JD Vance: Once compared Trump to Hitler, now they are running mates

Christopher King
·2 min read
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JD Vance delivered his speech at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday night. He has evolved from a bitter critic of former President Donald Trump to become his pick for GOP vice presidential candidate.

Vance, in a message to a friend eight years ago, called then-candidate Donald Trump "America’s Hitler."

"He sent the ‘America’s Hitler’ message to me in 2016," said state Sen. Josh McLaurin, D-Sandy Springs.

McLaurin and Vance were roommates at Yale Law School from 2010 through 2011. "He was vigorously opposed to Trump at that time," McLaurin said.

Vance rose from poverty to attend the elite law school. McLaurin says Vance criticized the Republican Party for ignoring the working class. "He thought if the Republicans didn't do something about that, then a demagogue would come along," McLaurin said.

McLaurin says Vance believed Trump was preying on working-class anxiety and anger. "He said Trump is that guy who is exploiting the working class," McLaurin said.

Now, Vance is the running mate of the man he once compared to a genocidal megalomaniac. How did Vance advance from staunch Trump critic to stalwart ally? McLaurin said, "He’s leveraging a lot of his own deep personal anger to convince himself that he is on the right road now."

"When you look at the harsh language he used many years ago, it does look like a big about-face," said Brian Robinson, who heads political strategy group Robinson Republic and is a panelist for The Georgia Gang. "The evolution of JD Vance in many ways mirrors the evolution of the Republican Party elites. JD Vance also wanted to have a political future and read the writing on the wall. The future of the Republican Party is in Trump’s image," Robinson said.

Robinson says Trump’s appeal to conservative working-class voters aligns with Vance’s values. "That populist message that President Trump is sounding is something that appealed to JD Vance," Robinson said. "He was able to look past what his initial grievances were, his initial disagreements and look at where Trump was on policy and saw there was a lot of intersection of interests."