J.D. Vance: Assassination Insurance

Submitted by Portfolio Armor:

Trump Buys Some Assassination Insurance

The first thing to understand about Trump's VP pick is that it's a form of assassination insurance. Had Trump not miraculously turned his head to look at a chart of soaring illegal migration numbers under Biden, the assassin's bullet might have killed him on Saturday. With no designated successor, neocon Nikki Haley might have ended up as the GOP's nominee for President in November. Much of the establishment would have been fine with that. 

They would not be fine with J.D. Vance at the top of the ticket though. Despite opposing Trump in 2016, Vance has come around to embrace Trump's positions on most issues. 

Including on immigration: 

And on some issues, such as the Ukraine War, Vance may be to the populist right of Trump.

Unlike Trump, Vance opposed the last Ukraine funding bill. 

The Vance Pick Is An Implicit Repudiation Of DEI

Unlike Biden, who picked an unpopular and incompetent running mate solely because she was a black woman, Trump picked the best-qualified candidate who shared his political views. 

Even one of the women suggested as a VP pick for Trump by one of our fellow ZeroHedge contributors supports Vance's selection. 

Vance Represents The Emergence Of A Counter-Elite

Another thing to understand about the J.D. Vance pick is--unlike any of the other mooted picks such as Marco Rubio--J.D. Vance is plugged into the online right, and its leading edge thinkers. One of those thinkers is the software developer and political philosopher Curtis Yarvin, who is friends with Vance. 

A point Yarvin has made is that you need some elites on your side for a successful revolution. It can't just be the salt-of-the-earth types who line up for Trump rallies. 

Vance is (now) a member of the counter-elite, and he has counter-elite backing.

Balaji Srinivasan, venture capitalist, former founder of a genetics startup, and former Coinbase CTO supports him. 

As does Elon Musk,

And David Sacks, 

The last part of Sacks's post is important, so here here's the full text of it: 

When the Twin Towers came down, JD Vance enlisted in the Marine Corps, gung-ho to exact justice on America’s enemies. Subsequently he came to believe the Forever Wars were a mistake. This is who I want by Trump’s side: an American patriot, with the courage to fight America’s wars but the wisdom to know when to avoid them. God bless JD, God bless Trump, and God bless the USA.

And Vivek Ramaswamy supports Vance as well.

The full text of Vivek's post:

So proud of my friend, classmate, and fellow southwest Ohioan today. We used to watch Bengals games at the bar in law school, it’s awesome we’re now here a decade later with JD joining the strongest presidential ticket in our lifetime. He’ll be an outstanding Vice President and I look forward to everything ahead for him and for our country.

The Market Implications 

The first market implication today was that shares of the free speech alternative video platform Rumble (RUM) spiked 20%(Vance is an investor in Rumble). 

Beyond that, Vance should be bullish for crypto, as he reinforces perceptions of Trump as the Bitcoin candidate. 

As we wrote over the weekend (Reactions To The Assassination Attempt On Trump), the rally in Bitcoin after Trump triumph over an assassin's bullet on Saturday made sense as a) the odds of Trump winning the election had just spiked, and b) Trump was seen as the Bitcoin candidate. 

At the end of that post, we mentioned we had another Bitcoin-related trade teed up for Monday. You can read about that trade here. 

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