Vice President JD Vance sparked instant outrage Thursday by slipping a political joke into his remarks about attending the 25th anniversary ceremony of the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
The moment unfolded while Vance hosted a White House press briefing, where he initially described the 9/11 ceremony as “an amazing honor” that he said he was “looking forward to.”
“I think that sense of commonality and common purpose that we all had on 9/11, that’s something that we should really try every single day to get back to,” Vance said.
But moments later, he cracked a joke about former President Joe Biden, who is undergoing treatment for cancer.
“As you guys can probably guess, I’m really looking forward to hanging out with Joe Biden,” Vance said with a smile. “I’m sure that we’ll have many, many intense intellectual conversations.”
He added: “It’ll be great. We’ll have a great time with Joe Biden and the other presidents.”
The attempted punchline drew immediate condemnation online.
“Vance is such a prick,” wrote former Obama national security staffer Tommy Vietor on X. “Biden is undergoing cancer treatment, but glad JD could use the anniversary of 9/11 to take a cheap shot at him.”
Freelance politics and culture writer Nick Field added: “He thinks he's so cool, and it comes off so pathetic.”
“Why? Who is the audience for this?” asked Obama campaign alum Ravi Gupta. “You can't even pretend to be a leader for all Americans on the anniversary of 9/11?”
Former Obama official Tim Fullerton said the comments from the vice president “showed who he really is,” while Missouri Democratic congressional candidate Fred Wellman called Vance a “pathetic worm of a man.”
“He’s talking about the 25th anniversary of the largest terrorist attack in American history as a laugh line to smear the former President,” Wellman wrote in a social media post.
One podcaster who goes by the X handle "@HalforNY__" offered a joke of his own: "The JD stands for joke delivery."
Vance is such a prick. Biden is undergoing cancer treatment, but glad JD could use the anniversary of 9/11 to take a cheap shot at him. https://t.co/CeTv3o8fNZ
— Tommy Vietor (@TVietor08) September 3, 2026
