Vice President JD Vance said Secretary of State Marco Rubio, his rumored rival for the MAGA throne, once derailed a “very serious” conversation about the Middle East with a deadpan joke about a Florida woman’s husband rising from the dead in Jerusalem.
Katie Miller, wife of senior Trump adviser Stephen Miller, revealed Thursday night that Vance would be the debut guest on her new podcast, The Katie Miller Podcast.
In a teaser clip shared on X, Miller peppers the vice president with a series of “Marco questions,” including a request for the “funniest joke” Rubio has ever told him.
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Vance, 41, who has been vying with Rubio, 54, for President Donald Trump’s favor for months, noticeably squirmed before settling on the unflattering anecdote.
“We were talking about something very serious related to the Middle East, and he started this joke totally deadpan,” Vance recounted.
He said Rubio interrupted their conversation to say he had learned “something interesting” about the Middle East during his time in the Senate.
Rubio then told Vance that a constituent had called him, saying her husband had died while they were visiting Israel and that she needed help returning his body to the United States. Then, Vance said, Rubio claimed the woman changed her mind and decided to leave her husband’s body in Israel.
Rubio’s punchline? “The last time somebody died over here, they rose from the dead three days later,” referring to Jesus.
“I didn’t know until the very end that it was a totally bulls--t joke,” Vance said.
The Ohio senator managed to fire off several backhanded compliments at Rubio in the under-two-minute clip, including references to his Florida roots.
“[Rubio’s] got a lot of Florida Man jokes,” Vance told Miller. “Because, you know, you’ll take some crazy story from the Jacksonville Times, and then it ends up—you think it’s a joke—but it’s actually something that actually happened in the Florida Panhandle.”
He also took a jab at Rubio’s sweet tooth, saying that half the time he sees him, Rubio is eating ice cream—a weighted allegation in the MAGA-verse, where right-wing commentators have relentlessly mocked President Joe Biden’s own affection for the icy dessert.
“He works out, but he can—I mean, house ice cream,” Vance said.
The awkwardly stifled interview comes just days after Trump stopped short of endorsing his vice president as his heir apparent for the 2028 election, instead saying Vance would “probably” be the favorite to take over the MAGA movement.
Trump also floated the possibility of Vance and Rubio teaming up.
“I think Marco is also somebody that maybe would get together with JD in some form,” Trump said. “I also think we have incredible people—some of the people on the stage right here.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to Vance and Rubio for comment.
