According to a report from the New York Times documenting Sen. J.D. Vance's metamorphosis from a moderate Republican, who once equated Donald Trump with Adolf Hitler, to fire-breathing MAGA enthusiast, Trump's vice presidential running mate has previously pushed for Republicans to ignore the courts and grab power.
In a deep dive by the Times' Matt Flegenheimer, he documents Vance echoing a statement attributed to Andrew Jackson when discussing pushing back at court interference with the statement: "The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.”
According to the report, that is not the only example of Vance's admiration for grabbing power.
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"Fire every single midlevel bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state, replace them with our people,” Vance also claimed on a podcast two years ago with Flegenhemer reporting, "... he [Vance] has been unswerving in recent years in his assessment of how Republicans should carry themselves when they win: Use every available lever of state, even if that means testing the bounds of the constitutional system."
Case in point, in that same podcast, Vance asserted, "We are in a late republican period. If we’re going to push back against it, we have to get pretty wild, pretty far out there, and go in directions that a lot of conservatives right now are uncomfortable with.”
The report notes that, in a speech before the conservative Claremont Institute three years ago, Trump's presidential running mate ominously warned, "If our enemies are using guns and bazookas we damn well better fight back with more than wet noodles.”
According to Ramesh Ponnuru, an editor at the conservative National Review who has known Vance for years, the aspiring vice president is not one who would step in and try and talk Trump down from exercising unchecked power.
Ponnuru explained the Ohio Republican is “...not going to be the guy to say, ‘Whoa, whoa, I’m not sure that we really have the power to do that.’”
“In a way, it’s like Trump chose Steve Bannon to be his running mate," he admitted.
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