JD Vance has been scolded online for a ‘locker room’ joke about a senator’s backside made in response to the US housing crisis.
The vice president partook in a prime-time town hall on Fox News ahead of the midterm elections on November 3.
While pretty lacklustre for the most part, one exchange raised eyebrows, as Vance was asked a question by a local college student – which he answered by saying all the wrong things.
‘A constant message that my generation hears from the Right is to get married young, have kids young, have as many kids as possible…’ Kate White began.
‘And I think what the Right doesn’t acknowledge most of the time is how disincentivised we are currently because of the cost of owning a home and the general expenses of raising a family.
‘So my question is, how does the Right, and yourself, expect us to start families young when the average price of a home in America now costs more than $415,000, which just feels out of reach for us?’
Immediately, Vance told the student, vice president of the school’s Turning Point USA chapter, ‘Thank you for the question, and thanks for the support.’
But rather than swiftly addressing her concerns, the Ohio Republican, 42, deflected with a ‘joke’ that left social media asking, ‘What is wrong with him?’
‘I want to point out that I think that I have been asked four or maybe five questions by my count,’ Vance began. ‘I have only been asked one question about [Republican Sen.] Jon Husted’s ass — and it was by [Fox News’s] Jesse Watters.’
The room filled with laughter as TV host Watters quipped with a smile: ‘It’s what people are talking about!’
Taking to X, commenting on the viral televised moment, users branded Vance’s comment ‘crass’ and ‘tone deaf’.
‘He’s asked the most basic question about housing affordability, and he can’t even pretend to take it seriously’, wrote @gtconway3d.
‘This guy has negative charisma and horrible political instincts. Here’s a great layup for an important answer and a good clip and he makes a bad joke and laughs like a moron. You are not trump bro’, said @Britt4rva.
‘You’ve got to be kidding me’, @YesJulz tweeted, while @TAPeters222 called him ‘insufferable’.
@JCassid69022617 said, ‘I want Trump gone but I sure don’t want this idiot in his place’, and @58isthenew40 called the remark ‘despicable’, adding: ‘These are not serious people. He goes right to an inappropriate joke instead of addressing her very real concerns.’
This isn’t the first time Husted’s behind has made news lately, as President Donald Trump also appears fixated on his physique, making it a recurring gag in his campaign speeches.
It began when NFL coach Jon Gruden informed the president that he and Husted played college football together in the 1980s.
Trump then said in Ohio: ‘I don’t do this with men very often. I started examining his body because I didn’t know he was a great athlete. And I looked, and I watched up and down. I looked at his ass. And then I looked at his hands. Look at his hands. He’s got these, like, claws.’
He said on another day in Kentucky that he’d been ‘studying’ Husted’s features: ‘You would be very unfortunate if you picked a fight with him at a bar someday.’
And in North Carolina on October 20, he singled out his derriere: ‘I looked at his ass, and then I looked at his legs. I said his ass ‒ it’s like a pile of muscle.’
A day later in Sharonville, Vance joined in, quipping: ‘What could I possibly say about Jon Husted that Donald J. Trump has not already said?’
Anyway, Vance did get round to addressing the housing crisis eventually, although his response was far from redemptive.
He argued: ‘I think we have to take stock of the fact that the reason why housing exploded in the United States of America is in part because we allowed 20 million illegal aliens into our country to buy homes that ought, by right, go to American citizens.’
That figure is greatly exaggerated, though. Last December, Vance used the same statistic, pointing to illegal immigration as the cause of increased ‘unaffordable’ housing costs during a cabinet meeting.
And while immigration rates do increase demand for housing, experts say immigrants are much more likely to rent in the US, not buy, and immigrants are not the primary drivers of rising costs – other factors are much more influential.
Plus, immigrant workers are essential to the housing supply and make up crucial proportions of construction workforces that can solve shortages and housing preference demands post-Covid.
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