AMERICA FIRST?

Vance Blows Open Split as Trump’s Approval Plummets

The vice president did not share the president’s enthusiasm for an intervention.

JD Vance has refused to follow Donald Trump in endorsing Israel Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s re-election bid, exposing fresh divisions as the president’s approval ratings plummet ahead of the midterms.

Days before Israel heads to the polls, Trump threw his “complete and total endorsement” behind Netanyahu, whom he hailed as a “Great Warrior Prime Minister” and an “even greater partner” in confronting Iran.

However, asked in an interview on Monday night if he supported the Middle East leader in light of Trump’s views, Vance initially laughed—and then declined to say.

“The president has the most influential endorsement in American or international political history,” he told journalist Mark Halperin on Air Force Two.

“I endorse American candidates, and that’s where I’m focused on is the midterm. So, I’m not getting involved in Israeli elections.”

The distinction is particularly striking given Vance’s own intervention in the Hungarian elections last year, when he traveled to Budapest to campaign for then-Prime Minister Viktor Orban.

The vice president even had a cringeworthy moment on the world stage when he tried to call Donald Trump during a rally in Hungary—only for the president not to pick up the first time.

But pressed again on withholding support for Netanyahu, Vance replied: “I’m not anti-endorsing him. I’m not pro-endorsing him.”

The comments came as Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth quietly met with Netanyahu Monday night at Ovda Air Base in southern Israel, according to Axios, in what appears to be a sign of support ahead of his election next week.

But Vance’s ambivalence emerges as Trump’s approval ratings hit record lows amid mounting anger over soaring prices, thanks in part to the president’s decision to join Israel in its war with Iran.

A Reuters/Ipsos poll published Monday, for instance, found Trump’s approval rating had plunged to a new low of 31 percent, with rising gas prices and dissatisfaction over his military actions contributing to the slide.

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Just 33 percent approved of his handling of the economy, while 68 percent disapproved.

The polls have sparked alarm bells within the GOP and have left the president scrambling to turn out voters, including in traditional red states where his policies have hurt his base.

In Kansas, for example, where Trump held a rally Monday night, farmers have been hit hard by the war’s consequences, with a gallon of diesel costing nearly $6.

Cattle ranchers have also been hit by Trump’s plan to reduce import tariffs to lower the price of beef as well as his aggressive immigration strategy, which has prompted some immigrant farm workers to stay at home in fear of being deported

Israel’s role in America going to war with Iran is particularly challenging for Vance, who served in the Marines and whose political reputation was built on his opposition to foreign intervention.

Now, as the standard-bearer of MAGA’s anti-interventionist wing, he has struggled to thread the needle on a war that could become a political liability for him later on.

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Trump, however, has gone all in on the conflict, and on Netanyahu’s political fortunes ahead of the Israeli election on Oct. 27—the first national election since Hamas attacked Israel in 2023.

“Thank you, President Trump, for the tremendous support and work together,” Netanyahu said in a statement in Hebrew posted on X after Trump endorsed him over the weekend.

“Together we will complete the mission!”

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Farrah TomazinPolitical Correspondent

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