Vice President J.D. Vance finally dishes details on a viral video where he did an awkward slow run with his family at Disneyland.
One online outlet labeled it a “diaper dash,” while the liberal voices at Pod Save America wondered if the loping Bigfoot-style jaunt was him “running for the first time in his life.”
It turns out it was part of a game he plays with his kids called “Ogre.”
“I like chasing after them, but I don’t run full speed. And so I was playing Ogre. And that was what caused the great scandal of how I ran,” he said on “The Katie Miller Podcast,” hosted by a former Elon Musk aide and wife of White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.
The 45-minute episode avoids politics, save for some chuckles over Secretary of State Marco Rubio, a potential 2028 presidential opponent, being labeled the funniest Cabinet member and Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy the biggest pushover when it comes to kids.
Instead, Mr. Vance waxes on about his family, raising children and life as the veep.
“You are never alone,” he said. “Basic things like driving to the grocery store and listening to a podcast, that just doesn’t happen anymore. I don’t go to the grocery store, but most importantly, I don’t drive a car at all anymore.”
He said he has gone shopping a couple of times just to get a sense of normalcy.
He said his kids mockingly call him “Mr. Vice President” — particularly when they’re about to misbehave — and they seem to have figured out how to use being in the public eye.
“They are very judgmental of our parenting in public, and they know that there are always cameras around, so they use that as an opportunity to say, ’Oh, you should have child protective services called because he didn’t give me two scoops of ice cream last night,’” he said. “I’m like, ’No so; that’s not how this works out,’ but they know they have an audience.”
Mr. Vance said the vice president’s residence in D.C. is a “no shoes inside” home, at the insistence of his wife, Usha.
“I always violate it; it kind of drives her crazy,” he said.
He also revealed the secret to making his peanut butter-chocolate cheesecake is using mascarpone instead of cream cheese — “I think it’s a little bit less tangy.”
Mr. Vance almost gave away his kids’ Secret Service code names, but they were blanked out in the audio. He did say each of them began with a B and one is a type of dinosaur.
Ms. Miller offered her own gem about her husband, revealing that he eschews all condiments but one.
“He’s only a mayonnaise guy,” she said.
Mr. Vance said his favorite is barbecue sauce.
• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.