JD Vance's Insecurity Is On Full Display As He Jokes About Not Being Donald Trump's Fat Friend

JD Vance underwent a major weight loss transformation; he lost 30 pounds in the two years before the 2024 election. But it seems like he's still sensitive about his weight. During the Cabinet meeting on January 29, Donald Trump was talking about prescription drug prices, and he veered into a story about "my friend, who's very successful...seriously overweight person, he takes the fat, the fat pill or the fat shot. ... it didn't work. I told him it's not working for him, it didn't work," via YouTube. And Vance jumped in with, "He's not talking about me."

Everyone seemed to have a good chuckle, but we're left wondering a few things. First, why did Vance feel the need to interject to clarify that he wasn't the friend in question? We've seen Vance show his insecurities over comments about his fashion, and this interruption seems to show that his insecurity extends to his size. Or maybe he just hadn't been able to talk in a while and needed some attention? At least one person on X seemed to think so, writing, "JD trying to be relevant."

Second, we're confused as to why Trump was telling this story at all when he confirmed, as he told it, that the person in question didn't like being talked about. Though there is one potential benefit of Trump telling rambling stories like this one during Cabinet meetings: when he's talking, he's not appearing to doze off. Trump has said that his Cabinet meetings can get boring, which is why he closes his eyes during them sometimes.

Whatever it was that prompted Donald Trump to tell the story of his famous friend who is struggling with weight loss and for JD Vance to jump in and make it about him, it caught people's attention. One critic thought that Vance was trying, but failed, to be funny. "He couldn't land a good joke if he had to," wrote a critic on X. Others quipped that Trump couldn't have been talking about Vance because the person in the story was Trump's friend, and Vance and Trump have had a complicated relationship.

Others were baffled by the topic coming up at all. "A cabinet meeting with the highest levels of our government sitting around laughing about an overweight billionaire questioning the price of Ozempic," tweeted one.

The story about an overweight friend using a weight loss drug is a story that Trump has told before, and it has left some people wondering if Trump is using the third person to refer to himself. Trump has confirmed that he's self-conscious about his weight. In a recent interview with The New York Times, Trump said he didn't take any weight loss drugs like Ozempic, but followed up with, "'I probably should.'"