JD Vance - Full Interview — Real Time with Bill Maher (HBO)

[0:00] He is the 50th vice president of the United States and author of two number one best-selling books, [0:05] Hillbilly Elegy and the one that's out now, Communion, Finding My Way Back to Faith, [0:11] J.D. Bantz, our vice president. [0:26] Not bad. [0:27] Do I have the nicest crowd? [0:28] I'm sure it's the only applause I'll get, but I'll take it. [0:30] No, I mean, I'm just glad you're talking to me, you know? [0:34] I mean, I say it every time when the Republicans come here, they take their beating like a man. [0:38] It's the people I vote for. [0:43] They're the ones who won't talk to me. [0:45] That's odd, isn't it? [0:46] It is very odd. [0:47] I mean, and I'm probably... [0:48] Unlike this new woman who was elected to New York, do you think she'll come on the show? [0:50] Oh, I know you want... [0:52] No, I can't get AOC. [0:54] I can't get Mandami. [0:55] I can't go and get Kamala Harris. [0:57] You know, it took me eight years to get Obama. [0:59] Mm-hmm. [1:00] Anyway, let's not talk about my problem. [1:03] And I promise this is going to be a lot easier than talking to the Iranians. [1:13] Or... [1:14] Or even more, the view. [1:16] The question is whether it's harder than the view. [1:18] That's right. [1:21] But look, you're negotiating for America. [1:23] I'm rooting for America, so I want success here. [1:26] But, you know, you came out of these meetings. [1:28] I heard sort of the same thing. [1:30] I've heard a lot of talk about progress and that. [1:32] I've heard it so many times before. [1:35] Why is this different? [1:36] Why isn't it bullshit this time? [1:38] Well, I'd say the most important thing, Bill, is that the people who judge whether the oil [1:44] is actually flowing, they judge this as a success, right? [1:47] So if you look at oil right now, it's back down to $73 a barrel, got up to $126 a barrel. [1:52] So there's a signal that there's something real going on here. [1:55] I think the second bill is whether we make the final deal. [1:58] Because you have to remember, this MOU is fundamentally, it says the straits are going [2:02] to be open, the oil is going to flow. [2:04] We're seeing that happen already. [2:06] It's also a ceasefire, which, as you pointed out, is always going to be a little messy when [2:09] you're dealing with the Iranians. [2:11] But if we make the final deal, then great. [2:14] If we don't make the final deal, their nuclear program is still destroyed. [2:18] They're still much weaker as a country. [2:19] So my attitude is America wins either way. [2:22] But I do think that what the president has done is asked us to do something that, frankly, [2:26] nobody in 47 years of dealing with the Iranians has done, which is offer them an opportunity [2:31] to fundamentally transform how they behave with the West. [2:34] They've been the largest state sponsor of terrorism basically since they began as a nation, [2:39] or at least as an Islamic republic 47 years ago. [2:42] He's saying, look, if they're willing to change, we're willing to change too. [2:46] If they're not willing to change, we still fundamentally have all the cards. [2:49] And I think that's a good place for us to be. [2:51] But their program isn't destroyed. [2:53] Their nuclear program isn't destroyed. [2:54] I mean, I don't know any of our objectives. [2:57] And look, I said I... [2:58] What part is not destroyed? [3:00] Well, we didn't get in there. [3:02] The whole thing was we have to get in there and see. [3:04] Otherwise, we wouldn't be doing this. [3:05] Well, let me say... [3:06] No, we didn't. [3:06] First of all, so a nuclear program, and I'm hardly a nuclear scientist. [3:10] I'm a lowly politician. [3:12] But the thing that you have to destroy is their ability to enrich uranium, which has been destroyed. [3:17] You have to destroy their ability. [3:19] Well, because you need functioning centrifuges that can actually spin. [3:23] But what was all the talk about? [3:24] We've got to get in there and we've got to get the dust. [3:26] Okay, that's... [3:26] And we didn't get in there, so how do we get the dust? [3:28] So that's actually a separate question. [3:30] So there's the highly enriched stockpile, which, by the way, was allowed to accumulate over 20 years of previous administrations. [3:36] That enriched stockpile is something that we want to get. [3:38] But, Bill, if we never get it, and the president wants it, and we are going to get it, but if we never got it, it's buried deep underground, and they don't have the ability to turn it into a nuclear weapon. [3:48] So the program is functionally destroyed. [3:50] We're just talking about can we set them back even further through these negotiations. [3:54] Okay. [3:55] I only have limited time with this, so I want to move on to other topics. [3:58] I want to tell you what people have been saying to me. [4:00] I tell them, you know, people get excited. [4:01] Wow, you have the vice president on. [4:03] I'm pretty impressed myself. [4:04] I'm very excited about this. [4:05] You know, I had Pence on. [4:10] I've had both his vice president a couple of weeks ago. [4:12] Pence was here. [4:13] I'm killing it with the vice president. [4:14] Okay. [4:18] Okay. [4:21] What did you talk about with Mike Pence? [4:24] Sex, drugs, and rock and roll? [4:25] I don't know. [4:25] He was a lot more human than I thought he was, than I'd ever seen him. [4:37] I even asked him to come on my podcast where I get stoned, and he was like, maybe. [4:42] So it was good. [4:44] But here's what people, when I say you, here's what sticks in their craw. [4:50] Okay. [4:50] The number one issue, immigration. [4:53] Not immigration. [4:54] We like it that you closed the border. [4:56] Thank you. [4:56] That needed to be done. [4:57] The people who were here, the way you treated, I'm talking about your administration. [5:02] Okay. [5:03] You weren't out there yourself. [5:04] But ICE, all that shit. [5:06] Too rough. [5:07] Too mean. [5:08] Too unnecessary. [5:10] I think you go, I'm not telling you what to do. [5:12] Okay? [5:12] I'm just giving you some advice as a friend. [5:14] Okay? [5:15] And I'm not, I am. [5:16] And I'm not saying, I'm not asking you to apologize if I don't like that people do that. [5:20] I'm just saying, you go a long way toward getting people who are just completely shut the door [5:26] to you and your administration if you would just own that. [5:28] That you guys went too far. [5:30] You went too far and you should own it like you did childless cat ladies. [5:34] Well, okay. [5:39] Here, here, here's the basic problem with that bill is you cannot do any deportations without law enforcement. [5:49] And you can't do a law enforcement operation like that without having some situations that don't look good when they're recorded like that. [5:58] I mean, let me give you like just one obvious example. [6:01] Let's just set aside the immigration element of this. [6:04] Okay? [6:05] If you take a guy who's committed murder and you go in and arrest that guy, sometimes that person's going to resist arrest. [6:11] Sometimes if you take a video of it and it's out of context and you don't appreciate why that person is being arrested in the first place, [6:18] it looks pretty icky if you take that out of context video clip. [6:21] And what I worry about is when people say you can't ever do immigration enforcement if it produces a bad video clip, [6:28] what they're really saying is you can't ever actually do immigration enforcement. [6:31] We had 12 million people come into the country, into the interior over the last four years. [6:36] I should say from 2021 to 2025. [6:39] And we were elected with a mandate to get some of those people out of the United States of America. [6:45] You can't do that easily. [6:47] Law enforcement, deporting people is never an easy process. [6:50] So I appreciate your argument that we've gone too far, but we couldn't do nothing. [6:55] And I don't think there was an easy way to do this. [6:56] Of course. [6:57] Just there's a middle ground. [6:58] See, the other thing that bothers us about stuff like that is that nothing ever lands in the middle, [7:03] which is what I'm always trying to get people to do. [7:05] I thought you were a crazy liberal. [7:08] You should watch the show. [7:10] You should watch the show. [7:11] I actually do watch the show. [7:12] I laughed my ass off backstage. [7:14] That was a good monologue. [7:14] Even though you were making fun of me, I kind of liked it. [7:17] Yeah. [7:18] It was fair. [7:20] I know someone in your administration who watches the show. [7:26] Because I always hear him. [7:33] The second lady, she's a big fan. [7:35] The second lady's a big fan of Bill Maher. [7:37] But what we hate is that the pendulum never lands in the middle. [7:40] You're right. [7:41] Biden did let in too many people. [7:43] It just boggles the mind why he did that. [7:46] But then it has to go all the way to the other side. [7:49] Always. [7:49] Nothing can ever land in the middle. [7:51] Did they go too far? [7:52] Probably in the Pentagon with DEI. [7:56] Yes. [7:56] And now Pete Hegseth is like firing everyone who's not whiter than an albino. [8:00] No, he's not. [8:01] Come on, Bill. [8:02] It certainly looks that way. [8:05] Well, but Bill, this is... [8:07] You've got to be... [8:08] Nothing lands in the middle. [8:10] I disagree with that. [8:12] I think sometimes things do land right where they should. [8:15] But just... [8:15] You take the story about Pete Hegseth. [8:18] Obviously, I'm biased. [8:19] I like Pete. [8:20] But if you look at the actual promotions that we've done, there have been a lot of people [8:25] from all walks of life. [8:26] There have been some high-profile people where he said, you know what? [8:29] I don't think that they merited a promotion. [8:31] But the idea that we're not promoting minorities in the Pentagon under Pete Hegseth, it's just not [8:36] true. [8:36] And I do think that sometimes your criticism is things don't land in the middle, and I [8:40] understand that. [8:41] Sometimes the problem is the media reports things in such a way where they actually obfuscate [8:47] or conceal the truth rather than reporting what's actually going on. [8:51] Of course they do. [8:51] They all do. [8:53] That's why you have to read both sides. [8:55] Yeah. [8:55] Well, like, my recommendation is if you read a news story and it says something bad about [9:02] me, you should disbelieve it. [9:04] It's probably lying. [9:05] Whereas if you read a news story that says something nice... [9:09] Right. [9:10] That's one way to look at it. [9:12] But, okay. [9:13] But I'm just... [9:14] Again, I'm just trying to help you with your issues. [9:16] Because I'll tell you something. [9:18] You, me, and a hundred friends. [9:20] This is like political therapy here with Bill Brown. [9:23] Because I'll tell you something that I don't think I've ever said, but this happened this [9:28] week with the thing I'm sure you want to talk about, we're going to talk about on the [9:30] panel, the Democratic Socialists. [9:32] I'm actually here to talk about my book. [9:34] I want everyone to... [9:34] You know, we're going to get to it. [9:36] We're going to get to it. [9:38] It's called Communion, available wherever books are sold. [9:43] But just one more thing about this, and then we'll get to the book. [9:46] Okay. [9:46] Okay. [9:47] Like, if this is where the Democratic Party is going, where this Democratic Socialist, [9:53] this obsession with Israel, with the Jew hating, with they don't believe in capitalism, [9:58] no prisons. [9:58] If this is where they're going, my vote is in play. [10:02] Okay. [10:03] And I like to hear that. [10:04] It actually always has been. [10:05] I just, every year, I don't make my decision by who was an R or a D. I actually always came [10:11] to the conclusion that the Democrat was probably better. [10:14] Sure. [10:14] And voted for them. [10:15] Okay. [10:15] And Trump can't run again, and he'd be a little too exciting for me anyway. [10:19] So, it's either going to be you or Rubio. [10:24] Here's my deal breaker for your side. [10:26] Okay. [10:27] Okay. [10:27] Under Trump, you guys have two outcomes than an election can be. [10:31] Either we win or they cheated. [10:34] That shit has to stop. [10:35] And the person who has to stop it would be you or Marco. [10:52] Can you tell me you will do that? [10:56] Will you bring us back to the middle, at least on that, where we concede elections, where it's [11:00] not either one of those two options? [11:02] Okay, Bill. [11:03] So, this is where I'm probably going to lose you here. [11:05] But here's... [11:06] That happened about eight minutes ago. [11:09] Look, I don't think that we should not concede elections, but I don't think that's what's [11:20] going on. [11:21] I think that if you go back, if you go back to the president's core argument, he was making [11:26] an argument about problems that existed in 2020. [11:29] And here's the problem that I'm most focused on. [11:31] The president and I have talked a lot about this, and I think we share a perspective here, [11:36] but set to the side the stuff that really gets you and your audience very angry about whether [11:41] the count was legitimate in Georgia or Pennsylvania or any of these other states. [11:45] Is it true that large technology companies, some of whom have financial interests that [11:51] exist outside the United States of America, were they censoring information in the run-up [11:56] to an election, and set to the side the stuff, again, the Georgia stuff, but it is... [12:02] That was litigated. [12:03] Dominion, the Fox News paid us... [12:05] No, I'm actually... [12:06] I'm trying to make the more middle ground argument here. [12:10] The biggest criticism I had at the 2020 election is that you had technology companies that were [12:16] quite literally censoring negative information about the left and promoting negative information [12:23] about the right. [12:24] So in a fundamental sense, like if the First Amendment says that we have a free and open [12:27] debate, and then the American people judge based on that free and open debate, the sense [12:31] in which I think the election in 2020 was rigged, I'm sorry, is that you had technology companies [12:37] that were putting their thumb on the scale in a way that completely obliterated the real [12:42] open exchange of ideas. [12:43] Now, by the way, it didn't happen in 2024, but it happened in 2020, and it was a problem. [12:47] Well, you're going to get a big pat on the back, and you go back to the White House. [12:51] All right. [12:52] Let's talk about your book, Communion. [12:53] I think it's very interesting because, you know, I always want to talk about what people [12:56] have in common. [12:58] I used to be Catholic. [13:00] You're a Catholic now. [13:01] That's right. [13:03] You used to be an atheist. [13:05] I'm an atheist now. [13:07] So we've been over to the same glass. [13:09] Yeah, that's right. [13:10] And, you know, you were born a Baptist. [13:13] This is about your spiritual journey. [13:16] That's right. [13:16] Which is really interesting. [13:17] And by the way, very personal. [13:20] Yeah. [13:20] It reminded me a little of Gavin Newsom. [13:22] He has a book here, and I was very surprised. [13:24] It didn't look like his book. [13:25] Had you read his book? [13:26] People bought my book. [13:27] That's the difference between them. [13:32] Sorry. [13:33] What does that mean? [13:34] I'm just saying. [13:35] That's fine. [13:36] Well, I'm just saying politicians are getting a lot more real when they write. [13:40] You know, it's not like that old kind of book. [13:42] You know. [13:42] Sure. [13:42] And it's about your moving toward the... [13:45] I'm just asking, why the Catholics? [13:47] Why go... [13:49] I didn't have a good experience with them. [13:52] Why did you... [13:53] You could have went Hindu. [13:55] Your wife's a Hindu. [13:56] Well, we should talk about that, Bill, in a longer setting. [13:59] Not just, you know, two minutes in front of the audience. [14:01] Do the podcast. [14:02] Okay. [14:03] All right. [14:03] We'll do the podcast. [14:05] I'll go down. [14:06] I'm not going to smoke weed, though. [14:11] I don't want to ruin my political career, Ian, but I've already ruined it by sitting here right now. [14:15] We don't make the guest smoke. [14:16] But I, I, I mean, here's, let me try to answer that question. [14:21] Okay. [14:21] So, first of all, I think that there's a core truth of the Catholic or the Christian faith, [14:27] that Jesus Christ is the Son of God and that all people need grace, okay? [14:30] But that fundamental truth that I believe in, I didn't land there. [14:34] I didn't start there. [14:35] What I saw was what I would call echoes of that truth in a lot of the people who lived [14:40] their lives in very, very charitable and good ways. [14:44] But I think with Catholicism in particular, what's interesting about it, because I meet [14:48] a lot of young Catholic converts, is they start to discover that truth because they're [14:53] attracted to the beauty and the stability of it. [14:56] I think people are craving in a modern world where we build ugly buildings and everything [15:01] is constantly changing and social networks have changed. [15:04] Even how, you know, men and women date one another. [15:07] I think that people are craving something that is more stable and that calls us to something [15:12] more beautiful. [15:13] And I think that was one of the ways that I found Christianity. [15:16] Now, it's interesting because I, I've actually gotten criticisms. [15:21] You know, one of the things I talk about in the book is I was a striver. [15:24] And I think that was very bad. [15:26] I think it's, it's, it's, it's wrong to be ambitious for ambition's sake. [15:30] If you want to be ambitious, you should be trying to accomplish something meaningful. [15:33] And it was my Christian faith that encouraged me to actually worry about things that mattered, [15:39] like being a good husband, being a good dad, being a good community member. [15:43] Now, I get criticism from some Christians who say, well, you know, that, that might be [15:48] true, but then you've got to talk about Jesus too. [15:50] But I think my point is, and I, as I talk about in the book, available wherever bookstores [15:54] are sold, or wherever books are sold, again, it is that like, I started seeing refractions [16:01] of the truth of the Christian gospel. [16:04] And that got me on a pathway to where I eventually accepted the truth that Jesus Christ was the [16:09] son of God. [16:09] But I think all of us have our own path. [16:12] You obviously have yours, but it's not over yet, man. [16:14] So I still have hope for you. [16:15] Okay. [16:15] Well, thank you. [16:16] I appreciate that you have hope for me. [16:19] And I for you. [16:21] Vice President, J.B. Vance.