Tim Hains – During a town hall Thursday on NewsNation, Donald Trump’s running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance urged Americans not to lose friendships and relationships over politics.
“Don’t get too personal all the time,” Vance said. “One of the things I’ve seen, especially from some of my wife’s friends and some of my friends, is if they disagree with us on politics — sometimes they’ll get very personal about it.”
“If you’re discarding a lifelong friendship because somebody votes for the other team, then you’ve made a terrible, terrible mistake and you should do something different.”
“I’ve got friends who like me personally, acquaintances who aren’t necessarily going to vote for me. That doesn’t make them bad people,” Vance said.
“Whether you vote for me and Donald Trump, whether you vote for Kamala Harris, don’t cast aside family members and lifelong friendships. Politics is not worth it. I think, if we follow this principle, we heal the divide in this country,” he said.
Here’s a transcript of the full question and answer:
AUDIENCE MEMBER: I’m an account manager for an automotive supplier here locally. My question is, two weeks from today, half of our country is going to be devastated. Looking at it from the winning side versus the losing side, do you have any thoughts on how the winning side can help, you know, outreach or Sure, lend a hand to those that might not like the outcome?
JD Vance I really appreciate that question, and I think it’s important, because you’re right. I think we’re going to win, and so maybe, like 49% of the country or whatever number it is, it will be a lot of our fellow Americans who didn’t vote for us. But I think one leadership can really set the tone.
People forget this, after the election of 2016 — I’m going to brag about my running mate here a little bit. After the election of 2016, Donald Trump talked a lot about the importance of unity, about the importance of bringing our country back together.
He talked a lot about how there were people in the Republican Party who wanted him to arrest Hillary Clinton, and Donald Trump said, “No, it’s time for us to heal as a country, actually realize that we’re on the same team.”
So I think the most important thing, ma’am — President Trump most importantly. But also, we just have to set the tone right. We have to set the tone that we’re all Americans, we’re all in this together, and we’re all part of the same American family. We all have responsibility here.
One of my favorite quotes about American citizenship is that it’s not easy, right? American citizenship is hard. You’ve got to be smart about the issues. You’ve got to know our history. You’ve got to pay attention and study to what’s going on.
We’ve got to be better at communicating and talking to one another. The biggest thing that I worry about, we’re talking about “threats to democracy.” That’s a term that you hear a lot.
To me, the biggest “threat to democracy is the rising tide of censorship, the idea that we should be trying to silence our fellow Americans rather than persuade them and talk to them. That’s always going to lead to people being pissed off because they don’t like to be told what to think or what to say.
They like to talk to one another, and that’s one thing that I’ll always commit to, as your vice president for the next four years, I’ll always try to talk to people. We’ll go out there and we’ll do events with people who disagree with us. We’ll answer questions from people who don’t always see eye to eye.
I think if we set the tone at the top, the leadership of this country is all about communicating with one another, I think that’s how we start to heal the divide, but we all have a role in it.
One final point I’ll say about this, don’t get too personal all the time. One of the things I’ve seen, especially from some of my wife’s friends and some of my friends, is that if they disagree with us on politics, sometimes they’ll get very personal about it.
If you’re discarding a lifelong friendship because somebody votes for the other team, then you’ve made a terrible, terrible mistake, and you should do something different. Like, don’t cast aside —
Most of my family obviously is going to vote for Donald Trump and JD Vance — and if they’re not, actually, I need to talk to them. But I’ve got friends who like me personally, acquaintances who aren’t necessarily going to vote for me. That doesn’t make them bad people. We can’t — this is my most important advice, whether you vote for me, whether you vote for for Donald Trump, whether you vote for Kamala Harris, don’t cast aside family members and lifelong friendships. Politics is not worth it, and I think we follow that principle will heal the divide in this country.
SF Source Real Clear Politics Oct 2024