See It Now: The Miseducation of J.D. Vance

Vice President J.D. Vance is not confused. He is not misinformed. He is, rather plainly, betraying what he knows to be true.

This week, Vance—Yale Law graduate, former federal clerk, author of Hillbilly Elegy and one-time critic of Donald Trump—declared that courts should not “dictate the legitimate authority of the executive branch.” He claimed judicial oversight of the president amounted to “overreach.”

This isn’t ignorance. It’s performance. And it’s dangerous.

In Marbury v. Madison (1803), the U.S. Supreme Court established judicial review—the principle that courts interpret the Constitution and constrain executive and legislative actions. It is the bedrock of American constitutional law. Vance studied this case. He likely taught it to first-year law students as a clerk. He knows better.

And yet here he is, undermining the most basic principle of constitutional democracy, not with passion—but with polish.

Vance invoked Andrew Jackson’s infamous quote: “John Marshall has made his decision; now let him enforce it.” He knows full well that Jackson’s defiance led to the Trail of Tears, where the law was ignored and lives were destroyed. This was not bold leadership—it was the Constitution being trampled underfoot. That Vance would present it as a model of executive strength is not an accident. It is a message.

He is telling the American public—and the judiciary—that if the courts get in the way, they should be ignored. That executive power comes not with limits, but with immunity.

And that’s where it gets real. At 78, Donald Trump shows signs of serious cognitive decline. Vance is not some theoretical veep. He’s a likely successor. His statements aren’t rhetorical flourishes. They’re previews of policy.

A President Vance, by his own argument, could ignore Supreme Court rulings. He would treat judicial review as mere suggestion—advisory at best, obstructionist at worst. He would make the presidency not co-equal, but supreme.

That’s not interpretation. That’s inversion.

This isn’t some average citizen misunderstanding civics. This is a man who earned a Yale Law degree weaponizing that education to dismantle the very system that credential gave him access to.

It is not more forgivable. It is less.

When a citizen misreads the Constitution, we call it ignorance. When a federal clerk rewrites it to suit authoritarian aims, we must call it what it is: betrayal.

During the 1930s, educated elites in Germany decided the courts were inefficient, the law too fragile for their ambitions. They told themselves they were modernizing. They weren’t. They were gutting democracy with a smile and a legal brief.

So let’s drop the illusion.

J.D. Vance is not defending the Constitution. He’s deflecting from it. He’s not resisting overreach. He’s rehearsing it.

And in the end, if our laws fall not to mobs but to men like Vance—sophisticated enough to know better, cynical enough not to care—it won’t be because democracy failed. It’ll be because it was hollowed out by those entrusted to uphold it.

Good night, and good luck.

Channeling Murrow’s voice for today’s America — not his words, but his principles.