JD Vance the Day-After Dove: Dissected

Newsweek · Shane Croucher · 2026-11-06 14:00 UTC

Dissected: The vice president says everyone knows why Republicans lost the midterms. A few facts are missing.

The morning after Democrats secured both chambers of Congress, Vice President JD Vance posted 614 words on X explaining why. "The reason we lost is the war," he wrote—adding, with a lawyer’s care, that "the president himself said so last night."

Donald Trump is the boss for two more years after all, and may still play kingmaker for the Republicans in 2028. Don’t bite the hand that feeds. You’ll get fake tan all over your mouth.

On the core point, Vance is right. Republicans lost not because their voters stayed home but because many of them crossed over. Saying that about his own administration’s war took some nerve, though it perhaps would have meant more before the midterms.

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