Trump's running mate, JD Vance, is Ukraine's worst nightmare

Former President Donald Trump elevated Sen. JD Vance to the national spotlight when he announced him as his running mate on Monday — and Ukraine is likely worried.

A Vice President JD Vance could be awful news for Ukraine in a Trump administration, stresses ‘The Business Insider’.

He has repeatedly made his position clear on Ukraine: no more military aid.

Former President Donald Trump's running mate, Sen. JD Vance, has made his stance on Ukraine clear: He doesn't "really care" what happens to Ukraine.

The Ohio senator, who was named the GOP nominee for vice president on Monday, made the comments during an episode of Steve Bannon's "War Room" podcast days before Russia invaded Ukraine in February 2022.

Since then, the 39-year-old has attempted to block millions of dollars in government aid to Ukraine and has criticized the Biden administration for its focus on the invasion.

If Vance is elected as Trump's vice president in November, the country's war efforts could suffer a massive setback, experts say.

Mark Temnycky, a nonresident fellow with the Atlantic Council's Eurasia Center, told Business Insider that Trump and Vance would likely try to block or scale back US aid if they're elected in November.

"Ukraine would have to rely more heavily on European assistance and involvement as the US scales back," Temnycky said.

An unnamed senior EU official told Politico that Trump's choosing of Vance was a "disaster" for Ukraine and the European Union as it continued to support the nation.

According to its website, the EU has provided 88 billion euros, or about $95.7 billion, in economic, humanitarian, and military aid since the beginning of the invasion.

Meanwhile, the US had sent $175 billion in aid to Ukraine as of May, per the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

Vance was one of 18 senators who voted against a $95 billion aid package to Ukraine and Israel in April.

The bill was ultimately approved, though Vance told reporters that it was "pretty clear to Europe and the rest of the world that America can't write blank checks indefinitely," according to Politico.

Speaking on Bannon's "War Room" in February 2022, he said: "I'm sick of Joe Biden focusing on the border of a country I don't care about while he lets the border of his own country become a total war zone."

Vance could wield significant influence on Trump as vice president, but his role shouldn't be overstated, according to Tom Packer, an honorary research fellow at the Institute of the Americas at University College London.

"The vice president has got very little power," he told BI.

While Vance is "clearly anti-interventionist — he clearly wants to pull back from a kind of strong confrontation with Russia" — the vice president's job is not one that has "control over foreign policy," he added.

Still, Vance's elevation as not just Trump's vice-presidential pick but also perhaps the heir apparent to his MAGA political empire is a signal about the future of the Republican platform.

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