{"id":1900,"date":"2024-11-12T07:20:55","date_gmt":"2024-11-12T07:20:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/at-the-debate-jd-vances-many-troubles-went-from-bad-to-worse\/"},"modified":"2024-11-12T07:20:55","modified_gmt":"2024-11-12T07:20:55","slug":"at-the-debate-jd-vances-many-troubles-went-from-bad-to-worse","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/at-the-debate-jd-vances-many-troubles-went-from-bad-to-worse\/","title":{"rendered":"At the debate, JD Vance\u2019s many troubles went from bad to worse"},"content":{"rendered":"<div data-testid=\"byline-container\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/author\/steve-benen-ncpn433601\"><picture data-testid=\"picture\"><source media=\"(min-width: 320px)\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com\/image\/upload\/t_focal-60x60,f_auto,q_auto:best\/newscms\/2021_37\/3505460\/steve-benen-msnbc_1.png\" alt height=\"48\" width=\"48\"><\/source><\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n<div>\n<p class>Republican vice presidential candidate <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/maddowblog\/vance-offers-wrong-defense-promoting-ugly-misinformation-rcna170371\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">JD Vance<\/a> was already struggling as a candidate for national office, but the past week or so has been especially brutal.<\/p>\n<p class>It was six days ago, for example, when the Ohio senator sat down with a prominent conservative pundit, who asked what can be done to address the cost of child care. Vance&rsquo;s answer was, by any fair measure, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/maddowblog\/trumps-world-salad-answer-child-care-policy-matters-rcna169909\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">ridiculous<\/a>. A day later, the GOP candidate lamented that deadly mass shootings in schools are a &ldquo;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/maddowblog\/jd-vance-calls-school-shootings-fact-life-faces-pushback-rcna169900\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fact of life<\/a>&rdquo; &mdash; a comment that sparked fierce and immediate pushback.<\/p>\n<p class>On Monday, Vance threw his support behind <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/maddowblog\/vance-offers-wrong-defense-promoting-ugly-misinformation-rcna170371\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a ridiculous and racist conspiracy theory<\/a> about immigrants abducting and eating pets, and on Tuesday, he <a href=\"https:\/\/www.politico.com\/news\/2024\/09\/10\/vance-electors-2020-election-00178266\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">endorsed<\/a> a <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Liz_Cheney\/status\/1833546226538828032\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">brazenly illegal<\/a> response to Trump&rsquo;s 2020 election defeat<\/p>\n<p class>Hours later, the Ohioan&rsquo;s week managed to get even worse during the presidential debate, as his running mate distanced himself from Vance&rsquo;s recent rhetoric.<\/p>\n<p class>The trouble began when ABC News&rsquo; Linsey Davis asked Donald Trump whether he would veto a national abortion ban if it got to his desk during a possible second term. The former president largely dodged the question, saying he wouldn&rsquo;t have to veto such a measure.<\/p>\n<p class>So, Davis tried again, reminding the GOP nominee that his running mate, just last month, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2024-election\/jd-vance-says-trump-veto-national-abortion-ban-rcna168084\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">told NBC News<\/a> that Trump would, in fact, veto a federal abortion ban. At that point, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/politics\/2024-election\/trump-says-wont-sign-federal-abortion-ban-dodging-veto-questions-rcna170536\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">the former president replied<\/a>:<\/p>\n<section>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Well, I didn&rsquo;t discuss it with JD, in all fairness. And I don&rsquo;t mind if he has a certain view, but I think he was speaking for me but I really didn&rsquo;t.<\/p>\n<p><small><span><\/span><\/small><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<\/section>\n<p class>He quickly added, &ldquo;We don&rsquo;t have to discuss it,&rdquo; dodging the underlying question again.<\/p>\n<p class>The exchange suggested that, as far as Trump is concerned, Vance isn&rsquo;t an entirely reliable source for information about the former president&rsquo;s position and plans.If this sounded at all familiar, it wasn&#8217;t your imagination. As longtime readers might recall, something similar happened eight years ago.<\/p>\n<p class>During the second presidential debate in 2016, ABC News&rsquo; Martha Raddatz reminded Trump that his own running mate had said, in the context of a discussion about U.S. policy in Syria, that &ldquo;provocations by Russia need to be met with American strength.&rdquo; In an unusual display, Trump <a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/trump-keeps-finding-new-ways-publicly-contradict-mike-pence-msna1187451\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">denounced the position<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class>In fact, the then-Republican candidate said of Pence, &ldquo;He and I haven&rsquo;t spoken, and I disagree. I disagree.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>In other words, in 2016, Trump became the first presidential candidate to ever distance himself from his own running mate during a general-election debate. Eight years later, he did it again.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div data-activity-map=\"expanded-byline-article-bottom\">\n<div data-testid=\"byline-thumbnail\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/author\/steve-benen-ncpn433601\"><picture data-testid=\"picture\"><source media=\"(min-width: 320px)\"><img decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/media-cldnry.s-nbcnews.com\/image\/upload\/t_focal-60x60,f_auto,q_auto:best\/newscms\/2021_37\/3505460\/steve-benen-msnbc_1.png\" alt height=\"48\" width=\"48\"><\/source><\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n<p><span data-testid=\"byline-name\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/author\/steve-benen-ncpn433601\">Steve Benen<\/a><\/span><span><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/SteveBenen\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\"><span><\/span><\/a><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Steve Benen is a producer for &#8220;The Rachel Maddow Show,&#8221; the editor of&nbsp;MaddowBlog&nbsp;and an BLN political contributor. He&#8217;s also the bestselling author of &#8220;Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans&#8217; War on the Recent Past.&#8221;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.msnbc.com\/rachel-maddow-show\/maddowblog\/debate-jd-vances-many-troubles-went-bad-worse-rcna170613\" class=\"button purchase\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Read More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance was already struggling as a candidate for national office, but the past week or so has been especially brutal. It was six days ago, for example, when the Ohio senator sat down with a prominent conservative pundit, who asked what can be done to address the cost of child [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1901,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1900","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics","category-trump"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1900","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1900"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1900\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1900"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1900"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1900"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}