Vice President JD Vance tried to reassure Jewish Republican donors in Las Vegas that he stands with Israel, but his refusal to distance himself from Tucker Carlson left many in the room unconvinced.
Vance appeared before the Republican Jewish Coalition on Monday in a closed-door session that AP News described as tense from the start. RJC board member Ari Fleischer called Vance "a giant question mark" before the vice president even took the stage. Some attendees left reassured. Others did not.
Terry Platt, an RJC member, captured the mood plainly:
"There's a sentiment here of some discomfort over the vice president speaking. Some people are disappointed. We're confused about his true sentiments."
The confusion is not hard to trace. Over the past year, Vance has built a pattern of remarks that Jewish conservatives find difficult to square with the pro-Israel commitments they expect from a Republican vice president, and a likely 2028 presidential candidate.
The friction between Vance and Jewish Republicans did not begin in Las Vegas. It started last December, when Vance spoke at Turning Point USA's AmericaFest conference and publicly rebuked Ben Shapiro, the Jewish-American commentator, for calling out Tucker Carlson. Vance told the crowd he had no interest in policing his own side.
"I didn't bring a list of conservatives to denounce or to de-platform."
That same week, Vance gave an interview in which he downplayed rising antisemitism on the right and called it "absurd" to suggest Carlson "has no place in the conservative movement." A year earlier, Vance had given Carlson a ringing endorsement. And Carlson, in the interim, had hosted Nick Fuentes, a figure even Vance has described as someone "who, you know, really does hate Jews", in what the New York Post characterized as "a lovefest."
Carlson's own record on the subject goes beyond that interview. Newsmax reported that Carlson has claimed Jews control Congress, the White House, the Pentagon, and America's banking system. He said of Christian Zionists: "I dislike them more than anybody" and accused them of having been "seized by this brain virus."
Then came the Rogan interview. Vance sat down with Joe Rogan for a wide-ranging conversation in which he accused the Israeli government of carrying out a "very discreet, extremely well-funded campaign" to "manipulate American public opinion." He also raised the unfounded theory that Jeffrey Epstein worked for the Mossad, Israel's intelligence agency.
For Jewish Republicans who had already watched Vance shield Carlson and dismiss concerns about antisemitism, the Rogan appearance deepened the alarm. President Trump chose Vance as his 2028 pick in part because of his media savvy and broad populist appeal. But that appeal now cuts in two directions, toward a massive podcast audience and away from a donor class that has long been a pillar of Republican politics.
At the RJC event, Vance tried to thread a needle. He acknowledged that the room might not agree with everything said by prominent conservative media figures, but he argued against writing them off.
"I recognize a lot of people in this room might disagree with things that Tucker Carlson or Megyn Kelly or Joe Rogan has said."
He then drew a distinction, between Rogan, whom he framed as persuadable, and Fuentes, whom he cast as irredeemable.
"I think it's a mistake to sort of say we're going to pen Joe Rogan off because he said something that we don't like. I think the best approach is to actually go in there, and talk to him, and make the arguments as best as you can."
The distinction is reasonable on its face. Rogan is a podcaster who entertains every conspiracy theory that crosses his desk. Fuentes is a self-described admirer of Adolf Hitler. The two are not equivalent, and Vance was right to say so.
But the gap in Vance's argument was what he did not say. He named Rogan and Fuentes. He did not address Carlson, the figure at the center of the controversy, in the same framework. He did not explain where Carlson falls on the spectrum between a careless interviewer and a committed antisemite. And he did not explain why he has repeatedly defended Carlson while acknowledging that Carlson's conduct has alarmed Jewish conservatives.
The omission did not go unnoticed. Bruce Pearl, a prominent pro-Israel conservative, told AP News: "If he continues on a path with Carlson, it's going to be a problem."
Vance also confused "blood libel", the medieval accusation that Jews murdered Christian children and used their blood in rituals, with "blood guilt," a separate theological concept. For a vice president trying to demonstrate fluency with Jewish concerns, the stumble undercut the message.
Meanwhile, a Cincinnati man recently pleaded guilty to vandalizing Vance's home, a reminder that the vice president faces hostility from multiple directions, and that his public standing carries real-world consequences for his family's security.
The political cost is already showing up in data. Newsmax reported that Vance's support among Republican voters has dropped from above 50 percent to 36 percent in a Morning Consult poll, with Senator Marco Rubio polling second at 22 percent. For a vice president widely seen as the 2028 frontrunner, that erosion is significant, and it tracks directly with the Israel and antisemitism controversies.
Vance has also publicly criticized Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, suggesting Israel made poor diplomatic decisions during the Gaza conflict with Hamas. Just The News reported that Vance called Israeli reactions to the U.S.-Iran deal a "weird panic" and a "freak out," and said Israel cannot "kill your way out of every national security problem."
Those remarks may reflect a sincere foreign-policy view. Reasonable people can disagree about the conduct of the Gaza conflict and about the terms of any deal with Iran. But when combined with the Carlson defense, the Rogan interview, and the Epstein-Mossad speculation, the cumulative effect is a vice president who appears more comfortable challenging Israel than challenging the antisemitic fringe of his own coalition.
That perception matters. Trump has publicly praised Vance's performance and defended his selection. But the president's endorsement does not erase the fact that Vance is losing ground with a constituency, pro-Israel donors and Jewish Republicans, that has been central to Republican electoral success for decades.
Perhaps the most damaging assessment of Vance's approach came from the one person he would least want as a character witness. Fuentes told The New York Times that Vance is running a cynical play:
"JD Vance panders to the far right but simply doesn't want the baggage of associating with the far right."
Fuentes went further, pointing directly at the contradiction Vance has refused to resolve:
"If he has a problem with 'antisemites,' then he should start by disavowing his best friend Tucker Carlson."
When a self-described extremist can identify the incoherence in a politician's position faster than the politician's own advisers can fix it, the strategy has a problem. Vance wants the populist media audience that Carlson delivers. He also wants the donor support and moral credibility that come with standing firmly against antisemitism. Those two goals are in direct conflict as long as Carlson continues to platform figures like Fuentes and traffic in conspiracy theories about Jewish control of American institutions.
The security concerns already surrounding Vance's detail make the political calculation even more fraught. A vice president whose protective detail has faced its own controversies cannot afford to look uncertain about where he stands on questions of hate and extremism.
The RJC meeting was closed to the press, which raises its own transparency questions. If Vance's message to Jewish Republicans was reassuring, there is no public record of it. If it was not, the closed doors only deepen the suspicion that the vice president is saying different things to different rooms.
Vance's defenders will argue that a big-tent conservative movement should not excommunicate media figures over individual remarks, and that engaging with Rogan and Carlson is smarter than shunning them. There is a version of that argument that holds up. Conservatives should not let the Anti-Defamation League or any other outside organization dictate who belongs in the movement.
But Carlson's record is not a single remark. It is a pattern, hosting Fuentes, accusing Jews of controlling American institutions, attacking Christian Zionists as brain-damaged. At some point, engaging with that pattern without confronting it becomes endorsing it. And Vance has not shown where his line is.
He distinguished Rogan from Fuentes. He has not distinguished Carlson from either. Until he does, Jewish Republicans will keep asking the question, and Vance's poll numbers will keep providing the answer.
A leader who cannot tell his allies where he stands eventually discovers he is standing alone.