‘Say Thank You’: JD Vance embraces viral meme persona with Halloween makeover

Vice President JD Vance leaned fully into internet humour for Halloween, dressing up as one of the exaggerated, meme-inspired versions of himself that have circulated online for years.

The 41-year-old Republican appeared in a curly brown wig, red tie and blue blazer, mirroring the cartoonish “bloated” image used by online trolls. In an Instagram video, Vance spun slowly in a circle as the “Twilight Zone” theme played, saying, “Happy Halloween. And remember to say thank you!”

He later shared a close-up selfie on X, widening his eyes to mimic the popular photoshopped meme. The White House joined in on the fun, reposting the image with the caption: “MAKE SURE YOU SAY THANK YOU.”

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Meme roots in Ukraine controversy

The “thank you” reference stems from Vance’s contentious February Oval Office meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. During the exchange, Vance rebuked Zelensky for not showing enough gratitude for US support in Ukraine’s war against Russia, saying, “Right now, you guys are going around and forcing conscripts to the front lines because you have manpower problems; you should be thanking the president for trying to bring an end to this conflict.”

The remark spread rapidly online, sparking a wave of memes portraying Vance as a clueless or childlike figure – images that intensified after his vice presidential debate with Minnesota Governor Tim Walz in October.

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Vance has since embraced the online caricatures, sharing edited images of himself across his own social media accounts. One version posted earlier on Friday read, “Can you hear the screaming.”

His light-hearted response drew praise even from within his party. “The fact that people started making memes of JD Vance like this and he basically just shrugged and said, ‘Screw it! Let’s roll with it,’ is one of the funniest things to happen in politics over the last decade,” one user wrote on X.

Gates McGavick of the Republican National Committee added, “Amazing. Great reminder that in politics, and in life, joining in on the joke is almost always the winning move.”