JD Vance Makes Dumb Look Strategic

JD Vance went on Fox to “help” Trump. Instead, he shoved his boss into the Epstein quicksand, handed Democrats a rope, and smiled stupidly for the cameras.

Guest article by Michael Cohen. For more from Michael, join him on Substack here.

Let me explain something to you about the Trump playbook. It’s not complicated. It’s not some mystical art passed down from golden escalator to golden escalator. The rules are simple: deny everything, deflect blame, dominate the narrative. And above all else—above all else—don’t hand your enemies a loaded gun and invite them to start shooting at you.

JD Vance clearly missed that day of class.

On Sunday, our genius Vice President—the man supposedly handpicked for his loyalty, his smarts, his ability to “fight”—waddled into Maria Bartiromo’s Fox News studio and decided that the best way to deal with the political minefield of the Epstein files was… wait for it… to blame Joe Biden. Not just blame him; to actually suggest that it’s the Biden administration that’s stonewalling on the release of the files.

Let’s pause for a moment here. Ok. Now, let’s proceed.

Hey JD, your boss is the President of the United States. Not Biden. Not Obama. Not Bill Clinton. It’s Donald J. Trump. You know, the man you work for. The guy who promised, on the campaign trail, to “release all the Epstein files” the second he got back into office. And here you are, pointing at Biden like a kid trying to distract mom from the fact that it’s your hand in the cookie jar.

This wasn’t some minor gaffe. This was political malpractice. Within minutes of the interview airing, Republicans—Republicans—were roasting him online. Bill Kristol, Jon Favreau, random conservatives, Never Trumpers, and MAGA purists all chanting the same thing: Fine. Release them. No redactions. Names. Dates. All of it.

What JD did in that moment wasn’t just dumb; it was dangerous for Donald. He reignited a bipartisan firestorm over a scandal the Trump White House has been desperately trying to contain. He gave every critic of Trump’s Epstein promise a megaphone. And he reminded the country that the President’s name appears “multiple times” in those files—not according to some left-wing conspiracy rag, but according to AG Pam Bondi’s own DOJ review.

Now, here’s where it gets really rich. Four days before that Fox interview, Vance reportedly huddled in the White House with Bondi and Kash Patel for a “strategy session” on how to handle the Epstein mess. This was supposed to be the big brains coming together to get the messaging under control. And what was the brilliant outcome? JD going on TV, blaming the wrong administration, and single-handedly reviving the “Trump is hiding something” narrative. If that’s strategy, then I’m Albert Einstein.

The playbook says you control the narrative by keeping the focus on your opponent’s weaknesses, not by spotlighting your own unkept promises. The playbook says you make yourself the attacker, not the punchline. JD managed to do the exact opposite; he turned himself into a walking, talking meme generator. By Sunday afternoon, the old Mar-a-Lago footage of Trump partying with Epstein and Maxwell was back in rotation. The “Trump, Why Won’t You Release the Epstein Files?” billboard was trending again. Every cable panel was asking the same question: If you have nothing to hide, why not just release them?

And here’s the brutal truth: that’s not a question the White House has a good answer for. The DOJ has already said there’s no “client list,” then Bondi told the world she’s got one “sitting on my desk.” The contradictions are glaring. The base is restless. The conspiracy crowd feels betrayed. This is a political migraine on its best day; and jerkoff JD just served it an espresso.

I’ve worked for Trump. I know what he hates. He hates being cornered. He hates being reminded of promises he hasn’t kept. And he really hates when his own people give the media an opening to make him look weak or dishonest. JD’s Fox performance did all three at once.

You can’t spin this as loyalty. Loyalty isn’t running interference so poorly that you hand the opposition better ammo than they had before you opened your mouth. Loyalty is knowing when to fight, how to fight, when to pivot, and when to shut the hell up.

So let me give JD some free advice—from a guy who’s been there, cleaned up the messes, and paid the price for them: learn the playbook, or stop pretending you’re the quarterback. The job isn’t to make yourself the story. It’s to make the other guy, the opposition, bleed. If you can’t do that without shooting your own team in the foot, then the best thing you can do for the boss, and for your own career, is to stay silent.

Because right now, the only thing your Sunday performance proved is that you’re not Trump’s secret weapon. You’re his slow leak. And every time you step in front of a camera without thinking, you make one thing very, very clear: the question haunting this White House isn’t “Why won’t Biden release the Epstein files?” It’s “Why won’t Trump?”

Until you have an answer that doesn’t make him look worse, just keep your mouth shut, stupid. And while you’re at it, ease up on the eyeliner.

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