For 39 days, Vice President JD Vance performed his duties in the shadows of two bigger-than-life figures: President Trump and Elon Musk.
That changed on Friday.
With cameras rolling, the vice president ambushed President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine, triggering the kind of overheated argument rarely seen in the Oval Office. Mr. Vance repeatedly accused Mr. Zelensky of disrespecting Mr. Trump by refusing to offer thanks for U.S. assistance.
“Do you think that it’s respectful to come to the Oval Office of the United States of America and attack the administration that is trying to prevent the destruction of your country?” Mr. Vance asked, yelling over Mr. Zelensky.
It was Mr. Vance’s most high-profile moment since assuming the role of Mr. Trump’s understudy. And it suggested that the 40-year-old, former first-term senator from Ohio is trying not to be relegated to the B-team of what has already become one of the most fast-paced and aggressive administrations in modern history.
The remarkable scene of a vice president injecting himself into the middle of a tense diplomatic discussion in the Oval Office also showcased Mr. Vance’s media savvy. A onetime best-selling author and CNN political contributor, the vice president has demonstrated a knack for seizing on moments that will capture the media’s attention.
On Friday, Mr. Vance found that moment as Mr. Zelensky tried to explain the ways in which President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia had reneged on prior diplomatic deals. Rather than engage with the Ukraine leader on the substance of that question, the vice president used a tried-and-true debater’s technique: He changed the subject.
“You should be thanking the president for trying to bring an end to this conflict,” Mr. Vance said, his voice rising.
Mr. Zelensky kept pressing, at one point asking whether Mr. Vance had ever been to Ukraine to see the situation for himself. When that seemed to anger the vice president even more, Mr. Zelensky began to chide him: “You think that if you will speak very loudly about the war, you —”
But that triggered Mr. Trump, who was sitting between the two men.
“He’s not speaking loudly,” the president said. Within moments, it was Mr. Trump and Mr. Zelensky who were yelling over each other in a confrontation that would ultimately lead to Mr. Zelensky’s early exit from the White House — without the minerals deal that both men had expected to sign.
Still, it was Mr. Vance, not Mr. Trump, who seemed to deliver the opening salvo on Friday, setting in motion the swift collapse of diplomacy between the two countries.
It was a striking moment for Mr. Vance, who has not been the one generating most of the banner headlines alongside Mr. Trump. That role has been reserved for Mr. Musk, the world’s richest man and the leader of the rapid effort to fire federal workers across the bureaucracy.
During Mr. Trump’s first cabinet meeting on Wednesday at the White House, the vice president sat across from Mr. Trump while the president lavished attention on Mr. Musk. Questions from reporters were directed at Mr. Musk — not Mr. Vance — about his demand that federal employees prove their worth by responding to an email with a description of their previous workweek.
And yet, there have been hints over the last six weeks that Mr. Vance was eager to showcase his own ability to shock.
In mid-February, Mr. Vance stunned European officials by declaring during a speech in Munich that they should end the isolation of far-right parties across the continent. The Germans, he said, should no longer refuse to work with a far-right political party that has often reveled in banned Nazi slogans and has been shunned from government as a result.
“There is no room for firewalls,” Mr. Vance said at the Munich Security Conference, referring to the longstanding agreement among Germany’s major parties not to work with the party, known as the Alternative for Germany, or AfD.
Mr. Vance underscored his message by meeting with Alice Weidel, the AfD’s candidate for chancellor in last month’s election.
The vice president has also used Mr. Trump’s favorite communications tool — social media — to grab attention.
Roughly two weeks after the inauguration, Mr. Vance reacted to several court rulings against the president’s executive orders by making a sweeping statement about executive power.
“If a judge tried to tell a general how to conduct a military operation, that would be illegal,” Mr. Vance wrote on X, the social media platform owned by Mr. Musk. “If a judge tried to command the attorney general in how to use her discretion as a prosecutor, that’s also illegal. Judges aren’t allowed to control the executive’s legitimate power.”
That statement, too, made headlines. Critics said Mr. Vance was claiming powers for the presidency that go far beyond the limits imposed by the Constitution. Article III of the Constitution empowers courts to exercise judicial review over actions of the executive and legislative branches of government.
Mr. Vance was once dismissive of the president and his agenda. In 2016, he called Mr. Trump an “idiot” and warned about his dangerous rhetoric.
That view is gone. In the Senate, Mr. Vance worked tirelessly to advance Mr. Trump’s political agenda, in part by heaping praise on him. When he became Mr. Trump’s running mate in 2024, Mr. Vance was a dutiful soldier on the campaign trail who was careful not to overshadow the candidate.
In an interview with The New York Times in October, just before the election, Mr. Vance said that he understood Mr. Trump’s abrasive approach to politics, but did not necessarily seek to mimic it.
“President Trump’s approach is President Trump’s approach,” he said. “His style is his style. Do I think that his style and his approach is a necessary corrective to what’s broken about American society? Yes, I do. That doesn’t mean I’m going to try to be Donald Trump.”
But neither, apparently, is he trying to be like the Republican and Democratic lawmakers who met with Mr. Zelensky just before the Oval Office meeting that went off the rails on Friday. That meeting went well, with some lawmakers from both parties posting smiling selfies with Mr. Zelensky. Some were anticipating being part of a signing ceremony for the mineral deal that they expected to take place in a few hours.
Instead, a black SUV sped out of the White House gates carrying Mr. Zelensky shortly after the meeting. Mr. Trump wanted him gone, as he made clear in a social media post.
“He disrespected the United States of America in its cherished Oval Office,” Mr. Trump wrote. “He can come back when he is ready for Peace.”
