It seems that Vice President JD Vance has forgotten all about his tumultuous childhood in Appalachia that was riddled with poverty, hardships and curious stains on his family’s couch — but social media users did not.
Last week, Vance went on “Fox & Friends” to defend President Donald Trump’s seemingly nonsensical but globally devastating tariffs. During Vance’s word salad of an argument, he made the claim that if Americans are forced to be less dependent on global imports, it’ll prompt a revival of American manufacturing. Vance then attempted to stress America’s need for self-sufficiency by using a pretty loaded word to describe a nation the U.S. is currently indebted to, and provides Americans with a good portion of its imported goods.
“We borrow money from Chinese peasants to buy the things those Chinese peasants manufacture,” Vance told the Fox News show.
When clips of Vance’s “peasants” remark made its way on to X, formerly Twitter, some users were stunned by Vance’s hypocrisy due to his upbringing.
“Hey, You forget where you come from …Now you’re a noble new American aristocrat? Or have you always been a hypocrite 👑?” a user said.
“From someone who has used his ‘American peasant’ roots to craft his political image,” one user pointed out.
“He says ‘Chinese peasants’ with such venom and condescension. You would think the poverty in which he grew up would give him some empathy, but instead it did the opposite,” another user said.
Others decided to just point out the obvious.
“how do the chinese have money to lend you if they are peasants?” another user pointed out.
Yet most were completely perplexed by a world leader casually using such a dehumanizing word.
“genuinely how does a vice president get away with calling chinese people ‘peasants’ in 2025. holy shit,” one shocked user said.
“Racism, imperialism, arrogance and ignorance,” another user wrote of Vance’s choice of word.
“This language is unnecessarily provocative and offensive coming from such a high ranking politician,” another user said.
“I like Vance but why on earth does he need to use the word ‘peasant’. The rhetoric needs to change,” a user noted.
“with each passing day, you really do understand vance’s mother choosing percs over him,” a final user joked brutally.
