Trumpism is often called a cult of personality. And as a strange moment at town hall on Thursday showed, not even Trump’s running mate is immune.
On Thursday, J.D. Vance appeared for a town hall in Michigan that was broadcast on NewsNation. During the event, a call came in to the town hall, which per the host, was from “former President Donald John Trump,” who “wants to weigh in.”
When asked what his question was for his running mate, Trump said “I do have a question, and I think it’ll be quite an interesting one, and the answer should be easy- how brilliant is Donald J. Trump?”
Vance laughed, the crowd applauded, and Vance joked that because it was a panel of undecided voters, “I hope I have your vote.” His answer to the question? “First of all sir, of course, you’re very brilliant. We both agree that it’s important to have very smart people running our government.”
Trump just called into the News Nation town hall with JD Vance to ask, “How brilliant is Donald Trump?”
JD Vance replied: “First of all, sir, of course, you’re very brilliant.”
It’s a cult. pic.twitter.com/XfI2kxJFaG
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) October 25, 2024
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His second question to Vance?
“Maybe I’ll ask a second one. I watched, believe it or not, CNN last night. And in watching it, I watched the town hall with Kamala. Let me ask you for a second [unintelligible] and it was not good. How brilliant is Kamala?,” Trump said, per Mediaite.
“That’s a very tough one, Sir,” Vance replied.
It was an extremely bizarre exchange, even by Trump/Vance standards, and it’s hard to imagine anyone else in politics ever having a similar conversation.
The whole thing was reminsicent of the cabinet meetings Trump used to hold as president, when the different cabinet secretaries would go around the table and take turns praising Trump.
Trump just went around and had his cabinet and senior staff praise him on camera https://t.co/zv1SsXgTU5 pic.twitter.com/GEawOsdojW
— Colin Jones (@colinjones) June 12, 2017
Of course, the majority of the people in those meetings, having served Trump previously, have not endorsed Trump for another term. As of August, only half of the 42 people who had served in Trump’s cabinet had announced that they had endorsed him, although the majority of Trump’s original cabinet, including the likes of Rex Tillerson and Jeff Sessions, had acrimonious departures from the Administration.
Featured image via You Tube/screengrab
