Newly released messages appear to undercut vice-presidential nominee JD Vance’s claims that he had a change of heart about former President Donald Trump once he witnessed his achievements in office.
In 2021, while campaigning for the US Senate seat he now holds, Vance asked people “not to judge me based on what I said” previously about the man he called, variously, a “cynical a**hole,” a “moral disaster,” a “total fraud,” an “idiot,” and “America’s Hitler.”
I did say those critical things and I regret them, and I regret being wrong about the guy,” Vance said at the time, adding that he in fact voted for Trump in 2020. “I think he was a good president, I think he made a lot of good decisions for people, and I think he took a lot of flak.”
However, The Washington Post obtained direct messages Vance reportedly exchanged privately on Twitter, in which he slammed Trump — a man he later deemed “the best president of my lifetime,” for his myriad shortfalls as commander-in-chief.“Trump has just so thoroughly failed to deliver on his economic populism (excepting a disjointed China policy),” Vance reportedly wrote in February 2020.
