{"id":2334242,"date":"2024-08-30T11:34:02","date_gmt":"2024-08-30T15:34:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/vance-defends-his-and-trumps-use-of-memes-to-attack-harris-washington-examiner\/"},"modified":"2024-08-30T11:40:03","modified_gmt":"2024-08-30T15:40:03","slug":"vance-defends-his-and-trumps-use-of-memes-to-attack-harris-washington-examiner","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/vance-defends-his-and-trumps-use-of-memes-to-attack-harris-washington-examiner\/","title":{"rendered":"Vance defends his and Trump\u2019s use of memes to attack Harris &#8211; Washington Examiner"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">28<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fvance-defends-his-and-trumps-use-of-memes-to-attack-harris-washington-examiner%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=2334242&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><p>In a recent CNN interview, Senator \u200bJ.D. \u2063Vance\u200c (R-OH) defended the\u2062 use of memes and jokes by himself and former\u200d President Donald Trump, particularly in the context of their critiques of Vice President Kamala Harris. This discussion arose after Trump reposted a crude meme \u200dabout Harris on his Truth Social account. When questioned by CNN&#8217;s John Berman about whether\u200c such posts contributed to uplifting the public,\u2063 Vance argued that Trump&#8217;s approach reflects a fun, relatable campaign style that contrasts with a more serious, conventional political discourse. He expressed that joking and\u200c humor are valuable \u2062in politics, even in light of criticisms regarding the misogynistic nature of some memes shared. \u2064Vance\u2064 also referenced a viral meme he posted about a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/transgender-beauty-queen-takes-crown-calls-win-a-celebration-of-womanhood-and-diversity\/\" title=\"Transgender Beauty Queen Takes Crown, Calls Win A \u2018Celebration Of Womanhood And Diversity\u2019\">beauty pageant contestant<\/a> as a joke, which unintentionally connected to the contestant&#8217;s past struggles with mental health. He stated\u2064 that his intention was not to\u2064 cause harm but to\u2064 engage\u2064 in humor, although he acknowledged the complexity of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/charles-lipson-can-desantis-get-past-the-donald\/\" title=\"Charles Lipson: Can DeSantis Get Past the Donald?\">discussing sensitive topics<\/a>. Vance\u200d emphasized the need for light-heartedness\u200c in \u200dpolitical\u2063 discussions while \u2062redirecting the focus to pressing issues facing American families.  <\/p>\n<p class=\"readmore\">\n    <button onclick=\"showReadMore()\" id=\"readmorebtn\">Read more&#8230;<\/button>\n<\/p>\n<hr id=\"line\">\n<span id=\"more\"><\/p>\n<p><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><?xml encoding=\"utf-8\" ?><\/p>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-button\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-icon td-icon-mobile\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-header-search-button-mob dropdown-toggle\" data-toggle=\"dropdown\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-search-icon td-icon-search\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><span class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-button\"><i class=\"tdb-mobile-menu-icon td-icon-mobile\"><\/i><\/span><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<div class=\"tdb-drop-down-search\" aria-labelledby=\"td-header-search-button\">\n<div class=\"tdb-drop-down-search-inner\">\n<form method=\"get\" class=\"tdb-search-form\" action=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\"><\/form>\n<div class=\"tdb-aj-search\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/#\" role=\"button\" aria-label=\"Search\" class=\"tdb-head-search-btn dropdown-toggle\" data-toggle=\"dropdown\"><i class=\"tdb-search-icon td-icon-search\"><\/i><\/a><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<h1 class=\"tdb-title-text\">Vance defends his and Trump&rsquo;s use of memes to attack Harris<\/h1>\n<div><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-title-line\"><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\">\n<div id=\"Brid_1741266\" class=\"tpd-featured-video bridtv\"><\/div>\n<p>In a tense interview with CNN, Sen. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/jd-vance\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"J.D. Vance\">J.D. Vance<\/a> (R-OH) defended his and former President <a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/tag\/donald-trump\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"Donald Trump's\">Donald Trump&rsquo;s<\/a> use of jokes and memes.<\/p>\n<div class=\"article-paywall\">\n<p>As part of a series of 30 reposts of memes over about a half-hour period on Wednesday on Trump&rsquo;s Truth Social account, the former president reposted a <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/david-axelrod-says-trump-unsettled-by-transformation-of-democrats-ticket-washington-examiner\/\" title=\"David Axelrod says Trump \u2018unsettled\u2019 by \u2018transformation\u2019 of Democrats\u2019 ticket - Washington Examiner\">crude sexual joke<\/a> about Vice President Kamala Harris, referencing her relationship with former San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown. During an interview on <em>CNN News Central<\/em> with John Berman, Vance was questioned about the post, after criticizing Harris for not lifting &ldquo;this country up&rdquo; and previously calling for Trump to be banned from <a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/why-this-average-american-is-voting-for-donald-trump\/\" title=\"Why This Average American Is Voting for Donald Trump\">social media<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;You were talking about Trump&lsquo;s social media, would&nbsp;you describe his posts over the&nbsp;last 48 hours as lifting&nbsp;people up?&rdquo; Berman asked. &ldquo;Quoting, reposting&nbsp;QAnon statements, reposting&nbsp;these misogynistic memes&nbsp;about Vice President Harris and&nbsp;Hillary Clinton? That&lsquo;s the&nbsp;kind of open discussion that&nbsp;you think is lifting people up?&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;Well John, I think if you&nbsp;look at Donald Trump&lsquo;s full&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/biden-throws-support-behind-newsom-urges-voters-to-reject-recall\/\" title=\"Biden Throws Support Behind Newsom, Urges Voters To Reject Recall\">campaign appearances<\/a> and yes,&nbsp;his social media appearances, what you see is two things: a guy with an agenda to lower&nbsp;prices and bring back American&nbsp;prosperity, and a political&nbsp;candidate who isn&lsquo;t stodgy,&nbsp;who likes to have some fun and&nbsp;likes to tell some jokes,&rdquo; Vance replied. <\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I&lsquo;d&nbsp;much rather have a candidate&nbsp;who&lsquo;s willing to go off&nbsp;script, who&lsquo;s willing to give&nbsp;every interview and is willing&nbsp;to tell some jokes,&rdquo; he continued. &ldquo;I do think&nbsp;that&lsquo;s how you lift people up.&nbsp;A politics of boring scolds&nbsp;telling people they can&lsquo;t&nbsp;laugh? That is not lifting&nbsp;Americans up, that&rsquo;s how to tear us down.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Berman then pressed Vance about his posting of a viral meme featuring a beauty pageant contestant in 2007, Caitlin Upton, during which she gave an infamously incoherent answer during the Q&amp;A part of the pageant. Vance captioned the video by jokingly claiming it was a clip from Harris&rsquo;s interview with CNN. Upton later said the attention she received from the incident made her consider suicide.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;So when you posted this last night, were&nbsp;you aware that the woman you&nbsp;are posting a picture of had&nbsp;contemplated committing suicide&nbsp;for the attention that it&nbsp;received?&rdquo; the CNN host asked.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;No, certainly not John, and my heart goes out to her, and I hope that she&rsquo;s doing well,&rdquo; Vance replied. &ldquo;Look, I&rsquo;ve said a lot of things on camera, I&rsquo;ve said a lot of stupid things on camera. Sometimes when you&rsquo;re in the public eye, you make mistakes. And again, I think the best way to deal with it is to laugh at ourselves, laugh at this stuff, and try to have some fun in politics.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;I posted a meme from 20 years ago, and I think the fact that we&lsquo;re&nbsp;talking about that instead of&nbsp;the fact that American families&nbsp;can&lsquo;t afford groceries or&nbsp;healthcare, young families can&rsquo;t&nbsp;afford to buy a home to raise&nbsp;their families in, those are&nbsp;the real crises that we should&nbsp;focus on,&rdquo; he continued.<\/p>\n<p>The Republican vice presidential nominee then turned to a wider point about humor in politics.<\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;There&lsquo;s nothing&nbsp;that says that we can&lsquo;t tell&nbsp;some jokes along the way while we deal with the very serious&nbsp;business of bringing back our&nbsp;public policy,&rdquo; he said. &ldquo;Politics has&nbsp;gotten way too lame, John, way&nbsp;too boring. You can have some&nbsp;fun while making a good&nbsp;argument to the American people&nbsp;about how you&lsquo;re going to&nbsp;improve their lives.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Berman then pressed him on the beauty pageant video, asking if he would like to apologize.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title><strong><\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&ldquo;John, I&rsquo;m not going to apologize for posting a joke, but I wish the best for Caitlin,&rdquo; Vance responded. &ldquo;I hope that she&rsquo;s doing well, and again, what I&lsquo;d say&nbsp;is one bad moment shouldn&lsquo;t&nbsp;define anybody, and the best way&nbsp;to deal with this stuff is to&nbsp;laugh at ourselves.&rdquo;<\/p>\n<p>Vance&rsquo;s posting of the video wasn&rsquo;t the first connection between Upton and Trump &mdash; after the 2007 pageant, she <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20071029125549\/http:\/\/www.news.com.au\/entertainment\/story\/0%2C23663%2C22450632-10229%2C00.html\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\" title=\"signed a contract\">signed a contract<\/a> with Trump&rsquo;s modeling agency.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <script data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/cdn-cgi\/scripts\/5c5dd728\/cloudflare-static\/email-decode.min.js\"><\/script><script>!function(){var g=window;g.googletag=g.googletag||{},g.googletag.cmd=g.googletag.cmd||[],g.googletag.cmd.push(function(){g.googletag.pubads().setTargeting(\"has-featured-video\",\"true\")})}();<\/script><script>var _bp=_bp||[];_bp.push({\"div\":\"Brid_1741266\",\"obj\":{\"id\":\"27789\",\"width\":\"1280\",\"height\":\"720\",\"stickyDirection\":\"below\",\"video\":\"1741266\"}});<\/script><script defer src=\"https:\/\/services.brid.tv\/player\/build\/brid.min.js\"><\/script><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<div class=\"tdb-block-inner td-fix-index\"><\/div>\n<p><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In a heated CNN interview, Senator J.D. Vance (R-OH) stood by his and former President Donald Trump&#8217;s use of memes and humor to criticize Vice President Kamala Harris. During the interview, which took place after Trump shared a crude sexual joke about Harris on his Truth Social account, Vance was questioned by host John Berman about whether such posts were uplifting for the public. Vance responded that Trump&#8217;s campaign is focused on lowering prices and restoring American prosperity while also being entertaining and relatable. He argued that having a candidate who can joke around is more beneficial than one who is overly serious.<\/p>\n<p>Berman pressed further regarding Vance&#8217;s own meme featuring Caitlin Upton from a 2007 beauty pageant, which had drawn negative attention due to her incoherent response during the Q&amp;A segment. When asked if he was aware of Upton&#8217;s struggles with mental health following that incident, Vance expressed sympathy but maintained that humor has its place in politics. He emphasized that focusing on lightheartedness can help address serious issues facing American families today.<\/p>\n<p>Vance concluded by stating he wouldn&#8217;t apologize for sharing the meme but wished Upton well, asserting that one unfortunate moment shouldn&#8217;t define anyone and advocating for laughter as a way to cope with challenges in politics. Notably, this wasn&#8217;t the first time Upton had been linked to Trump; she had previously signed with his modeling agency after her pageant appearance<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2653,"featured_media":2334243,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Trump_Vance_jj1p3.webp","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[4021,19561,32171,3634,15469],"class_list":["post-2334242","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-harris","tag-memes","tag-political-commentary","tag-trump","tag-vance"],"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/08\/Trump_Vance_jj1p3.webp","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2334242","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2653"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2334242"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2334242\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2334243"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2334242"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2334242"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2334242"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}