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JD Vance mocked for claiming Young Republicans’ Nazi-loving texts are just ‘stupid things young boys’ do
The GOP operatives caught in the scandal are between 20 and 40 years old.
www.advocate.com
Vice President JD Vance is facing intensifying backlash after dismissing a trove of leaked Young Republicans group messages filled with racist, antisemitic, and violent rhetoric as merely “stupid things” that “young boys” say. His remarks have drawn outrage among the political opposition and sparked pointed criticism on MSNBC’s All In With Chris Hayes, where guests described his defense as emblematic of “the moral rot” within the Trump-era Republican Party.
“The reality is that kids do stupid things, especially young boys,” Vance, 41, said earlier Wednesday on The Charlie Kirk Show. “They tell edgy, offensive jokes. That’s what kids do.”
Related: Leaked chats reveal Young Republicans peddling racism, fascism, & Hitler worship in bombshell Politico report
But the leaked chats, first reported by Politico, showed much darker content: Young Republican leaders, ranging in age from their early 20s to nearly 40, praising Hitler, threatening political opponents with “gas chambers,” and using racist and homophobic slurs. Several of those involved have since lost jobs or been removed from leadership positions.
‘These weren’t kids — they were grown men’
On Wednesday night, All In With Chris Hayes devoted a full segment to the fallout, dissecting Vance’s defense and the culture that allowed such rhetoric to fester. “These weren’t young boys,” Hayes said. “They were career Republican political operatives in their mid twenties and mid thirties, otherwise known as adults or grownups or fully formed moral agents responsible for their actions.”Hayes noted that while some Republican organizations, including the Black Conservative Federation, condemned the messages unequivocally, others, including Vance, rushed to excuse them. “The problem is this didn’t happen in a vacuum,” Hayes said. “This is part of the ideological formation of a whole MAGA-centric cohort of conservatives.”
‘Grooming them for cruelty’
Former Trump Homeland Security official Miles Taylor, now a prominent critic of his former party, said during the program that Vance’s remarks reveal how far-right extremism has migrated from the fringes to the mainstream of the GOP.“This stuff existed on the fringes, but now it’s not the fringes anymore — it’s the core,” Taylor said. “These guys, like JD Vance, are grooming young men in the Republican Party. They are grooming them for cruelty. They’re raising these weak little loser incels to go attack people because of their race or religion.”
Taylor added that when he served under President George W. Bush, “mentors would have policed this kind of rhetoric. My butt would’ve been kicked out the door.” Now, he said, leaders like Vance and President Donald Trump are normalizing it from the top down.
‘The moral rot on display’
I’ve Had It podcast host Jennifer Welch, another guest on the program, said Vance’s defense illustrates the moral collapse of many Republican figures who’ve aligned themselves with Trump.Related: Elon Musk's trans daughter, Vivian Wilson, calls out his Nazi salute: 'Call a spade a spade'
“Everybody that comes into his orbit becomes a worse person,” Welch said. “Marco Rubio, JD Vance ... the moral rot on display that we see is intentional. They are flexing the authoritarian muscle.” She added that Vance’s hypocrisy is especially glaring: “He’s married to a woman of Indian descent. He has mixed-race children. If this man will not defend his wife and will not defend his kids, do you think he gives a crap about you?”
Taylor summarized it as a broader cultural transformation: “The rotting fringes are now the rotting core.”
GOP ties to extremist content are hardly isolated
The Vance episode is just the latest in a string of controversies tying Republican figures to extremist imagery and rhetoric. For instance, The Advocate recently reported that Virginia Republican lieutenant-governor candidate John Reid, who is gay, is under intense scrutiny for being linked to a Tumblr blog that reposted Nazi-themed pornography, violent sexual content, and white supremacist symbols. Reid has denied ownership of the account, calling the allegations a coordinated smear, but has nevertheless faced mounting calls from Democratic lawmakers to drop out of the race.For Vance, who remains one of the most prominent political heirs to Trump’s populist coalition, the episode raises an uncomfortable question not whether the party will confront its extremists, but whether it even recognizes them as such anymore.
Watch Chris Hayes question JD Vance’s position on racist, Nazi-loving texts below.
