Vice President J.D. Vance poked fun at European outrage about Elon Musk’s rise to the top of the Trump administration during his blistering speech at the Munich Security Conference Friday.
He took time out from warning European leaders that they were sleeping at the wheel of democracy to defend a man sometimes called the real vice president.
‘Trust me, I say this with all humor, if American democracy can survive 10 years of Greta Thunberg’s scolding, you guys can survive a few months of Elon Musk,’ he said.
Thunberg’s teenage environmental crusade has irritated conservatives in America.
And Vance’s comparison may go some way to silencing questions about how he gets along with the world’s richest man, even it was a bit of a backhanded defense.
He rather suggested that Musk will only be around for a matter of months.
While Vance was in Europe for an A.I. summit and the Munich meeting, Musk hogged the headlines Tuesday when he held court, answering questions in the Oval Office of the White House, beside President Donald Trump.
But it was Vance’s turn in the spotlight Friday, when he used his speech to deliver a blistering attack on Europe and its leaders.
Vice President J.D. Vance took European leaders to task in their own back yard with an fiery speech at the Munich Security Conference on Friday afternoon
Teenage climate activist Greta Thunberg
‘Europe faces many challenges, but the crisis this continent faces right now, the crisis I believe we all face together, is one of our own making,’ he said.
‘If you’re running in fear of your own voters, there is nothing America can do for you, nor, for that matter, is there anything that you can do for the American people who elected me and elected President Trump.’
If his audience of European VIPs had expected Vance to discuss the future of the war in Ukraine, outlining Donald Trump’s peace plan, they were in for a shock.
Some shifted in their seats as he attacked European politicians head on.
He accused European Union officials of ‘canceling elections and asked whether ‘we’re holding ourselves to an appropriately higher standard’.
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‘There is a new sheriff in town,’ he said referring to President Donald Trump. ‘We may disagree with your views but we will fight to defend your right to offer it in the public square.’
The hall was packed to hear Vance speak. Audience members sat on the stairs or stood three deep in the aisles, sending temperature soaring even before Vance turned up the heat.
He cited the example of a British man, Adam Smith-Connor, who was arrested after he refused to leave a safe zone around an abortion clinic designed to protect vulnerable women.
Vance claimed it was an attack on the ‘basic liberties of religious Britons’ that ‘criminalizes prayer.’
‘British law enforcement spotted him and demanded to know what he was praying for,’ said Vance.
‘Adam replied simply, it was on behalf of the unborn son that his former girlfriend had aborted years before.’