JD Vance Turns The Tables On CNN Host After REFUSING To Take The Bait

Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH) on Friday swatted down attempts by a CNN anchor to guilt-trip him into contrition after posting a meme making fun of Vice President Kamala Harris’s interview the previous night.

Vance on social media posted a long-running clip of a young woman competing in a 2007 beauty pageant attempting to answer a complicated question on international politics. The flabbergasted contestant did her best to deliver a word salad of a response that has been, and still remains, a viral moment of hilarity for the internet to share. However, the effect it had on young Caitlin Upton was devastating, according to an interview she gave eight years later. “I thought about committing suicide” as a result of the attention she received from the infamous clip, she told New York Magazine.

(VOTE: Are You Supporting TRUMP Or KAMALA In November?)

Rather than focus on Vance’s criticism of Harris, CNN anchor John Berman asked the Republican vice presidential nominee if he was aware of Upton’s struggles before sharing the meme which he captioned, “I have gotten a hold of the full Kamala Harris CNN interview.” Harris was widely panned over a dismal performance in her first interview with Dana Bash where she delivered extended, sometimes nonsensical answers that dodged the question or conflicted with her past statements. She was joined by running mate Tim Walz who interjected at periods to run out the clock on Bash.

BREAKING: I have gotten ahold of the full Kamala Harris CNN interview. pic.twitter.com/c6nfcJrFJy

— JD Vance (@JDVance) August 29, 2024

But Vance didn’t take the bait. “My heart goes out to [Upton] and I hope that she’s doing well” before admitting he’s made his own mistakes on camera. “I think the best way to deal with it is to laugh at ourselves, laugh at this stuff, and try to have some fun in politics. I posted a meme from 20 years ago, and I think the fact that we’re talking about that instead of the fact that American families can’t afford groceries or health care” is the problem, according to Vance. “There’s nothing that says we can’t tell some jokes along the way.”

Berman doubled down, asking the Ohio senator if he’d like to apologize to Upton for mocking her plight. “I’m not gonna apologize for posting a joke, but I wish the best for Caitlin. I hope she’s doing well. As I’ve said, one bad moment shouldn’t define anybody, and the best way to deal with this stuff is to laugh at ourselves.” With nothing left to go on, the anchor changed topics.

WATCH:

Very real utterances in Harris’s interview underscored concern by major media figures that she is not being truthful about her positions with the American people. Daniel Dale, a fact checker for the network, scolded Harris for telling Bash that her “position hasn’t changed” when it comes to fracking, a policy she promised to ban nationally while running for president in 2019. Today, as she tells it, her position is the “same as it was four years ago” when she said in a debate that President Joe Biden would not ban fracking. “I went over the transcript of that debate tonight. Nowhere in there does she make clear that she had abandoned her previous support for a fracking ban. Rather, she repeated that Joe Biden, the head of the Democratic ticket at the time, would himself not ban fracking,” Dale explained.

CNN analyst Bryan Lanza, speaking on a panel, was equally suspicious about Harris’s evasive answer. “I still have questions about where she is on fracking. We‘ve spent a lot of time. She clearly doesn‘t want to answer the question and I‘ll tell you why she doesn‘t want to answer the fracking question,” he said following her interview with Bash. “Because her San Francisco values are out of the mainstream in Pennsylvania. Fracking has been a long part of her issues when she was attorney general, when she was district attorney. That’s who she is.”

(FREE RED HAT: “Impeached. Arrested. Convicted. Shot. Still Standing”)