Republican vice presidential nominee says ‘Germans and other nations’ – not Russia – would ‘have to fund Ukraine’s reconstruction’

JD Vance has suggested that American support for NATO should be predicated on the European Union not regulating Elon Musk and his X social media platform, formerly known as Twitter.

The Republican vice presidential nominee and Ohio senator claimed in an interview with YouTuber Shawn Ryan that a top EU official had threatened to arrest the billionaire if he allowed former President Donald Trump back on X.

“The leader, I forget exactly which official it was within the European Union, but sent Elon this threatening letter that basically said, ‘We’re going to arrest you if you platform Donald Trump,’ who, by the way, is the likely next president of the United States,” Vance said in the interview published last week.

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    • psmgx@lemmy.world
      752·
      2 months ago

      I think it’s Musk’s backers, the Russians who helped fund the twitter acquisition, who are really taking center stage.

      Lots of talk about Europe and NATO means they’re pushing hard for those talking points.

  • FelixCress@lemmy.world
    1261·
    2 months ago

    “I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives,” Vance added. “But European countries should theoretically share American values, especially about some very basic things like free speech.

    The US ranked 26th in the world when it comes to free speech, with several members of the European Union higher up the list, according to the 2024 Global Expression Report.

    😂😂😂

    • Asafum@feddit.nl
      281·
      2 months ago

      “I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives, but I’m going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives!”

      Hate and Ignorance: The American Way™

      • Miles O'Brien@startrek.websiteEnglish
        14·
        2 months ago

        WOAH there, slow down a bit.

        He would never go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives.

        He will send OTHER people, no point in getting his shoes dirty by actually going there.

        It’s an American tradition.

  • njm1314@lemmy.world
    96·
    2 months ago

    It’s an amazing thing to say you can abandon a military Alliance because a campaign donor ask you to.

    • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldEnglish
      101·
      2 months ago

      That’s just how the Trumpies do business. “Give me what I want or I’m leaving” is how Trump claimed he renegotiated NAFTA and reworked the US / China trade relationship and was allegedly going to forge an Amazing Massive Incredibly Lucrative New Deal with the then-Brexit-ing UK.

      Far more often than not, the renegotiation just involves bribing Trump and his immediate crony base of support in order to leave existing policies alone. That is, incidentally, how Trump left the back door to Mexico open for Chinese EV imports, despite claiming it was the bestest renegotiation of a trade deal in the history of ever.

      If Vance is ever in a position of authority, there’s little doubt he’ll be at some NATO summit demanding everyone in Germany buy a copy of Hillbilly Elegy in order to get him to STFU about a pull out.

  • Semi-Hemi-Lemmygod@lemmy.worldEnglish
    90·
    2 months ago

    “I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives,”

    So he’s not just a weird couch fucker, he’s also totally ignorant of US foreign policy over the last hundred years.

    • Billiam@lemmy.world
      41·
      2 months ago

      “I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives,”

      What a weird thing for someone who served* in Iraq to say.

      *Vance served in Iraq the same way he fucks couches: from the rear.

      • kent_eh@lemmy.caEnglish
        12·
        2 months ago

        He “served” in the PR office.

        Trying to manipulate public opinion and distort facts has been his entire career.

    • RubberDuck@lemmy.world
      1·
      2 months ago

      He’s an isolationist… So this comment might be true. His stance is fuck every other country, I’ve got mine.

      Just wait untill they find out many, many, many of their supply chains come from and/or run through countries kept stable only through pax americana. Doing an afghan style withdrawal on a global scale will not only fuck every other country… it will fuck them more.

      But who are we kidding, this is just rhetoric. The moment this guy feels he has the power to tell other countries what to do, he absolutely will.

  • givesomefucks@lemmy.worldEnglish
    792·
    2 months ago

    The fact checking in this article is perfect lol

    “So what America should be saying is, if NATO wants us to continue supporting them and NATO wants us to continue to be a good participant in this military alliance, why don’t you respect American values and respect free speech?” Vance asked. “It’s insane that we would support a military alliance if that military alliance isn’t going to be pro-free speech. I think we can do both. But we’ve got to say American power comes with certain strings attached. One of those is respect free speech, especially in our European allies.”

    Musk has been accused of banning several journalists since taking over Twitter, now X.

    “I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives,” Vance added. “But European countries should theoretically share American values, especially about some very basic things like free speech.”

    The US ranked 26th in the world when it comes to free speech, with several members of the European Union higher up the list, according to the 2024 Global Expression Report.

    • thefartographer@lemm.ee
      2·
      2 months ago

      I’m not going to go to some backwoods country and tell them how to live their lives

      “Nah, we like your people oppressed”

  • GiddyGap@lemm.ee
    682·
    2 months ago

    So what America should be saying is, if NATO wants us to continue supporting them and NATO wants us to continue to be a good participant in this military alliance, why don’t you respect American values and respect free speech?

    JD, buddy, what you don’t understand is that Europe’s free speech is far more free than the US.

    Americans have a tendency to think they have everything and everyone else has nothing. Until we go somewhere else and discover it’s the other way around.

    • tissek@sopuli.xyz
      101·
      2 months ago

      Europe’s free speech is far more free than the US

      But not Europes FREEZEPEACH™! And freezepeach is all that matters

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.worldEnglish
        42·
        2 months ago

        Its a race to the bottom as the police and surveillance states of the entire NATO block fill to bursting.

        Vance is bitching because an American company got on the wrong side of the European security state today. Tomorrow, he’ll be clamoring to shut down the BBC or to censor some German metal band for being critical of his Dear Leader.

    • TheBraveSirRobbin@lemmy.world
      61·
      2 months ago

      Americans have a tendency to think they have everything and everyone else has nothing. Until we go somewhere else and discover it’s the other way around.

      Obviously healthcare and education are things they are pretty much guaranteed that we don’t have. They have better worker protections. I mean I’m not against gun rights, but what we have in the States is an embarrassment. I’m sure there are several other issues that I’m not thinking of right now or don’t know about, but I didn’t know we had worse free speech than Europe.

      What makes Europe free speech more free than ours?

      • azuth@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        11·
        2 months ago

        What makes the US have more free speech?

        Legally all EU countries have freedom of expression enshrined in their constitutions.

        Culturally I find Americans blind to any non governmental censorship. Since it’s legal its OK.I believe not allowing private companies to censor people is absurdly considered a violation of free speech.

        There are obvious results as well: the US is way less politically diverse.

        • rottingleaf@lemmy.world
          31·
          2 months ago

          That’s true. Ancaps love to talk how almost anything government-done can be done by private entities in the right conditions and social consensus. Turns out this is true for censorship too.

          I’m completely ideology-agnostic at this point. Whatever works, works. Nothing around seems to work though.

          In any case, while this is true, power goes the shortest way and power corrupts. USA is the hegemon of our world and the center of our civilization, which is now united by American English language and American technologies, and what’s the worst, American corporations. Much more power goes its way to corrupt it.

          You know how bad people like to grease in shit the right tools for fixing the problem, preventively? That Putinist thing about “multi-polar” world means that they want to be a little hegemon too, and to have free reign in gray zones. But there is a similar sane point.

          But really decentralization of tech research and production and standards is something we all need else we vanish. Right now we have one big Internet with one set of protocols, a handful of very complex software stacks everybody uses, and this situation should already be called a centralized one. Due to network effects and other, mostly with fake argument, kinds of pressure it doesn’t make sense for most people to use parallel systems.

          A de-facto conglomerate of companies, social groups, interests and ideas can be a monopolist too.

      • Goldmage263@sh.itjust.works
        6·
        2 months ago

        I’m not who you asked, but I often think of supression tactics against forms of free speech used in the US that some countries in the EU do less. Not all of them (UK online speech policing and arrests as a counterexample), but voter supression, union busting, and law enforcement response to protests have been handled in various countries in ways I consider more free for the citizens.

        TLDR: Intimidation tactics and biased response happens less in other countries.

      • GiddyGap@lemm.ee
        2·
        2 months ago

        What makes Europe free speech more free than ours?

        The gist: While free speech is a constitutional right in both the US and most European countries, free speech is now controlled to a large degree by social media companies in the US.

        Here’s a good, short recap of a longer study on the subject from a US scholar: https://news.ku.edu/news/article/2020/01/11/study-analyzes-american-other-free-speech-traditions-suggests-inevitable-clashes

  • dustyData@lemmy.world
    65·
    2 months ago

    The gall of saying, that entirely different culture that’s been around for longer than our country, they should have our same values, right after calling them backwoods countries. The extreme narcissist egoism is palpable and disgusting.

    • dhork@lemmy.worldEnglish
      20·
      2 months ago

      He didn’t call the Europeans “backwoods countries”. He called those other places that. He specifically says that European countries should be more like us, for all the white right reasons…

      • dustyData@lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        2 months ago

        The insult is the implication. “I wouldn’t tell a backwoods country to be like us, [but we should]. So instead I will tell you that you are not like US [because I actually think that you are backwoods], and you should be like us to [so you aren’t like those backwoods countries anymore].”

    • nfh@lemmy.world
      4·
      2 months ago

      Encouraging assassinations of the current elected president and VP should really earn him the chance to see the inside of a jail cell. Even for a few days while they question him. I think that would be good for everyone involved.

  • TheDemonBuer@lemmy.world
    501·
    2 months ago

    This is why Europe must take control of its own defense. Europe doesn’t want to be a mere vassal of the US for precisely this reason.

    • frezik@midwest.social
      2·
      2 months ago

      I have a bit of schadenfreude around this. For years, people said Europe was fine, and didn’t need to invest more in their military. “No, you silly American, we are just fine with the military we have because we don’t go invading other countries.”

      Now here we are. Thing is, I wasn’t even talking from the perspective of Europe becoming warmongers like us. I wanted Europe to be armed well enough to handle what the US has been doing, and the US can draw down its military. Then we could put that money into healthcare and schools and shit, but Europe would have to pick up the slack (and also Japan, S. Korea, Taiwan, and Australia). This is still a good idea.

  • whyNotSquirrel@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    35·
    2 months ago

    Lol, soon he’ll ask NATO military communication to use Twitter

    what the fuck is the link between a shit platform and military alliance

  • Jumi@lemmy.world
    25·
    2 months ago

    If Trump becomes president we should embargo the US like Russia since he’s Putins lapdog

  • Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works
    22·
    2 months ago

    Ah yes, the law of equivalent exchange. Force a private company to adhere to your laws? No defensive military pact for you.

  • thefartographer@lemm.ee
    15·
    2 months ago

    He must have shouted that quote so that the interviewer could hear him with his head so far up Elon’s ass