JD Vance Memorializes Charlie Kirk
The Veep in the Podcast Suite
After Charlie Kirk was murdered, J.D. Vance skipped the 9/11 commemorations and instead flew on Air Force 2 to Utah to transport the remains of his good friend to his home in Arizona. Today Vance hosted Kirk’s podcast. This detail says a great deal about politics in these times.
I’m not criticizing Vance’s decision to take care of his friend’s family after Kirk’s murder. Vance’s success in the 2022 Ohio Senate race and selection to be Trump’s running mate were, in great part, due to Kirk’s influence. They also had a real friendship, not only talking politics but also sports and family.
I was preparing a lengthy post about Kirk’s place in U.S. politics, building on my previous work on how social media is changing the nature of the presidency. It’ll be up tomorrow.
Today, I watched the podcast1 and am channelling my inner Jen Golbeck to do a quick report on it. I’m working from my scanty notes (but hey, it’s online, feel free to see if I got it right. I also have some screenshots of the chat.
My takes are mostly impressionistic. I’m not going to argue with the statements, so much as use them to explore the MAGA worldview.
Everyone Loved Charlie
Much of the podcast was taken up by associates of Charlie Kirk talking about what a decent guy he was—loving father and husband, generous colleague, etc. Vance said that Kirk never raised his voice to his wife and that Vance was inspired by him to be a better husband and father. Tucker Carlson said the same sort of things, although Vance used that segment to also rehash the discussion of strike on Iran’s nuclear facilities.
Susan Wiles, the White House chief of staff spoke about how important Kirk, working with Vance, was in getting Trump’s more controversial cabinet nominees confirmed. Wiles, the first women to be White House chief of staff, avoids the limelight and seems to have a knack for working with Trump. She rarely makes public appearances so it was interesting to get a look at the person that Trump calls “the most powerful woman in the world.”
Secretary of Health and Human Services, whose face looks like a catcher’s mitt and whose voice sounds like a badly damaged window air conditioner, RFK Jr. explained that Kirk was his biggest advocate. Charlie Kirk was an exceptional political operator, not just an influencer. Innumerable rising GOP figures have Kirk to thank for helping them get started. Kirk’s judgment of political horseflesh was very good and he saw that RFK Jr. and “Make America Healthy Again” would be a strong addition to the Trumpist coalition.
RFK Jr. also provided some useful insight into the MAGA world-view. He said that the pandemic restrictions abrogated Constitutional rights. Pandemic lockdowns violated the freedom of assembly and shutting down those who questioned these policies (like RFK Jr. himself) violated freedom of speech. RFK Jr. also argued that the pandemic lockdowns violated the Sixth Amendment because it made trial by jury impossible.
As a good coastal liberal, I’d argue that the pandemic was a global emergency and that temporary limitations on rights is appropriate. But at the root of MAGA is deep distrust of these established authorities and an assumption that authorities are constantly plotting to take away these rights. These restrictions would lead to taking away the all-important 2nd Amendment, which for MAGA is as critical as the 1st Amendment.
On Political Violence: Incite or Insight?
Objectively, there is a great deal of political violence in the United States today and it is coming from many directions. Political violence is bad, no matter how you feel about the specific cause. (And that includes Charlie Kirk’s murder—it was a terrible thing—all murders are!)
One would hope that the vice president (and the president, and really everyone) would insist that we listen to one another and not turn to violence.
Vance did… not exactly. Throughout the program Kirk was cited as someone willing to listen and disagree peacefully (although most of the disagreements cited were about divisions in MAGAworld.)
When speaking to Stephen Miller, the deputy White House chief of staff and homeland security advisor, Vance asked about the plans to “go after the NGO network that foments, facilitates, and engages in violence…”
Miller replied (and I’ll quote the entire thing):
I’ve said this before and it bears repeating, the last message Charlie sent was, I think the day before we lost him, which is that we need to have an organized strategy to go after the left-wing organizations that are promoting violence in this country. And I will write those words on my heart and I will carry them out. There’s incredible sadness and incredible anger. The thing about anger is that unfocused anger, blind rage is not a productive emotion. But focused anger, righteous anger directed for a just cause is one of the most important agents of change in human history. And we are going to channel all of the anger we have over the organized campaign that led to this assassination to uproot and dismantle these terrorist networks. Let me explain a little about what that means. The organized doxxing campaigns, the organized riots, the organized street violence, the organized campaigns of dehumanization and vilification, posting people’s addresses, combining that with messagings designed to trigger and incite violence, the actual organized cells that carry out and facilitate the violence. It is a vast domestic terror movement. As God is my witness we are going to use every resource we have at DOJ, DHS, all of the government, to identify disrupt and dismantle and destroy these networks to make America safe again for the American people, and we’ll do it in Charlie’s name.2
In his closing statement (about an hour later), Vance built on Miller’s comments describing political violence and hatred on the left as the great problem. He claimed that statistics showed that while there was some vitriol on the right, the overwhelming majority was on the left. He mentioned his kids being screamed at on a visit to Disneyland.3 He demanded a crackdown on this rhetoric and the organizations that enable it, including, of course, the GOP’s favorite bête noire, George Soros
Violence in the MAGAverse: Who’s Counting?
Most studies show that there is more political violence emanating from the right than from the left. But that is not how those on the right see things, they would dispute what counts.
For me and mine, while we acknowledge some violence and damage done in the George Floyd protests, we believed they were mostly peaceful and understandable. But in MAGAverse these protests were carefully orchestrated by a vast network of far-left operatives, caused untold damage and mayhem, leaving U.S. cities a smoking ruin.
This came on top of decades of being told that U.S. cities and universities were violent, out of control, radical hotbeds. This came on top of a vast feeling of displacement by uncaring elites that shipped jobs overseas, allowed in millions of undocumented immigrants, and turned a blind eye to the opioids epidemic. The best single description for the Trumpist movement is this article by Walter Russell Mead. He describes the Trumpists as aggrieved by elites that seemed to be actively working against them economically—but also socially in advancing the rights of minority groups, while leaving white Americans as the only social group that could be criticized.
From the MAGAverse perspective, they are only acting in defense, after decades of assault. The murder of Kirk and attempted assassination of Trump are just further evidence of how far the left will go to defeat them. This of course is the nature of political violence, the actions by one side feed the grievances of the other and they cycle continues.
While right wingers have been decrying left wingers celebrating Kirk’s murder—there isn’t actually that much evidence of this. Democratic party leaders have made the appropriate statements condemning the murder, even if they decry Kirk’s rhetoric and beliefs. If you look, you can certainly find people who are celebrating Kirk’s murder, but it also isn’t real hard to find people saying that Kirk’s murder should be answered with violence.
I’m not defending the MAGA worldview, I’m explaining it. It’s rooted in feelings—it runs on anger and grievance—but you cannot argue with feelings, they have to be acknowledged. More violence is likely and the White House, as exemplified in Vance’s performance, is not lowering the temperature. This national fever must run its course and to survive we must understand it.
Veepology is not for the faint-hearted!
My transcription, it may not be 100%, but I promise it accurately reflects what Miller said. It’s pretty frightening stuff.
Vance closes with a lengthy criticism of an article in The Nation by Elizabeth Spiers. The article argues that all the talk of Kirk’s openness and commitment to dialogue is eliding his reprehensible views. Spiers states of Kirk: “He had children, as do many vile people.” Spiers also states that people shouldn’t be murdered for the views, but Vance has a point to prove. Interesting that the best example he can find is in a magazine with about 100K subscribers, when his podcast was viewed or listened to by well over 1 million.
Good column. Thanks for your roundup.