JD Vance Claimed Trump Won 2020 Election In Damning Clip

The Republican vice presidential nominee, Senator JD Vance of Ohio, falsely and brazenly claimed that Donald Trump won the 2020 election in a newly resurfaced exchange from two years ago.

Trump’s running mate, who has repeatedly propped up the Republican presidential nominee’s election conspiracy theories, was asked by Jason Selvig of The Good Liars, a political comedy duo, if he believed Trump’s repeatedly disproved claims that President Joe Biden stole the election from him. The clip was posted online by Selvig on Thursday.

“Did Donald Trump win the 2020 election?” Selvig asked Vance.

“Yes,” Vance replied. When Selvig repeated the question, Vance gave an affirmative “yep.”

Selvig then asked Vance whether he’d concede if his opponent won more votes. Vance then refused to answer. 

“I really feel bad for you, man,” Vance said to Selvig after he repeated the question.

Vance has been facing pressure to address where he stands on Trump’s election conspiracy theories since his debate Tuesday against Democratic vice presidential nominee Tim Walz. On stage, Walz asked Vance if he believes Trump won the 2020 election, alluding to comments Vance made earlier this year questioning the election’s results and saying Trump should ignore “illegitimate” US Supreme Court rulings on the matter.

“Tim, I’m focused on the future,” Vance replied before pivoting to an attack on Harris.

Walz quickly called him out.

“That is a damning non-answer,” he said. “I’m pretty shocked by this. [Trump] lost the election. This is not a debate. It’s not anything anywhere other than in Donald Trump’s world.”

When a reporter asked Vance the next day why he dodged the question, he accused the press of being hyper-focused on the issue.

“The media is obsessed with talking about the election of four years ago,” Vance replied, adding, “I’m focused on the election of 33 days from now because I want to throw Kamala Harris out of office and get back to commonsense economic policies.”

Vance’s insistence that the media move on from the matter stands in stark contrast to messaging from Trump, who still regularly brings up his accusations about the 2020 election at his rallies.

CORRECTION: An earlier version of this article said the video of Vance saying that Trump did win the 2020 election was recorded on Thursday, after the vice presidential debate. The video was from 2022, when Vance was running for Senate.