Vance's Secret Service codename Bobcat.

4:37Ben Meiselas:and they have like the Bobcat Survivors Club and they hand out these patches. And so J.D. Vance called out Trump and his regime, which he's a part of, and then they leaked it and then others inside Trump leaked that to the press. So let me show you what went down. Here's J.D. Vance admitting that, yeah, we mishandled the Epstein files for sure. Trump regime, we mishandled it. Here, play this clip. It was Donald Trump. He also kicked him out of Mar-a-Lago in 2005. He kicked him out of Mar-a-Lago.

5:07JD Vance:No, it's just – It's obvious that Epstein was a sick man. Yes, but if people want to say we mishandled the Epstein release, guilty. We did mishandle, especially the communications of it. What do you think should have been done? I think that we should have just dropped everything at the very beginning.

5:21Ben Meiselas:Then J.D. Vance goes on to say that the Democratic Party far more cool than the Republicans, he goes. You know, the influencers, actors, athletes, they tend to be Democrat. Democrats tend to be viewed as much cooler than us Republicans. This is what he says on Rogan. Here, play this clip.

5:40JD Vance:There's like an element of truth to it, which is that Republicans still fundamentally have a cool problem, right? There's something more charismatic, more cool about the Democrats as opposed to the right. And so you said something about there are too many dorks or something on the right. There's a lot of dorks. You know, fair. I'd say there's a lot of dorks. There's a lot of dorks. left too. It's a different kind of dork. It's a different kind of dork. But the point is that there's something, you know, like, okay, if you're a pop star, you're a rock star, you're an actor, you're in all these cultural centers, you're more likely to be left than right.

6:16JD Vance:And so I think that a lot of young people who are attracted to these population centers, they sort of move along with the prevailing culture. I think that's one thing that's going on.

6:25Ben Meiselas:And then at the same time, Donald Trump is saying, we're just going to bomb the hell out of We're going to bomb them, bomb them, bomb them. J.D. Vance literally goes, we're not just going to bomb, bomb, bomb and bomb. That's quite literal. Trump literally said, we're going to bomb them. We're going to bomb them until they behave. Here, let's play this clip.

6:43JD Vance:What the president has done, I think very, very capably, is said, we're going to use military force in this situation when it's connected to something we're trying to achieve. So if you shoot at ships, we're going to shoot at the facilities at which you used to shoot at the ships. But we're not just going to do something open-ended indefinitely. We're not just going to bomb and bomb and bomb. We're going to try to use our military force as one of the many tools that we have to solve the problem. And obviously, like I'm biased, but I think that's exactly the right approach.

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9:02Ben Meiselas:Vance goes, look, I like wealth being created, but if you don't ensure that some of the prosperity is shared with the people, then you're going to, then he says, well, then you're going to have communism. So he still uses the communism frame in order to fear monger when, if anything, I mean, the Trump regime is the most communist regime ever, but for their right wing oligarchs. But it's fascinating that JD Vance is kind of taking a position that goes exactly the opposite of what Trump and Rubio have been saying. Here, play this clip.

9:32JD Vance:That to me is the fundamental challenge of AI is it's going to unleash a lot of wealth creation. But if that wealth creation all goes to some segment of people, you're going to have communism. Like that is the choice before us is a lot of wealth being created. That's good, by the way. I like wealth being created. But if you don't ensure that there's some broader prosperity from that wealth creation, like we have run this experiment before and it leads to communism. Right.

9:59Ben Meiselas:Then JD Vance calls out Israel and calls out the influence operation that Netanyahu and Israel run in the United States. And J.D. Vance is like, have you read the Time Magazine article where it talks about Netanyahu funding all of these American influencers to attack the memorandum of understanding and to attack me when I was trying to do a deal and trying to do a peace deal with Iran. Here, play this clip.

10:26JD Vance:Defense contractors, there's a lot of talk about how much is the Israeli government influencing American politics. And there are certainly certain people within the Israeli government who hate the deal. We see exact evidence. There was a time story that came out yesterday that basically there are certain influencers in America who are being paid in order to attack the deal. I think some of it, it's just pure political ideology, right? It's foreign policy perspectives.

10:55Ben Meiselas:is more over here from J.D. Vance. And J.D. Vance says, it's just fascinating that he brings this up. Like, it's kind of he brings this up, in my opinion, with like a wink and a nod. He's like, the idea that Donald Trump can just be easily blackmailed. It's crazy to me to even think that he can be blackmailed. I see the way he processes stuff, the way he picks up the phone. You think that guy is going to be blackmailed anybody just a fascinating thing to bring up here play this clip it's more doves good right so what what i i think a lot of people i've heard this argument

11:34JD Vance:is is this idea that donald trump you know was sort of i've even heard people say he was blackmailed into this yeah a lot of people think that that's not true dude it's just it's just not true i've seen the decision making up close again whether you agree or disagree with our negotiation or whether you agree or disagree with the decision to launch the campaign Epic Fury to begin with, the idea that Donald Trump is being blackmailed is crazy to me. Because again, I see the way that he makes decisions. I see the way that he processes this stuff. The idea that he picks up the phone with anybody and says, hey, I'm going to take orders from you.

12:12JD Vance:No, that's just not how Donald Trump operates.

12:15Ben Meiselas:Going back to J.D. Vance on Iran, J.D. Vance says, look, we're not going to send troops ever into Iran. We're not sending them. Now, this at the same time, Rubio and Hegseth, Hegseth's making high T videos. The Defense Department or Department of War becomes high T. Did you see that? Did you see that video? I showed it yesterday. But while Trump, Hegseth, Rubio are leaking ground invasion, Rubio's out there saying, no ground invasion. Let's play this clip. It's not good.

12:45JD Vance:It's not good, right? And so, So like if the Iranian people want to rise up and change their government, that's up to them. But we're not going to send 150 ,000 ground troops in order to accomplish a change in a regime unless the people on the ground themselves want to accomplish that outcome. Now, we're not going to send the troops in regardless, but like to propose sending in the troops. You're basically saying that the U.S. military should do the job for the Iranian people. we're not in that business anymore.

13:18Ben Meiselas:We're just not. Rubio then admits that Epstein had connections at the highest level of the Israeli government. Let's play this clip.

13:25JD Vance:Clearly had connections to the highest levels of American intelligence. He clearly had connections to the highest levels of Israeli intelligence. In fact, one of the interesting things the Epstein saga reveals about, and I try to make this point, it's one of the reasons why I'm always careful And I say there are some elements within the Israeli government who don't like our peace process because there are a lot of elements within the Israeli government that actually do like our peace process. They recognize that this indefinite campaign is not good for them either. And the Epstein thing is interesting because as much as I know, you know, Prime Minister Netanyahu, not a particularly popular person in the United States of America right now.

14:09JD Vance:Epstein seemed to be connected to the elements of the Israeli deep state that were left of center. Like I've always found that fascinating. It wasn't like he was super connected to the right of center of Israeli politics. J.D.

14:23Ben Meiselas:Vance also wonders if a malicious ghost would be the same thing as a demon. Okay, play this clip.

14:31JD Vance:Here's the way I would put it. There's also a difference between a demon and a ghost, right? These things are two very different conceptual things. Right. But if I'm a human being and I meet a malicious ghost, maybe I think it's a demon. And maybe all I'm saying is maybe there's some point at which the conceptually interesting – this is such a weird conversation – at which point the conceptually interesting discussion of what it is is separate from how it appears to me and how I'm going to understand it as a human being.

15:04Ben Meiselas:And then J.D. Vance goes on to say how space aliens can be also angels and demons. Okay, here, play this clip.

15:14JD Vance:That, you know, metaphysically, there could be two separate things going on. There could be celestial, there could be extra earth, outside of earth space aliens, and there could also be angels and demons. These could be two totally separate things. And then J.D.

15:29Ben Meiselas:Vance, I think, takes another shot at Trump and Rubio and Hegseth and that crew that wants more war. And J.D. Vance says, the military is one tool, but diplomacy is another. And I'm frustrated by Americans who say you can't negotiate with the Iranians. It's Trump. That's Rubio. That's Hegseth.

15:54JD Vance:Here, play this clip. You know, you see Mike Pence, who's sort of a super hawk, my predecessor, who say this, there are people, you know, who are super hawkish in the American system who have attacked the deal and frankly, in some ways have tried to derail the deal. And what I always say to those people is, what is your proposal? What is your actual argument? So just take the Strait of Hormuz, like the narrowest, but in some ways the most important part of this back and forth right now. Strait of Hormuz is a narrow waterway. To the extent you shut it down, you shut down 25 % of the world's energy supply.

16:28JD Vance:Okay. Joe, you could take$100 ,000 and go buy a bunch of drones in the black market and post yourself on an island in the Strait of Hormuz or near it, and you could fire drones at those ships. Okay. Now, what does that mean? Some oil and gas is still going to get out because some ships and some ship captains are going to say, screw you. Now, the United States can help that, right? We can shoot down some of those drones. We can shoot down some of those missiles. And so we can facilitate the flow of traffic. But the people who are like, you cannot negotiate with the Iranians. The reason why that's fundamentally idiotic is because so long as you have some person who's willing to fire off a few cheap drones, you're going to have some ship captains who say, no, no, no, we're not willing to do this.

17:15JD Vance:So we got to kind of use all tools at our disposal. The military is one tool, but diplomacy is another tool. and I'm very frustrated by the Americans and frankly by people in other countries who are like, you cannot negotiate with the Iranians. Well, then what is your proposal to get people to stop shooting at ships in the Strait of Hormuz? You can bomb them. You can take away their radar. You can take away some of their drones and some of their missiles, but it's just too easy to fire at ships in the Straits. So you've got to actually be willing to talk.

17:45Ben Meiselas:J.D. Vance says, I will go to my deathbed thinking that there is a story there when it comes to Epstein that he definitely was in on something. Okay, here, play this clip. Where he was trying to either influence people

17:58JD Vance:or compromise people. Correct. So it's not, there's some sort of an operation that was going on. There is a story there. And, you know, I will go to my deathbed believing there's a story there, but I can't prove it. And I promise you there's not some document that at least I'm hiding that allows us to prove exactly what was going on and how.

18:20Ben Meiselas:And then finally, you have J.D. Vance as he was heading to Capitol Hill after that interview. He said, of course, we will support the results of a free and fair election, and we're not going to challenge the results at the midterm. Let's play it.