Anthony Scaramucci said in a new interview that Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), who secured the Republican vice presidential nomination last week, is already “hurting” former President Trump’s campaign.
“JD, I think, stands for ‘Just Dull,’ so, he is not doing well on the stump for Donald Trump. He’s hurting him. The memes on social media are killing him,” Scaramucci told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins. “The net negatives are terrible for the vice president.”
The Ohio senator has come under fire in the past few days for recently resurfaced comments in which he chastised “childless” Democrats and argued people without children should have less of a say in democracy because they don’t have a stake in the nation’s future.
The controversy has led some House Republicans to question if Vance was the right choice and if he could lose the election for Trump, as Democrats have a newfound energy backing Vice President Harris’s presidential campaign after President Biden withdrew from the race.
Scaramucci, who served briefly as Trump’s White House director of communications, argued in comments highlighted by Mediaite that a Trump running mate is supposed to “get out of the way” and allow the former president to shine.
Scaramucci said that former United Nations Ambassador Nikki Haley, a GOP primary candidate, would have been a much better vice president choice for Trump.
“When he loses the election and they do the post obituary of the election, and they’re in the morgue looking at the body of the lost election, they’ll say ‘wow that was a terrible mistake not to go with Nikki Haley,’” Scaramucci said. “You could have appealed to a broader base of people, to women, to more independents, but he didn’t. He went hard MAGA.”
Scaramucci, who only lasted 10 days in the Trump administration before being fired, said he believes Trump hates what’s being discussed about Vance. He also argued that the Ohio senator “may or may not make it to November” and that Trump could potentially replace him.
“I mean … that’s what ‘The Apprentice’ is all about,” Scaramucci said on CNN. “Of course I’ve had that experience with Donald Trump. I do think he could.”
“It’s just a question of how many ‘Scaramuccis’ JD is going to last,” he added. “We’ve got the shot clock on right now.”