JD Vance, no fan of gender-neutral bathrooms, was photographed in his high school yearbook next to three girls posing in front of urinals in a bathroom during his senior year.
The photo, unearthed by the Daily Mail, shows an 18-year-old JD Hamel, as he was known at the time, standing next to the three girls, who were facing the urinals. The picture was captured in the 2003 Middletown High School yearbook.
One of the three girls pictured in the photo spoke to the Daily Mail, telling the tabloid the photo was intended to illustrate the authority of the girls in the student government, of which Vance was the vice president at the time.
“We thought it would be funny,” one of the women, who requested anonymity, told the outlet. “Usually it was all male officers, and we were an even split, and so it was sort of the opposite.”
The three other girls in the picture were the president, treasurer, and secretary, according to the outlet.
“Kamala Harris created inflation that’s crushing American families, caused a historic crisis at our southern border, and allowed deadly fentanyl to flood into communities across our country, and this is what the media is worried about,” a spokesperson for Vance told The Daily Beast in a statement when asked about the photo.
“A goofy high school yearbook from over 20 years ago? Get a life,” the spokesperson concluded.
The Ohio senator previously questioned ambassadorial appointees about whether they would “Increase gender-neutral restrooms and locker rooms in overseas facilities,” according to a memo obtained by The Washington Post. The memo was a part of Vance’s crusade against “woke” appointments to the State Department, according to Politico.
“If you are injecting your own personal politics in a way that harms American national security and diplomacy, that’s not fine,” Vance told Politico in 2023.
Vance held up Stephanie S. Sullivan’s appointment as envoy to the African Union for flying a Pride flag outside the U.S. Embassy in Ghana while she was stationed there.
“Why do we have a liberal white woman going to Africa and telling them they’re not civilized enough when it comes to transgender ideology?” Vance said of Sullivan during her appointment hearings.