Vice President JD Vance shared a prank President Donald Trump played on him that had Vance terrified of the Oval Office’s “Big Red Button.”
During a recent appearance at a Republican Party dinner in Ohio, Vance, 40, told the audience that Trump, 79, was on a phone call with an unnamed foreign leader in the Oval Office when the conversation began going poorly.
“The president looks over at me, puts the foreign leader on mute and says, ‘This is not going very well,'” Vance recounted to the Republican gathering.
Trump then pressed a red button on his desk, causing immediate alarm for his vice president.
“My eyes get really big, and I’m like, ‘Mr. President, what just happened?'” Vance said.
“And he looks at me and he goes, ‘Nuclear. Nuclear,'” the vice president continued.
“And two minutes later, a guy walks in with a Diet Coke. And he looks back at me and he says, ‘It wasn’t nuclear. It’s just the Diet Coke button,'” Vance told the laughing crowd.
“So that’s the kind of guy, my fellow Republicans, that we have as the president of the United States,” Vance concluded.
The Diet Coke button has been a fixture of Trump’s Oval Office setup.
Trump had the button installed during his first presidency to summon his favorite beverage. The button was removed during President Biden’s term but was reinstalled when Trump returned to office.
The Wall Street Journal reported that “a valet button that Trump famously used to order Diet Cokes was set up and ready to go” shortly after Trump’s January 20, 2025 inauguration.
The red button sits in a wooden box on Trump’s desk.
Trump’s preference for Diet Coke has been well-documented throughout his political career. The president, who doesn’t drink alcohol, was even gifted an inaugural bottle of Diet Coke by Coca-Cola Chairman and CEO James Quincey.
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