‘BULLY-BOY STRENGTH’

MAGA Columnist Trashes ‘Sensitive Bunny’ JD Vance

The veep’s peeps were not happy with the Wall Street Journal.

A prominent conservative columnist at Rupert Murdoch’s Wall Street Journal says JD Vance might be too much of a “sensitive bunny” to ever be president.

Kimberley A. Strassel rubbed the VP and his protective team the wrong way with an explosive op-ed headlined “President Vance Goes AWOL” last week.

In it, she accused Vance of abandoning his fellow Republicans at a critical juncture to hawk his recently published memoir about his journey with faith.

“Congress is crying out for a dedicated White House ambassador—someone who can be trusted to speak for the president, to yea or nay ideas, to shuttle proposals, to wrangle rebels in line,” she wrote. “Mr. Vance is promoting a book.”

In a new op-ed on Thursday headlined “How to Lose Friends and Alienate People, by JD Vance,” Strassel began by saying her previous Republican targets over the years “took the beatings like men.” She said many went as far, even if only in confidence, to admit they “probably deserved it.”

“Not so Vice President JD Vance, and his dreary band of online enforcers,” she wrote in the WSJ, calling out the 41-year-old father of four’s “egotism—or rather, insecurity."

The columnist questioned why Vance was inflaming an unnecessary “right-on-right cage match” when he could be out trying to win over new voters.

“One answer is simply that Mr. Vance is a sensitive bunny,” she wrote. “If he wants to be president, he’ll need to get over that.”

BOOK TOUR BLOW UP

MAGA Columnist Goes Nuclear on JD Vance

Leigh Kimmins

In the new op-ed, Strassel, 53, stated that Vance’s “real bully-boy strength” was demonstrated by his “online army” of influencers and journalists who sprouted “whataboutisms and falsehoods” in reaction to her column.

She wrote, “They labeled me a spineless leftist, their proof a series of lame rejoinders: Yeah, but the Senate sucks! Yeah, but what about Mitch McConnell? Yeah, but, you probably don’t even like the SAVE America Act! Yeah, but you’re a loser.”

Republicans indeed slammed the columnist on social media, including podcast host Katie Miller, who attempted to explain Vance’s absence from the political arena as “parental leave,” except that the column was written days before Vance’s latest son was born.

Sean Davis, co-founder of The Federalist, a fanatically MAGA website, had a days long public meltdown about the column. Among his posts on X have been one saying, “I’m sorry, but pulling this obvious little stunt against J.D. Vance, whose wife just gave birth, when Mitch McConnell hasn’t been seen in weeks is absolutely absurd.”

VANCEY-PANTS

Outed Diva JD Vance Goes After His Own Secret Service Agents

Leigh Kimmins

Strassel called out the accusations on her social media on Monday.

“Nice try. When Vance chose to blow off the GOP to go on Rogan—and when this was written—his wife was still expecting,” she wrote on X. “And as problematic as McConnell’s absence is, there is a gulf between having to be admitted to the hospital for a health issue, and choosing to fly to Texas for a taping.”

In her new column, Strassel also revealed that Vance’s press team had contacted her editors to “demand corrections” to her column.

“They wanted a mea culpa for what I didn’t write—namely that Mr. Vance had showed up to the House... on Wednesday,“ she wrote. ”Never mind that Congress’s anger stemmed from Mr. Vance’s decision to ditch them for Mr. Rogan’s program."

Vance recorded a nearly three-hour interview with Joe Rogan in Texas on July 14, which was released the following day.

Play Video

That was just one part of a month-long media onslaught to promote his second book, Communion. He made an appearance on The View on June 16, while three days later NBC News reported that Vance “had this week circled on his calendar for months.”

Vance’s book tour came at the time when the U.S. was in the midst of negotiating an end to Trump’s war on Iran. Sources close to the VP told NBC News that he “treated the confluence of the Iran deal and his book release as a happy coincidence.”

REVOLT

MAGA Turns on Conservative Columnist for Vance Jab

Laura Esposito

The columnist continued to repeat insults she received from the “online mobs” supporting Vance, which included a “billionaire lackey,” “intellectually dishonest,” and “anti-Trump,” who lives for the “donor class.”

She wrote, “If they think that’s bad, they should hear what my kids call me.”

Strassel added that “successful politicians seek to find new allies, not to alienate longstanding ones.”

The Daily Beast has contacted reps for Vance for comment.

Vance’s team told the Daily Beast that Strassel’s previous op-ed was “factually inaccurate.”

“Vice President Vance has been to the Capitol over two dozen times over the course of his tenure as Vice President, including as recently as Wednesday, which the Wall Street Journal and this rag outlet fail to acknowledge in order to fulfill their bulls--t fake narrative,“ a spokesperson said.

See more of our coverage in your search results.

ADD THE DAILY BEAST ON GOOGLE

Cameron AdamsReporter

Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here.