Washington – Vice President JD Vance acknowledged on Friday that Elon Musk has made “mistakes” while executing massive federal employees and emphasized that he believes that there are “many good people who work in the government.”
“Elon himself has said that you sometimes do something, make a mistake and then get rid of the error. I’m accepting mistakes, ”Vance said in an interview with NBC News.
“I also think you have to quickly correct those mistakes. But I am also very aware of the fact that there are many good people who work in the government, many people who are doing a very good job. And we want to try to preserve as many of what works in the government as possible, while eliminating what does not work. “
The most gentle tone of Vance represented a contrast of the chainsaw approach that Musk, the richest man in the world, has taken by leading the initiative of President Donald Trump to reduce federal expenditure and reorient the federal bureaucracy. The layoffs of thousands of government employees have been the centerpiece of Musk’s work during the first seven weeks of the second administration of Trump’s White House, with the cuts that produce demands and setback from the judges. Musk has greatly characterized federal workers as “scammers” on whom you cannot trust their work.
“I think some people are clearly collecting a check and are not doing a job,” Vance said when asked about such Comments from Musk. “Now, how many people is that? I do not know, in a federal workforce of 3 million people, whether a few thousand or much larger than that. “
“However, the problem is, it is a problem when people live on the generosity of the US taxpayer in a civil service work and do not do people’s issues,” he added. “That does not distract or subtract value from the fact that it has many great officials who are doing an important job. But I think that most of those great officials would say that we want to be empowered to do our job. We do not want the person who does not appear five days a week we make it difficult to do what we need to do.”
Vance’s comments occurred during an exclusive and broad interview aboard the two Air Force, since the vice president and second lady Usha Vance returned from a visit to a plastic factory in Bay City, Michigan. The journey of his caravan to the city illustrated how different life is now for him and his young family.
Dozens of protesters had aligned the street that led to the factory, greeting Vance and his travel party with middle fingers and vulgar signs, one of which presented a spastic cross and read “Go home, Scumbag”. The night before, Vance was booed while arriving for a performance at the Kennedy center in Washington. And while walking with his 3-year-old daughter near his home in Ohio last weekend, Vance found himself in a civilian but, in his description, bothering Pro-Ukraine protesters.
“The thing in the Kennedy center that I thought it was fun,” Vance said aboard his plane on Friday afternoon. “The thing of my house I thought it was a bit annoying. I think you only take the good with the bad. … I only see it as, depending on your perspective, a characteristic or an error of this new life. “
In his comments at the factory, where he was welcome by a more friendly audience and Pro-Trump full of local Republicans, Vance promoted the commitment of the administration to manufacturing and economic recovery by tempering expectations for the rapid change Trump promised in the campaign.
The majority of respondents in two surveys published this week, 56% of adults surveyed by CNN, 54% of registered voters surveyed by the University of Quinnipiac, said they disapproved how Trump is handling the economy. Meanwhile, Trump’s impulse for tariffs in foreign products has lit the fears of a commercial war that could increase consumer prices.
“Now I have to be honest with you,” Vance said in Bay City. “The way ahead of us is long, but we are already, in just seven weeks, beginning to see the first indications that the president’s vision becomes our shared American reality.”
During the campaign, Vance frequently talked about a woman who had known that she said that she and her husband could no longer afford her weekly tradition of Asar Fillets on Friday nights. He recalled that story aboard his plane on Friday, Vance described the recent lower prices of gas as a positive sign.
Vance also acknowledged that “you see the things that are leveled, not an ideal situation, but a much better and more significant improvement” while the fault of former President Joe Biden, whose policies, according to him, had left Trump in a hole.
“My ambition is that we see some quite fast results, which begins to see at least one path to financial stability,” said Vance, specifically pointing out 10,000 manufacturing jobs added last month. “You’re going to see progress. I think it will be incremental progress. But I also think it is important to be honest with people who do not get the deficits of $ 2 billion during the night. You will not get out of the $ 2 billion deficits during the night. “
Vance also discussed his initial role in the configuration and articulation of Trump’s foreign policy agenda, from a provocative speech at the Munich Security Conference last month to an extraordinary clash from the Oval office two weeks ago with the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whom Vance had accused of being insufficiently grateful for the US help.
“I only try not to be excessively written,” Vance said before remembering his speech in Munich, which rebuked European leaders on issues such as freedom of expression and mass migration. “The classic in Munich would have been to appear and give a speech about NATO or give a speech about where the thing of Ukraine-Russia was at that time, and only thought for me, such as, ‘What do I think is really important to say?’ And the president agreed to say it, so I said it. “
Vance added that he does not “enter these things trying to be like a spokesman for the administration. Some of that happens naturally, but fundamentally, the president is the spokesman of the administration, and everything flows from there. I try to do a good job. I try to say things that I think are true, but they also agree with the president’s preferences. And let the cards fall where they can.
Trump, who is constitutionally forbidden to fulfill another term, raised his eyebrows in a Fox News interview last month saying that he was “too early” anoint Vance as his successor in 2028. Vance and others close to Trump have ruled out Trump’s question and answer to her, remembering that such a talk was premature.
He made a variation of the question on Friday: does he see himself as Trump’s successor? – Vance replied that he is not thinking of a presidential campaign at this time. He related the story of how he felt on the night of the elections, when, surrounded by his closest friends and family, it was clear that he had won the vice presidency.
“Wow, I am the United States elected vice president,” Vance recalled. “And, you know, if I never go further in politics, I am totally well with that, but we have a very good opportunity to do many really good things, the next four years.”
“If I do very well for the next four years, everything else will be taken care of alone. … Now, as, yes, in two and a half years, will that become more difficult? Will people be more focused on politics than in what the White House is doing that particular day? Maybe, “he added.
“I mean, man, if it were a central figure to solve the Russia-Ukraine crisis, who gives a s — What do I do after this?” Said Vance. “That is the attitude I take. So I’m very focused on doing a good job.”
