In a new interview with NBC News, Ohio Sen. JD Vance finally weighed in on his painfully awkward encounter at a donut shop in Valdosta, Georgia last week. The video from the campaign stop featured Vance attempting to make friendly small talk with the clerk, who appeared to have no interest in being seen on camera with him. In his NBC interview, however, Vance chalked the awkwardness up to the clerk being nervous.
“I just felt terrible for that woman,” Vance said. “We walked in, and there’s 20 Secret Service agents, and there’s 15 cameras, and she clearly had not been properly warned, and she was terrified, right? I just felt awful for her.”
Vance added that he told his staff to change their strategy a bit after the incident. “I like to get out there and talk to people, and we want to make sure we’re doing it, but definitely make sure that people are at least OK with being on camera, or we’re going to walk in and you’re going to have a person who has, practically, a panic attack because she’s got 15 cameras in her face,” he said.
When Vance introduced himself to the donut shop employee with, “I’m JD Vance, I’m running for vice president, good to see you,” she made her feelings about meeting him known with a simple, “OK.” Later, he finished his donut order by asking for “whatever makes sense.”
The vice presidential candidate also used his NBC interview to throw in a dig at the Harris-Walz campaign, saying, “We don’t want to have these scripted events—I don’t want to go and do three takes of buying Doritos at a Sheetz.”
He was referring to Harris and Walz’s recent stop at a Sheetz gas station in Pennsylvania, where Walz handed Harris a bag of Doritos. The clip’s been widely interpreted as a tongue-in-cheek jab towards Fox News and their negative reaction to Harris eating Doritos during the 2016 election.
Vance’s comments on his interaction with the donut clerk come after a week of widespread mockery of his behavior in the store, from viral TikTok impressions to X users speculating that Vance’s campaign team hates him and is setting him up to fail.
The video came across even worse due to Tim Walz’ viral visit to a Nebraska sandwich shop the day before. Walz not only knew exactly what he wanted to order but he seemed to get along great with all the employees there, with zero awkwardness to be found.
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