JD Vance Spends Day of Tragedy Trolling Foreign Podcaster
JD Vance found time to insult a British podcaster on Thursday as the nation reeled from the worst aviation disaster in almost a quarter of a century.
The vice president was responding to criticism from Rory Stewart, a former Conservative lawmaker who now co-hosts the popular 'The Rest Is Politics' podcast. Stewart, who was also a tutor to Princes William and Harry and teaches at Yale, had trashed comments made in a Fox News interview on Wednesday.
'There's this old school—and I think it's a very Christian concept by the way—that you love your family and then you love your neighbor, and then you love your community, and then you love your fellow citizens in your own country, and then after that, you can focus and prioritize the rest of the world,' Vance said in the interview. 'A lot of the far left has completely inverted that.'
Replying to a clip of Vance's remarks on Twitter, Stewart said Vance had given a 'bizarre take on John 15:12-13 (This is My commandment, that you love one another, just as I have loved you. Greater love has no one than this, that a person will lay down his life for his friends), calling Vance's interpretation 'less Christian and more pagan tribal.'
'We should start worrying when politicians become theologians, assume to speak for Jesus, and tell us in which order to love,' Stewart continued.
'Just google 'ordo amoris,'' Vance, who converted to Catholicism in 2019, replied. 'Aside from that, the idea that there isn't a hierarchy of obligations violates basic common sense. Does Rory really think his moral duties to his own children are the same as his duties to a stranger who lives thousands of miles away? Does anyone?'
'I've said before and I'll say it again: the problem with Rory and people like him is that he has an IQ of 110 and thinks he has an IQ of 130,' Vance added in a follow-up post. 'This false arrogance drives so much elite failure over the last 40 years.'
Alastair Campbell, the onetime spin doctor for former British prime minister Tony Blair and current co-host of Stewart's podcast, said it was 'very odd' the U.S. vice president 'has nothing better to do than troll my podcast partner.'
Stewart himself replied to Vance's jibe on Friday morning, saying it was an honor to 'have my IQ questioned by you Mr VP.'
'But your attempts to speak for Christ are false and dangerous,' Stewart wrote. 'Nowhere does Jesus suggest that love is to be prioritized in concentric circles. His love is universal.' He went on to argue that humanity is 'selfish and tribal,' but 'the last person we should be invoking to justify our selfishness is Christ.'
On Thursday, Vance also spoke at the White House press conference where President Donald Trump blamed DEI for undermining safety in U.S. aviation in response to the midair collision between a passenger jet and a military helicopter which is believed to have killed 67 people over Washington, D.C.
When Trump was asked how he knew diversity initiatives had played a role in the crash, Trump provided no evidence but instead said: 'Because I have common sense, OK?' He also said answered another reporter's question about his claims that diversity hiring was related to the disaster by saying: 'It just could have been.'
After thanking Trump for his 'leadership' at the press conference, Vance doubled down on his boss' rhetoric.
'When you don't have the best standards in who you're hiring, it means on the one hand, you're not getting the best people in government,' Vance said. 'But on the other hand, it puts stresses on the people who are already there.'
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