What to Know
Things are not looking great for Vice President JD Vance. Recently, he has sparked a lot of backlash for his unwavering loyalty to President Donald Trump. When people, including religious leaders, were upset by the AI image Trump shared (the one that depicted him as Jesus), Vance said it was merely “a joke” and people just didn’t get it.
“And, of course, he took it down because he recognized that a lot of people weren’t understanding his humor in that case,” Vance said, adding that Trump just likes to “mix it up on social media” sometimes. OK. And, of course, people still have questions about the way he has defended Trump’s war in Iran, given that he claimed to be an anti-interventionist. These controversies might’ve impacted the turnout at a recent event that Vance headlined.
He recently spoke at a Turning Point USA event in Georgia.
Turning Point USA seems to have misestimated crowd size for Vance. Akins Ford Arena less than 25% filled for the vice president. pic.twitter.com/K2SnkmuATh
— Jake Traylor (@jake__traylor) April 14, 2026
But not that many people showed up for it, according to footage circulating on social media and reports from multiple news outlets. Even Turning Point CEO Erika Kirk skipped it, though she said it was because of an unspecified security threat. A viral video shared on X shows Akins Ford Arena looking pretty empty, suggesting that the organization might have overestimated how many people would want to listen to Vance speak.
MS NOW journalist Jake Traylor shared the footage on X, writing, “Turning Point USA seems to have misestimated crowd size for Vance. Akins Ford Arena less than 25% filled for the vice president.” Although some people had doubts about the footage and what it represented, multiple news outlets reported the same thing.
The Associated Press reported that some college-aged people in “Turning Point attire, Trump hats and red-white-and-blue paraphernalia” attended the event, but “were outnumbered more than 2-to-1 by empty seats.” Yikes. The news outlet also described the arena as “mostly empty” and said the questions were “awkward.”
He also faced criticism and heckling.
So, in addition to the fact that not all that many people attended the event, not everyone who was there was actually there in support of the vice president. According to a report from The New York Times, about 10 minutes into the event, Vance was interrupted by hecklers, who shouted out things like, “Jesus Christ does not support genocide!” and “You’re killing children! You’re bombing children!”
Turning Point offered an interesting explanation for how the event turned out. In an attempt to explain why the venue looked so empty, Turning Point spokesperson Andrew Kolvet tried to blame left-wing protesters.
“The left-wing groups swarm the ticketing and they try and book up all the tickets, and then they don’t show and that’s one of their forms of protest,” Kolvet explained, per The Daily Beast. “Normally, we’re pretty good at sniffing it out, but they use some new means and activities, and so we’re working with our ticketing systems to adjust for that moving forward.”
But critics on social media blamed Vance.
Hahahahhahahahhahahahhahahahahjahahahahhahahahahah times infinity https://t.co/T4lcC4fTUp
— Adam Kinzinger (Slava Ukraini) 🇺🇸🇺🇦 (@AdamKinzinger) April 14, 2026
While Kolvet tried to give left-wing activists all the credit, a lot of people on X felt that the low turnout was probably all Vance’s doing. One critic said it probably had something to do with Vance’s reaction to Trump’s Jesus post. “Young people love Christ and His Church,” the person wrote. “They aren’t going to support you, especially as a Catholic, if you choose to be quiet when the president slanders Both.”
Someone else claimed that “no one respects” Vance because he’s “lacking charisma and changing his name, faith, and ideology for power.”
And some critics found the apparent low turnout pretty amusing. Another person wrote, “Hahahahhahahahhahahahhahahahahjahahahahhahahahahah times infinity.” And another commenter asserted, “The JD Vance humiliation tour continues.”
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