Vice President JD Vance on Wednesday blamed the war with Iran for Republicans' Election Day collapse. It is the clearest break he has made with President Trump since taking office.
Vance made the case in a long post on X late Wednesday morning, his first extended comment since Democrats won control of both the House and the Senate. "The reason we lost is the war," he wrote, adding that the president had acknowledged as much the night before.
No to an Amnesty Pivot
Vance predicted that party insiders would spend the coming months arguing that Republicans need to embrace amnesty to win voters back, and he rejected that reading of the results outright. Anyone who believes the war was worth the defeat, he wrote, should make that argument openly, including the price of losing the Senate for the next six years.
On Tuesday night, Trump told The Wall Street Journal and other outlets that Iran was "a piece" of the problem, while insisting he had made the right decision in going to war.
What Defecting Voters Wanted
Citing findings from a pollster, Vance said voters who backed Trump in 2024 but turned away from Republicans this year ranked four priorities highest: ending the war, lowering the cost of living, putting America first and changing the country's relationship with Israel.
He closed on an upbeat note. He told frustrated conservatives they had every right to be angry and urged them to turn that anger into electing Republicans who share their views.
A Change in Tone
The post marks a shift for Vance, a longtime skeptic of foreign interventions. He was reported to have private doubts about the conflict but defended it in public, repeatedly assuring supporters on the campaign trail that Trump would not let Iran become a "forever war."
Donald Trump Jr., an early champion of Vance as his father's running mate and reportedly at odds with the president over the war, said he agreed with every word of the vice president's assessment.
The night was also personal for Vance. Democrat Sherrod Brown won the Ohio Senate seat Vance gave up to become vice president. Vance is widely seen as the front-runner for the 2028 Republican nomination, and he has said he will not decide on a presidential run until after the midterms.
Based on reporting by the New York Post (nypost.com). Photo: Vice President JD Vance, official portrait, March 2026 (Emily J. Higgins, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons).
