The Dan Bongino Show
Donald Trump Jr. on JD Vance, Tim Walz, and Kai Trump | Episode 05 - 03/21/25
Fri, 21 Mar 2025
Donald Trump Jr. joins Vince in studio to discuss the happenings in and out of DC including JD Vance and his future in the party, the massive impact of his daughter Kai Trump with behind the scenes of her RNC speech, as well as the incredible momentum of the Trump presidency. ‘Four Shots Of Vodka’: JD Vance Says He’d Need To Be Totally Boozed Up To Answer Questions Like Kamala Harris https://dailycaller.com/2025/03/20/jd-vance-kamala-harris-vince-coglianese-alcohol/ Trump Officially Orders Dismantling Of Department Of Education https://dailycaller.com/2025/03/20/trump-officially-orders-dismantling-of-department-of-education/ Attorney General Pamela Bondi Announces Severe Charges Against Violent Tesla Arsonists https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/attorney-general-pamela-bondi-announces-severe-charges-against-violent-tesla-arsonists Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Donald Trump Jr. and what brings him to the studio?
Good to see you, man. Nice to see you. Good to be here. I mean, I feel honored to be in the lineup that you had going on this week. I mean, that's a pretty solid start.
Well, I think people should know that all of the people I've interviewed this week happen to be close friends. Like, everybody, every one of these guys is a buddy. And of mine as well.
Of yours, yes.
That's what I mean. Yeah. That's great. In fact, let's start with J.D. Vance, because he made a big splash yesterday. He was here on our program. We had a great interview with him. And then the media went absolutely wild. They were furious at him. Can we play the clip of him that everybody's talking about? This is him talking about Kamala Harris consuming vodka shots before every single meeting.
Take a look at this. You talked earlier about the role of the vice president and how it's different with each presidency. How are you doing the job differently than Kamala did it? Well, if we're going to stick the landing on that, that's where he responds.
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Chapter 2: What did J.D. Vance say about Kamala Harris and vodka?
That was not the response that got the media open arms.
You talked earlier about the role of the vice president and how it's different with each presidency. How are you doing the job differently than Kamala did it?
Well, I don't have four shots of vodka before every meeting. That's one way I think that Kamala really tried to bring herself into the role is these word salads. And I think that I would need the help of a lot of alcohol to answer a question the way that Kamala Harris answered questions. So good.
I mean, tough but fair. Tough but fair. I mean, it's legit. I mean, I've never seen someone that could get to the ranks that Kamala Harris did who could not complete a sentence. Yes. And you saw that. It was just such an empty suit. It's like a caricature created entirely by the media and a democratic apparatus that this is going to be the leader of the free world. I'm like, Yeah. And you saw it.
You always knew it kind of intuitively. But during that presidential run, you saw it so early when it was like, OK, fine. What would you do differently? I wouldn't do anything differently. Fine. You got it wrong. Even the left was killing her for that. Like, just answer something on the border, on Ukraine, on any one of the major issues that was destroying the nation. But when she was asked.
A second time, and a third time, and a fourth time, and a fifth time, and was- In friendly outlets. Listen, if you go on The View and basically almost end your political campaign as a Democrat, if you can't get through The View, how are you going to get through Putin, Xi?
It's the most basic question imaginable. It's the kind of thing that you would think to yourself while you're brushing your teeth before the interview. They're probably going to ask me, how would it be different? Yeah. You know, and that's the most basic possible question. And it was, what's her face? Sunny on The View. Sunny Hostin, who was like, how would your presidency be different?
She's like, not at all.
It'd be the same. It'd be exactly the same. Everything that we've failed at, we're going to continue failing at. And I'm like, how do they not know to adjust? Like, hey, I get it. Everyone's had a bad answer. Right. Everyone's, you know, put their foot in their mouth, whatever it was, or maybe got caught off guard. But like you're running a presidential campaign, like adjust. Big time. Overcome.
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Chapter 3: How did J.D. Vance become Vice President?
You start going down the list, and you realize, whoa, each of these guys has been subjected to their own trials at the hands of the American left, and... They're so they're in better position now.
They're ready to fight 100 percent. And you sort of brought in that coalition. So I was sort of behind the RFK endorsement. I sort of made that happen through a good friend of mine that was best friends with his son. It was like another one of those like you two would be best friends if you hung out. And so we did.
And it was like you saw the Democrats were trying to turn Bobby into the ultra conservative. And that's the choice to get MAGA versus MAGA to try to split that vote. And so I was like, hey. Bobby, you're not going to win. We know that. But you could cause significant damage here. I actually believe in so much of what he's saying out there.
I think you are a subject matter expert on the health stuff. I think it's so critical. I have five young kids. I see the garbage that's out there. I see what they try to cover up. Let's figure out how to work together. He was like, okay. And we sort of negotiated that one. It was me, my buddy, Bobby, his campaign manager, and Susie Wiles. And that was it. We kept everyone else out of that.
We did the same thing with Tulsi, actually, because my friend who introduced us was also a kind of former Democrat that saw what happened during lockdowns and became like, you know, was totally, you know, red pilled and has been on board. So we brought this sort of interesting coalition back together. But to get back to J.D. Yes.
You know, that was complicated because the reality in politics and, you know, all of politics, but money controls so much.
Yes.
So every billionaire donor that's out there that's writing $5, $10, $15, $20, $25 million checks and up sometimes, they want their puppet in there. They want to be able to try to control the future. They want to be able to do this. So they...
And so for me, it was basically the biggest voices in that room for JD would have been me initially and all in, Tucker, Charlie Kirk, some of the just the grassroots guys that are on the ground that know what's going on. It was us versus the entire billionaire class. who each had their own whatever it may be. There wasn't necessarily a consolidation around one particular guy. It got to a couple.
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Chapter 4: Why is Donald Trump Jr. advocating for J.D. Vance?
And I think the one thing my father probably figured out would be like, I'm just the guy on the ground. I'm the guy that doesn't just show up for the selfie to be in the back of his speech. I don't go to his speeches. Right. I go to the speeches where he can't be. Right. Because that's actually a creative. Yeah. Right. Like if there's one Trump in the room, it's plenty.
You don't need two Trumps in a room. I don't add much value. Some of the stuff you do for history because it's cool, but too many people in that world just, I just want to be where he is because I can be in a selfie and I can use it to promote whatever. It's like, no, no, no. I'm going to go to the middle of Iowa and speak to 300 people in a room that the nominee can't go do to add value.
So I just had a feeling of what's going on on the ground. I have a feeling where people are. So he's sort of trusting me with that one. And I knew... It was always, even the Sunday shows, he started crushing, like I said. He's putting, you know, Martha Raddatz in a play. Martha, do you hear yourself speaking? Yes. Trendel Aragua only took over a couple of buildings in Colorado.
I mean, it's, you know, it's wild how deranged they are. Yes. And he could... He could do it, but I get high strung. I get aggressive. He'll tell these people and he'll slap them around like a little child, but just calm and collected and cool and everyone saw it. And I knew I was finally vindicated because there were a lot of people in the press, all those butthurt billionaires.
They were MFing me behind my back. And some of them even came up to me afterwards like, I hated you more than any person in politics for about a month and a half after the convention, but You were actually right. I was like, you should not have told me that because I don't forget these things. But it's fine. I've noticed a lot of people saying that. Like I was completely wrong about J.D. Vance.
I had no idea. That's like the number one thing I hear right now. And so I knew I was good because half the time, you know, hey. playing to the whole crowd, but sometimes it's an audience of one. And that audience of one is a very powerful band. And it was after the debate, the vice presidential debate, I go do the spin room, and I did two hours of straight media, just from American to BBC.
And my phone keeps ringing in my pocket. And I'm like, OK, just mute, mute, mute. Because I figured, oh, it's just a bunch of people. JD did great. It was actually no people. It was 15 missed calls from my dad at 2 in the morning. I'm going to call him back, and I do. He picks up on the first ring at 2 o'clock in the morning. He's kind of a machine. You know, Don, Don.
I did that one for you, Don. But that was a 10. There's not a lot of 10s. That was a 10. And so it was finally like, okay, I don't care if I'm vindicated in the minds of the billionaire class. It means nothing to me. Like, I fight for... If I cared about that, I would have stayed as a real estate developer in New York.
Like, I actually, you know, sort of... I'm basically a redneck on the weekends when I'm not, you know, in a suit or whatever doing those things. That's what I like to do. Those are the people I hang out with. And so, you know, that was a... But the ultimate vindication was him finally being like, hey, man, this is a risk. It's a little bit of an unknown entity.
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Chapter 5: What influence did Kai Trump have at the RNC?
We were nice to a 17 year old girl so we could destroy Don next week.
I read it this morning and it is it's very glowing and it talks about how she's like kind of the. She's like the humanizing force for the Trump White House. And in a way, it's kind of a backhanded compliment to her. It's like everyone else is like completely unhuman, but she's very human. But this is what we call in journalism a beat sweetener.
It's like you write a really nice piece just to like, oh, maybe we'll get the Trump family to like us again. And then, boom, they try to hit you.
At this point with the Washington Post, I imagine that's a lost cause for me. If they're. If they're decent to a 17-year-old, I'm all for it. Hopefully that's the start. Yeah, my understanding, and I haven't even had a chance to read it yet. it, it sort of talked to her more on a political thing. And that's her, like, she's trying to not get anything that you're like, it's not political at all.
I think that's what makes it. It doesn't have to be. She's like, it's not my world. I don't want to do that. Uh, so, you know, they're trying to make it more like the, well, this is a political for it. It's like, she has nothing. She, she's talking to young kids.
And like, I think, you know, a kid that's, you know, just, you know, clean cut and works hard and a straight A student and was a good athlete, you know, like maybe that's a better role model. And some of the stuff that's being pushed on us, like, you're not good unless you have nose rings and rainbow-colored freak hair and mutilate your body.
You're confused and you hate your country and your parents. That's the ideal child. It was sort of like, oh, wow, it's refreshing. Maybe you can have a normal role model for a change.
So one of the cool things that they did focus on in that Washington Post piece is just what she's doing with social media and bringing people inside of this world that nobody else has access to, not even those top Trump donors or anybody else. This is the granddaughter of the president. So she goes to a bunch of cool events and she captures them.
And in the process, she gets to meet a lot of cool people, including Elon Musk. And Kai, I think, in the last 24 hours has posted a video. Can we play this? This is a video from Kai Trump, Donald Trump Jr. 's daughter. Apparently, she has just received a Tesla from Elon Musk. Oh, boy. Oh, shit.
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Chapter 6: How did the Trump family react to Donald Trump Sr.'s shooting?
I went to boarding school in eighth grade. I just wanted to get out of New York City. It was my parents going through a rough divorce and all that. I was like, you know what? I just want to be here. Went to boarding school in central Pennsylvania. And, you know, a couple guys there saw that I love the outdoor stuff, took me under their wing, got me, you know, shooting guns.
I mean, I shot air guns and stuff like that earlier. But, like, fly fishing and air guns. And I just fell in love. And the second I could drive. Well, because your life is so busy. And the environments you're describing are meditative. Like, you can just, like, get out and be alone. They're like, what do you like?
I can't, I have totally ADD about everything, but like, you know, I can go in the mountains without a phone for 10 days, come back out. And it's like, you know, now you, within about four hours of catching up on emails, I'm usually back to the stress level I was before, but that that's sort of my release. And so I just, I just love being out there, whether it's fishing, hunting, just shooting.
Your dad never had an interest. He was never into that.
I've seen him shoot once or twice, but that's about it. You're not going to change him. You know what I mean? My dad's the guy that... And it's why he's probably successful at so many things. He's the guy that can't even understand why... you may not like the same music that he does. He's like, no, but this is the best. He's so committed. He's very proud of his playlist. Yeah.
DJ Trump is a thing. That's Mar-a-Lago. He'll sit there and do it all night. And I'm like, OK, I got to go because it's playing so loud. I can't hear. I'm not having it. He's like, you hate music. I'm like, I don't hate music. If I can't have a conversation because you're like,
We're playing so loud. I don't feel the need to sit here that long. I think back to it was the 2016 election and we were on the road. It was the New Hampshire primary. And if you recall that night, it was very snowy. The debate. I remember that. The debate occurred. Marco Rubio was having a lot of trouble on stage. We don't talk about that now because Rubio is wonderful.
But Rubio was having trouble on stage. And so that night we went to the only steakhouse. It was me and a couple of Daily Call reporters and Tucker Carlson. We all went to the only steakhouse that was open that night. And we're sitting there. enjoying our meal and the Secret Service comes walking in a few minutes later. It's an almost empty restaurant.
And sure enough, right after they come in and scan the restaurant, your entire family walks in and everybody walks in to have dinner. And President Trump stops by the table, not yet president. And my buddy, Alex Pappas, says to him, asks a reporter, he goes, I can ask you about your playlist. He goes, you've got like the Rolling Stones, you've got like Elton John. Go right to Pavarotti.
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