Lost in the surprising U.S. military operation that led to the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro last month was the notable absence of Vice President JD Vance.
Speculation swirled about Vance’s standing in the administration after images released by the White House following Maduro’s arrest showed President Trump keeping an eye on developments alongside Rubio; War Secretary Pete Hegseth; CIA Director John Ratcliffe; White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller; and Gen. Dan Caine, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
But according to Vance, his notable absence was by design.
“I was in a van, in a mobile Situation Room about 20 miles away from Mar-a-Lago,” Vance told the Daily Mail during an interview this week.
“I was actually with some friends, and [Secretary of State] Marco [Rubio] called me, probably around 10:30 p.m. [Jan. 2] and said, ‘This is going to happen tonight.’”
“I travel with a very large Secret Service detail, and would it be a problem for the vice president to show up with 30 siren cars at Mar-a-Lago an hour before this operation goes live?” he recalled. “And we decided, yes [it would be].”
Despite not being there to monitor the capture, Vance insisted that he was looped in the whole time.
“I expected it was going to happen that night,” he said, adding that “the plan was originally for me to go in.”
“[We decided that] I would just watch it remotely and ensure that we preserved operational security, which, by the way, we were able to do. One of the critical reasons that mission was ultimately successful is because no one found out about it.”
Asked if Trump was annoyed that his second-in-command was not present, Vance insisted.
“No, not at all. I was [on] the phone, with the president and the entire team for about six hours for the entire course of that operation.”
“I think it’s funny,” he said.
“The media tries to create something out of nothing.”
The capture of Maduro was arguably the biggest foreign policy move to happen under Trump’s second term after Maduro and his wife, Cilia Flores, were apprehended at their fortified compound in Caracas and flown to New York to face federal drug trafficking and weapons charges.
The move has prompted many — including some Trump allies — to push back against the president that too much focus is being put on foreign nations and not on “America first”, which was a backbone of Trump’s 2024 campaign.
Vance addressed the critics in a tell-all with fellow conservative Megyn Kelly yesterday.
“What are we talking about Iran for? What do you mean America first? Let’s focus on our own problems, affordability, all these things,” Kelly said.
“They think President Trump spent too much time focused on overseas issues anyway and they definitely don’t want to get involved in Iran. And then there’s a larger faction, another faction, that is also large that’s more neocon-y that says, ‘We missed an opportunity. We let those protesters down. You know, the window’s closing. We should be more aggressive militarily than we are right now.’ Where do you fall?”
“First of all, I hear the criticisms out there that the administration is too focused on foreign policy. I just have to defend the president. I don’t think that’s true,” Vance responded.
“I think that certainly when you’re the president of the United States, you do have to conduct foreign policy. We’re the most powerful country in the world.”
“But what I see him every day, he’s laser-focused on how do we make the American people more prosperous and more secure in their own country. That’s what our immigration policy is about, which we’ve taken a raft of crap over,” Vance continued.
“That’s what our crime policy is about. That’s, you know, even the foreign policy stuff. Much of the president’s foreign policy has been focused on reshoring industry, on using tariffs to force people to reinvest in the United States of America.”
Take a look at the entire interview —
Vance is considered the frontrunner for the Republican nomination in the 2028 presidential election.