JD Vance’s “very awkward” stop at Georgia donut shop goes viral

https://www.newsweek.com/jd-vance-awkward-stop-georgia-donut-shop-1943204

39 comments

  4. Felt like a scene from a really bad M Night Shymalan movie with how robotic he was.

  5. I’ve decided I no longer find Vance funny. He’s too whiny, grating, and tedious. I look forward to never thinking about him again after the election.

  6. I’m delighted by how bad he is at this.

    The less popular he is, the better. There’s some very small percentage of even Trump’s voters that might be reluctant to vote for him again since Vance has a more than decent chance of becoming President if Trump’s elected.

  8. I’d probably be this awkward also but I’m also not running for VP

  9. All jokes aside this guy is truly unaware, it really is sad that this is the best that Trump could come up with for a running mate.

  11. That was weird. Vance’s small talk:

    How long has this store been here? How long have you been here? And you, how long have you been here, and that guy, how long has he been here….

  12. Vance has to be one of the most universally terrible VP picks ever, right? Bruh cant even go to a donut shop and make small talk with actual people for a couple of minutes.

  13. How long have you worked here? Where do you live? Do you have a couch? What do you do with your couch?

    How long have you had a couch?

    Ok good

  14. I saw two different people independently compare him to the alien wearing a man’s skin from Men in Black and the similarities are uncanny.

  15. Props to the first clerk for stating she didn’t want to be identified in the video.

  16. He is extremely awkward, but the Harris/Walz campaign must not make the mistake of thinking debating him will be easy. Take him as seriously as you would any tough opponent. Never make the mistake of slacking off on any opponent, because that is how they can surprise you when you least expect it. 

  17. They cut the part where asked if they had any “plush donuts with good stitching.”

  18. Did someone in his team post this? Why?
    Also, any lingering shred of respect that I may have had for this guy evaporated when he had to ask a staffer how many donuts he should get.

  19. He’s an anchor pulling Trump under. Their campaign is so negative and hopeless and Trump says his term will be about retribution. You have to be a sick fuck to vote for that

  21. Vance: I am running for vice president.

    The woman: Ok.

  22. As somebody who worked in food service, the way she non-chalantly said “okay” when greeted by a vice presidential candidate absolutely sent me. Makes me think of how I spoke to customers who demanded that I accept their coupons.

  24. The worst thing about it was his horrible haircut from the back.

  25. “Hey guys! Whoa! Big Gulps huh?!? Alright! .. … … .. Ok gotta go!”

  26. “Whatever makes sense”

    Dude, if you don’t like doughnuts, that’s fine. But your energy isn’t far off from “An amount of doughnuts enjoyed by a group of fellow human beings”.

    At least we know his conversation skills rival his ability to order doughnuts.

  27. As someone from GA, you really have to work hard to be awkward at a GA donut shop. JD Vance has gone beyond weird.

  28. This is twenty times worse than the yowl that ended Howard Dean’s campaign.

  29. JD Vance brings weird haircut and zero riz to a donut shop for photo op. Hard to argue with campaign strategy like that. About the only redeeming thing about this is that there is a far greater chance they paid for the donuts ..unlike their felonious leader who gives other peoples food away.

  30. She very definitely didn’t want any part of that interaction, but she also wanted to keep her job. She was far more polite than I would have been.

  31. Did he ever ask anyone’s name? I saw that he asked about them in their capacity as workers, seemingly just to fill time, but he seemed to really struggle making a connection to them as people. “How long have you worked here?” “Two years.” “Ok. Good.” No follow up. Just a mental checkbox that he has made human conversation with the worker.

    If he had said “How do you like it here?” or something fun like “Geeze, if I worked at a donut shop for two years I might not fit through that door.” it would have felt so much more genuine. But everything about this stunt felt like a stunt. They obviously thought “Let’s stop by a simple donut shop. Show everyone we like the simple things in life. Meet some regular folk.” but the thing about meeting regular folk when you’re an out of touch politician who sees every interaction as transactional, it really highlights how irregular you are.

  33. That poor girl who didn’t want to be on video is now everywhere

  34. I love how the woman was like, “I don’t want to be on camera”. AKA, I don’t want to be a prop for your stupid political video so you can pretend to have black support. Good for her!

  35. What is so telling is how ill-prepared he was. These types of “off the cuff” campaign events are incredible scripted. The candidate had advance team that scouts locations up to a week in advance. This team is responsible for making sure that the stop will play will with the press, the location fits the campaign agenda, and that the onsite participants will contribute positively to the campaign message. Critically, many of these campaign positions are volunteers supported on a per-diem basis for basic expenses.

    This viral moment screams incompetence. Either the Vance team is either totally checked out, or the purity test demanded of the latent Trump GOP is simply bleeding campaign competency.

    So what does this mean? Vote. Vote like you want a functioning government. Vote like you care that the thousands of people filling politically splintered jobs in the politics government have core competency and care about their jobs and simply give a shit about doing a good job.

  36. The man said “the zoo is in town”. Right from the very first thing he says, he was out of touch and weird. *Zoos* do not travel, JD. You’re thinking of a *circus*. The expression we humans use is “The circus is in town”

  37. I love rhe first lady in the video who makes it clear that she doesn’t want to be filmed.

    “I’m JD Vance. I’m running for president.”

    “Okay.”

    “<silence>”

  38. It’s funny to me, as he was clearly briefed before hand. “Go to a donut shop. Look normal. Interact with The People.”

    But JD doesn’t know how to talk to real people he doesn’t know. Speaking to strangers can be a challenge! So clearly he’s got some crib notes. “What do I say?”

    “I dunno, ask them how long they’ve worked there, normal stuff, you know.”

    So he rolls in. He fires his prepared Opening Joke: “The circus has come to town”. Not a knee slapper, but not much of a reaction either. Alright, time to tell them who JD is and get some handshakes, some Celebrity Fawning Awe, all that good stuff.

    “Don’t film me.”

    Hm, that didn’t take. Okay, let’s launch the A-Game: “How long have you worked here?”

    And… well shit, we’ve reached the end of the script. Uh, “okay good”. Next guy, how long have you worked here? Okay, good. You? Okay, good.

    Uh… improv time, you’ve got this JD… “How long has this place been here?” Bang-pow! Smooth as a velvet sofa.

    And that’s it. That’s all we got.

    …I mean, this is awkward AF and clearly not the response he wanted. They are trying to “relate to the people” but don’t know any of the moves. They lack the empathy to connect to others. And those others… talk about getting the wrong address. They didn’t scope out the area to make sure this was a Republican-friendly donut shop. There was no fawning. No awe. No spectacle.

    A boring, weird man wants to make buying donuts from disinterested minimum-wage workers into an Event. It goes about as well as one would expect.

  39. “How long have you worked here?” feels like a rude and invasive question but I’m not sure why.

    I guess it’s sort of like, “What’s your employment history?” Someone working there could feel insecure about not having worked there long, and someone who’s worked there a long time might wish they’d moved up the ladder or gotten a different job by now.

    No matter what, no one is going to find that question interesting. It doesn’t naturally lead to more conversation unless you force it, and it’s not a necessary introduction for more interesting questions like “Which kind is your favorite?” In fact, Obama would’ve asked, “Which donut is the most popular?” then “Which is your personal favorite?” then get the employees involved in joking around about which person’s choice is the best.

    But Obama wouldn’t be in that donut shop at all. It’s a chain store that’s been there only 4 years, and there are only 3 employees and no customers in the shop. Obama would go to a place that’s more important to local history and that had lots of people to interact with. And he probably wouldn’t walk in during a hot summer day wearing a full suit and tie. He definitely wouldn’t have had that haircut.

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