JD Vance's conversion aided by Peter Thiel
JD Vance's Catholic conversion narrative credits Peter Thiel as a divinely sent emissary who showed him that smart people could be religious.
Snapshot · The Bulwark Podcast
Jane Coaston: POTUS's Racism Notches Another Win
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Jun 26, 2026
Where this was said
JD Vance at the Nixon Foundation: Watergate Was No Big Deal
At 41:58 · chapter starts 33:50
The conversation shifts to what Tim Miller calls a 'planned bit': JD Vance at the Nixon Foundation, delivering a pre-meditated rehabilitation of Watergate. Vance's argument, played in audio, is that the scandal would barely register today and that the 'deep state' that destroyed Nixon was the same one that tried to destroy Trump. [1] — Tim Miller "JD Vance told the Nixon Foundation that if Watergate happened today it would be a 12-hour news story, not a presidency-ending scandal. He c…" 34:36 Tim Miller offers a crisp corrective: Nixon's own aides ordered the DNC break-in, Nixon used the CIA to construct a cover-up, a White House slush fund financed the operation, and the president himself was on tape. There was no deep state conspiracy — the deep state was Nixon's. Jane Coaston notes that Vance may simply not know what happened, and that the right's Nixon rehabilitation requires carefully ignoring the EPA, his Black advisory cabinet, and his Ebony magazine interview. The hosts ultimately land on a more chilling reading of Vance's remarks: he isn't making a historical argument. He's announcing that in the Trump era, the government can commit crimes in the open, because the propaganda apparatus and the degraded attention economy will absorb anything.
JD: Watergate would be a 12-hour story today
Vice President JD Vance told the Nixon Foundation that if Watergate happened today it would be a 12-hour news cycle, not enough to bring down a presidency.
JD Vance at the Nixon Foundation: Watergate Was No Biggie
JD Vance told the Nixon Foundation that if Watergate happened today it would be a 12-hour news story, not a presidency-ending scandal. He compared the 'deep state' that brought down Nixon to forces opposing Trump — getting the story exactly backwards.
Watergate, Actually Explained
Nixon's aides bugged the DNC, used the CIA to cover it up, funded the whole operation with a White House slush fund, and Nixon was caught on his own tapes. The 'deep state' was Nixon's own apparatus — not the investigators. JD Vance got this exactly wrong.
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