J. D. Vance Has a Tucker Carlson Problem

By Roger L Simon

MAGA and most other Republicans are rightly concerned about the midterms and even more about the 2028 presidential election.

That latter election would give a Democrat—of whatever stripe, but possibly AOC or even Zohran Mamdani (were that legal)—the opportunity to reverse everything President Trump has done through executive order. They could also, if you are listening to what they are saying, do several degrees worse and make the Biden Administration look like the second coming of Calvin Coolidge.

“From the river to the sea” would mean the Hudson to the Pacific.

As most know, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination is J. D. Vance, an estimable fellow, currently vice president and both a former senator and a best-selling author of a legitimate (not political) book.

Also in the running—or would be except he has already said he would not run if Vance does—is the longtime senator and, equally estimable, Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Trump has declared that Vance and Rubio running together would be a “dream team,” but so far, although it has not been specified, that would put the vice president at the top.

Another likely candidate is popular Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who has been notching important achievements of late, among them banning CAIR and the Muslim Brotherhood in his state and advocating the elimination of most property taxes.

This would all be well and good except the GOP appears to be in the middle of a civil war of its own with the renegades led by Candace Owens and Tucker Carlson.

Owens has been revealed to most people as a crackpot and is dismissible, but Carlson, despite his increasingly extreme positions, maintains significant influence.

The epicenter of the civil war at the moment is the TPUSA AmFest in Phoenix. So far, it has been nonviolent and limited to speeches. Early on, Ben Shapiro did a good job of excoriating Carlson and Co., as judged by audience response. Carlson himself followed him and was met with something closer to uncomfortable silence.

The former Fox News host was singing the praises of Islam, which he called “mostly good,” and Sharia law, of which he has recently and suddenly become supportive. Despite having a wife and daughters, Tucker is apparently not overly concerned with Sharia’s legalized misogyny—one man is considered equal to two women in court; a daughter receives half the inheritance of a son; a wife must obey her husband’s sexual demands whatever they are; if a wife disobeys, a husband may strike her; four male witnesses are required to convict for rape, and so forth, including travel restrictions without a male guardian, not to mention all the face and body covering regulations and on and on. Technically, apostates from Islam are to be killed. Some of this has been loosened up in some societies, but far from all.

Tucker has also made outrageous comments about Jews and Israel. Just the other day, he told us that Israel was an “insignificant” country with no “natural resources” at the very same time Israel was closing a $31bn deal to sell its LNG to Egypt, which was shortly after it had made a deal to sell its Arrow-3 missile defense system to Germany for more than double that sum. “Insignificant” Israel is a rather obvious technology and gas (i.e., natural resource) giant.

Is Tucker’s cognitive disorder Qatar’s doing? Maybe partly, but it is J. D. Vance’s problem. Currently, he and others are unable to shake themselves free of Carlson’s celebrity and the attendant charisma that remains.

If they don’t, it could sink the Republican ship. I’m not just talking about the Jews, many of whom were in the process of shifting to the GOP or already had, only to be repelled by Tucker’s antisemitic ravings, but also about the evangelicals who constitute a much larger backbone of the Republican Party. Without them, they are lost.

As many have noted, demography is destiny. Among Jews, the more orthodox are the fastest-growing segment, obeying the biblical admonition to be fruitful and multiply. The others, like most secular people, are having fewer children. The orthodox have long been the most conservative and by far the most likely to vote Republican—until the advent of Tucker’s screeds.

Evangelical fertility rates are diminishing slightly, but they too outpace the general population. Tucker disdains them even more than he does the Jews and has said as much. The evangelicals certainly have heard this. As people who know that key Republican segment better than I do have told me, many are likely to stay home.

This places J. D. Vance in a box. He must separate from Tucker and his followers, but he must do so subtly to avoid escalating the already percolating civil war. I sympathize with his dilemma. I used to like Tucker, too. Many of us did. He blurbed a recent book of mine. But, as he tells us, he was seized by a demon. I don’t particularly believe in such phenomena, but maybe now I do, because it doesn’t seem to have let go.

So if J. D. doesn’t start to separate himself, either he, his nomination, the GOP, or all of the above are doomed.

Thus far, TPUSA has been his ally, but he needs more. He needs to take action himself, his own version of a Bill Clinton “Sista Souljah” moment regarding the extreme alt-right. This moment may not have quite arrived, but it’s not far off. Someday soon, it will definitely be there. J. D. should be ready to seize the time.

First published in American Refugees