Republican JD Vance runs scared from Trump-bashing past

Author JD Vance, who is running for a Senate seat, has avoided debates that threatened to highlight his past criticism of Donald Trump.

Previous attacks on former US president Donald Trump have derailed author JD Vance’s Senate candidacy. Picture: AFP

The millionaire author JD Vance, who is running for a Senate seat in Republican colours, has ducked out of two debates that threatened to highlight his past criticism of Donald Trump.

Vance’s attempts to disavow remarks from 2016 that Mr Trump was “an idiot”, “reprehensible” and “noxious”, have fallen flat as he faces a barrage of attacks from Trump loyalists

The creator of Hillbilly Elegy, recently adapted for a Hollywood movie, is the latest Republican candidate to find his views coming back to haunt him, ­despite efforts by the party’s senior figures to sideline the former president.

Republican leaders have urged members to move on from last year’s election defeat and look forward to the midterms in 2022. The party needs to swing only a handful of seats to take back control of both houses of congress next year, hobbling President Joe Biden as his term winds down.

Mitch McConnell, 79, the ­Republican Senate majority leader, said this week that the 2022 midterm race “will be about the future, not about the past … it is likely to be a very good election for Republicans”. He was among those who clashed with Mr Trump for refusing to endorse his claim that the 2020 election was stolen.

Chris Christie, 59, the former New Jersey governor, said on Sunday that Republicans were “wasting time talking about past elections … it is over”.

Mr Trump was quick to retaliate: “Everybody remembers that Chris left New Jersey with a less than 9 per cent approval rating – a record low.”

With the party base in his thrall as he toys with another White House run in 2024, Mr Trump, 75, still dominates the Republican landscape. Glenn Youngkin, 54, the party’s candidate in the race to be Virginia governor, kept Mr Trump at a distance throughout his campaign, in an effort to broaden his appeal to swing voters, but he did accept the former president’s ­endorsement as “an honour”. Mr Youngkin overturned a huge deficit in a state that Mr Biden carried by 10 points last year to win with ease, setting a template that Republican challengers will aim to copy nationwide.

Mr Trump’s constant meddling and the daily stream of messages riling up supporters via his website make it all but impossible for Republican candidates to thrive without his endorsement. Adam Kinzinger, 43, a Republican member of the House from Illinois who voted to impeach Mr Trump, confirmed last month that he would not seek re-election.

Vance, 37, has found his election hopes crumbling as his ­attacks on the former president resurfaced in Ohio. “I’m a Never Trump guy,” Vance said in a 2016 interview, admitting also that he did not vote for him in the election. “I never liked him.”

He has tried to backtrack, claiming he regretted his ­remarks and now “stands with Trump” but the betrayal appears to have doomed his campaign.

Mr Trump’s endorsement threatens to create further controversy for the party: Sean Parnell, 40, whom he backed for the Senate race in Pennsylvania, is mired in allegations of domestic abuse, with his estranged wife claiming he beat his children and choked her, as an ugly divorce plays out in the courts. Mr Parnell denies the allegations.

The Times