Vice President JD Vance, who said he will announce whether he’s running for president in 2028 after the midterm elections, was asked this week if he’s endorsing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the PM’s re-election campaign. The question came after President Trump endorsed Netanyahu, a divisive figure both at home and abroad.
Vance laughed at the question and responded, “The president has the most effective endorsement in American or international political history. I endorse American candidates and that’s what I’m focused on until the midterms. So I’m not getting involved in the Israeli election.”
When pressed, Vance added, “I’m not anti-endorsing him. I’m not pro-endorsing him. I’m not getting involved in Israeli elections.”
Critics of the Trump administration, including the splinter GOP group Republicans Against Trump, are replying with accusations of hypocrisy — in April Vance traveled to Budapest and endorsed Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán at a rally to help with Orban’s re-election campaign. (Courthouse News Service described Vance’s public support as “a breach of longstanding diplomatic custom.”)
Q: Do you endorse Benjamin Netanyahu?
Vance: “The president has the most effective endorsement in American or international political history. I endorse American candidates. I’m not getting involved in Israeli elections”
(Vance endorsed and campaigned for Hungary’s Orban) https://t.co/laPgLxW3uw
— Republicans against Trump (@RpsAgainstTrump) October 20, 2026
Fox News commentators also criticized Vance’s reluctance to endorse Netanyahu, seeing it as a move that could be interpreted as a lack of alignment with Trump.
Trump supporter and social media influencer Jack Posobiec responded to Fox News’s critical take on Vance’s position, writing: “JD Vance is now being labeled anti-Israel, that he committed an ‘unforced error,’ and they’re ‘disappointed’ he didn’t endorse Bibi Netanyahu.”
JD Vance is now being labeled anti-Israel, that he committed an ‘unforced error,’ and they’re ‘disappointed’ he didn’t endorse Bibi Netanyahu https://t.co/1ETjlpizK7
— Jack Posobiec (@JackPosobiec) October 20, 2026
At the rally in Budapest, Vance told the crowd, “Then my friends go to the polls and, this weekend, stand with Viktor Orbán because he stands for you and he stands for all these things.” At the podium, Vance also put President Trump on the phone and placed him on the loudspeaker. Trump praised Orbán as “a fantastic man.”
(Orbán lost the election to Péter Magyar, a former ally who had become Orbán’s fiercest critic.)
lol Vance endorsed Orban and joined him on the campaign trail earlier this year:
– We have got to get Viktor Orban reelected as prime minister of Hungary, don’t we?
- Then, my friends, go to the polls in the weekend. Stand with Viktor Orban https://t.co/QJKX686KKk— This You? (@Thiss_Youu) October 19, 2026
Vance also called Orbán “the single most profound leader in Europe on the question of energy security and independence” for not cutting off Russian energy supplies following Russia’s attack on Ukraine, a statement that takes on new significance after Trump last week relaxed sanctions on Russian oil.
Vance said at the rally in April: “It is funny to watch prime ministers and leaders in some of the Western European capitals talk about the energy crisis, when, frankly, they should have been following the policies of Viktor Orbán in Hungary.”
