California Gov. Gavin Newsom has never been shy about taking shots at President Donald Trump, but lately his focus has shifted. With Vice President JD Vance increasingly viewed as the next standard-bearer of the MAGA movement, Newsom is warning that the bigger threat may not be the man at the top — but the one positioning himself to inherit the throne.
During a recent interview, Newsom suggested Vance doesn’t just mirror Trump — he surpasses him in one key way, a remark that quickly ignited debate online.
During a sit down with Jen Psaki of MS Now, Newsom didn’t just take aim at Trump. He zeroed in on Vance — and what he suggested makes him more dangerous.
“There are some people waiting in the wings in the MAGA world who would love to be the chosen ones of the Trump orbit. JD Vance is one of them. Marco Rubio is one of them. Do you think they can carry on the MAGA flame here?” Psaki asked.
Newsom was reflective but very pointed and direct in his response.
“No, but Vance, for whatever reason, scares me,” Newsom admitted. “Almost more than Trump.”
“Why?” Psaki pressed.
“I don’t know. I just, I mean, talk about a guy who put a mask on and his face grew into it,” the governor bluntly stated.
“I mean, JD Vance and Marco Rubio were two of the most effective critics, just like that guy, what’s his name? Graham … Lindsey, of Donald Trump,” Newsom continued before proclaiming, “What frauds, what phonies, but JD is a unique fraud and phony, and he’s a little more dangerous.”
But Newsom’s comments were only the beginning of the debate about why Vance “scares” some even more than Trump. The theories quickly began piling up online.
“This is so true. JD lies more smoothly than Trump,” this Threads user believes.
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Another Threads user chimed in with a similar take on Vance’s moral character or lack of one:
“He’s absolutely correct. Vance is a covert sociopath. He has no true identity, suffering from a severe identity crisis that has spanned into his adulthood. That lack of identity makes him very, very easily influenced because he lacks any true values.
Threads poster WinterMint2022 was much more specific and put a name to why Vance doesn’t sit right with so many Americans:
“He scares you because he has no morals. He’ll jump onto any train or any thought so long as it keeps him in power. … We know Trump is a narcissist and ultimately just wants his ego catered too. As evil as that is, we can justify it. Vance makes no sense, lacking integrity, and morals.”
Another commenter added a sharper edge to the debate, writing, “Jd was molded and groomed by Peter Thiel.. extremely terrifying. He put him through college as well.”
That connection is not unfounded. Tech billionaire and venture capitalist Peter Thiel — often described as a Republican kingmaker — was one of Vance’s earliest and most influential backers.
In 2022, Thiel poured $15 million into Protect Ohio Values, Vance’s Senate campaign fund, according to The Conversation. It was one of the largest donations ever made to a single Senate race at the time.
Thiel, Vance’s former employer at Mithril Capital, was widely reported to have privately advocated for him during discussions about Trump’s running mate, helping position Vance for the vice presidency.
The Thiel influence only deepened the online debated over whether Vance merely adapted to Trump or transformed himself to secure his rise.
That transformation is particularly striking given Vance’s past.
Vance was once a staunch critic of Trump, a never-Trumper, along with other now Republican bootlickers.
Vance, the Ivy League-educated author of the best-selling memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” once called Trump “cultural heroin” and a proponent of falsehoods and fake promises to the American middle class, according to The New York Times.
During Trump’s first term as president, Vance once called him “America’s Hitler” and an “idiot,” Politico reported. He also said during a 2016 interview, “I never liked him.”
But by 2021, when he was running for an open Senate seat in Ohio, Vance had rolled over and profusely apologized to Trump, crawling on his belly to court the president and slither into his good graces.
At the vice presidential debate, when confronted directly about his past anti-Trump comments, Vance acknowledged his reversal.
“I was wrong about Donald Trump,” Vance said. “And yeah, when you screw up, when you misspeak, when you get something wrong and you change your mind, you ought to be honest with the American people about it.”
But Newsom also called out Secretary of State Marco Rubio and South Carolina GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham, both of whom were once fierce never-Trumpers, too, and are now close allies in the MAGA world.
In a recently resurfaced video that’s since gone viral, Rubio is heard calling Trump a “con man” at a Super Tuesday evening in 2016.
“I will never stop until we keep a con man from taking over the party of Reagan and the conservative movement.”
Both are on the record as having severely criticized Trump for years before throwing away any moral hesitations or guilty consciences to become some of Trump’s most loyal supporters.
