During his speech to the Ohio Republican Party Dinner in Lima, Ohio, this week, Vice President JD Vance spoke about getting the Vice Presidential offer from President Trump.
00:00So the Saturday before the GOP convention, the president, I actually flew down to Florida to meet with the president and we talked.
00:09It was the first time I had ever talked with him explicitly about becoming his running mate.
00:13And he said, you know, I'm not sure what I'm going to do, but it's probably going to be you, so go have fun the next couple of days.
00:19How do you have fun the next couple of days when that's what the president tells you?
00:23And of course, so that evening he flew up to Pennsylvania to do a rally in Pennsylvania, and that was the famous moment where he turned his head and missed, I think, what would have been one of the great tragedies in American history, not just a tragedy for him personally.
00:40And I really do believe, I'm a person of faith, I imagine most of you are too, I believe the hand of God prevented America from experiencing great national tragedy in that moment.
00:53But, so I call the president that night, it's probably two in the morning at this point, I call the president that night, remember I had just met with him that morning, talking about becoming his running mate, and I'm like, sir, how you doing?
01:06And he's like, I'm fine.
01:08He's just been shot in the ear, I'm fine.
01:10You know, nearly lost his life, but totally fine.
01:12He goes, how's it playing out there?
01:14And I'm like, Mr. President, I think it's playing pretty damn well, because remember he had that photo where he raises the fist iconically, and I said, I think that photo is going to go down in history.
01:23That's one of the great photos, and of course, I was right about that.
01:27So, the morning of the convention, the morning he announces me to be his nominee, he calls me at around 11.45, and I'm not kidding you, I don't answer the phone.
01:38And I don't know what had happened, we had just landed in Milwaukee, we've got three little kids, you know, it was a hot day, we were trying to get through all the security to get to our hotel room, I don't know what happened.
01:48So, I call him back 15 minutes later, and he answers the phone, and he says, J.D., you just missed a very important phone call.
01:58And I said, yes, yes, Mr. President.
02:03And he said, I'm going to have to select somebody else now.
02:05And of course, you know, my heart stops, and I think he's actually going to do it, but then he asked me to be his running mate, he actually talks to my son, and you know, the rest is history, right?
02:15The rest is history.
02:16So, that's the first story.
02:18The second story that I'll tell you is, we've probably been in the Oval Office for all of 10 days.
02:23And I'm sitting there, and we have a phone call with a foreign leader, I won't mention who, and it's a tough phone call.
02:29There are some tough issues that we have to work through with this foreign leader, and he asked me to come sit behind him at the Resolute desk so that if I need to say anything, I can just speak directly into the speakerphone.
02:40And it's early in the administration, so there's not a whole lot in the Oval Office yet, and there's this sort of wooden box with a red button sitting on the Resolute desk.
02:49And I think to myself, that's probably not a button that you want to press, right?
02:53So, we're talking to this foreign leader, and the president looks over at me, puts the foreign leader on mute, and says, this is not going very well, and he presses the red button.
03:06And my eyes get really big, and I'm like, Mr. President, you know, what just happened?
03:12And he looks at me, and he goes, nuclear.
03:16Nuclear.
03:19And two minutes later, a guy walks in with a Diet Coke, and he looks back at me, and he says, it wasn't nuclear, it's just the Diet Coke button.
03:26And that's...
03:27So, that's the kind of guy, my fellow Republicans, that we have as the president of the United States, a guy who can do a good job, but keep a sense of humor.
03:39And I've learned a ton, even in 130 days, 140 days, however long we've been in office.
03:50I think I've learned more, I've had more on-the-job training than I think any person in the history of having a job for all of about five months.
03:57Because the thing that I've learned about the president of the United States, and I guess I kind of knew this a little bit, but I've really learned it seeing him interact with foreign leaders, with congressional leaders, and just doing the job of the president of the United States, is what makes the president so successful is he has the best instincts about people of anybody that I've ever seen in my life.
04:17He knows when somebody is selling him a load of BS, he knows when he's making progress, when he needs to cut something off, he knows when he's dealing with somebody that he can trust, and he knows when he's dealing with somebody that he can't trust.
