Vice President JD Vance is moving to build a political identity of his own after Republicans lost control of Congress in Tuesday’s midterm elections. In the days since the defeat, the 42-year-old has blamed the war with Iran for the losses and set out a platform that puts affordability first. It is a message that sounds different from President Donald Trump’s.
Vance has not said whether he will run for president in 2028. Trump has not endorsed him or anyone else. But Vance is widely seen as the leading potential contender for the Republican nomination, and the way he talks about the defeat is an early sign of how he plans to shape his own future.
Vance Shifts Focus From Trump
During the final weeks of the campaign, Vance changed how he spoke to voters. A Reuters review of half a dozen speeches he gave after the Republican convention in September found that he talked less about Trump and more about the issues he wants to be known for. Those issues are economic nationalism, foreign policy restraint, and public safety.
In plain words, economic nationalism means putting American workers and American industry first. Foreign policy restraint means being careful about starting wars abroad. Public safety means a tough line on crime.
Vance largely avoided Trump’s signature policies in those speeches, including the Iran war and deportations. Polls showed the president’s falling popularity was hurting Republican candidates, so Vance kept the focus on his own ground. Two people familiar with the strategy told Reuters the shift was deliberate. Vance and his advisers believed these were issues he could speak about with authority. Trump embraced the same ideas as part of his MAGA movement, but Vance had become their most visible champion.
In his stump speeches, Vance told voters to support Republicans because they would investigate fraud in federal health care and antipoverty programs. He tied that message to the cost of living. He almost entirely ignored the Iran war and gas prices, and he seldom mentioned Trump by name. “I want my kids to raise a family in a country that is vibrant and thriving and free and prosperous. I want the simple things,” Vance told one of his final rallies in North Carolina. “And because I want that for me, I want it for you too.”
Postmortem Blames Iran War
On Wednesday morning, Vance took a more public step. In a long post on X, he gave a blunt account of why Republicans lost. He blamed the war with Iran, called for a swift end to the conflict, and urged Republicans to focus on affordability, rethink foreign relations, and overhaul the relationship with Israel.
“To the people who are just pissed at the results, you should be,” he wrote. “Let’s take that anger and get back to the work of saving our country.”
It was the first time Vance had openly sided with ending the war. Trump launched the war against Iran after sustained lobbying from Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and later endorsed Netanyahu in the Israeli election. Trump has acknowledged the war played a role in the Republican defeat because it pushed up gas prices, but he has continued to defend it. “I would have done nothing different,” he told reporters on Wednesday. He has also called Americans’ worries about affordability a Democratic “hoax.”
Three people familiar with the White House and Vance’s communications told Reuters the vice president was not breaking with Trump. They said White House chief of staff Susie Wiles knew about the post in advance. Reuters could not determine whether Trump knew about it in advance. Donald Trump Jr., the president’s eldest son, endorsed Vance’s remarks on social media, along with some conservative allies.
On Friday, Trump reshuffled senior White House leadership, replacing Wiles with Stephen Miller, who starts as chief of staff on Monday. The move suggests the White House plans to double down on some of Trump’s more hardline policies.
