Vice President JD Vance sparked outrage after comparing a Purple Heart–decorated U.S. Senator disabled by her Iraq War service to the titular character in Forrest Gump.
Vance, 41, posted the remark on X Wednesday amid a heated exchange between Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Sen. Tammy Duckworth during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, where the two clashed over U.S. military action in Venezuela.
“Watching Tammy Duckworth obsessively interrupt Marco Rubio during this hearing is like watching Forrest Gump argue with Isaac Newton,” the vice president wrote.
“Thank God we have a Secretary of State who knows his facts AND has the patience of Job. Great job,” Vance added in a follow-up post, which had been viewed roughly half a million times as of publication.
Vance’s reference to the Oscar-winning 1994 film—whose main character, played by Tom Hanks, has significant physical and intellectual disabilities—comes after Duckworth lost both legs and partial use of her right arm while serving in Iraq in November 2004.
Duckworth, then a 36-year-old combat pilot, was flying a Black Hawk helicopter back to a military base roughly 50 miles outside Baghdad when a rocket-propelled grenade pierced her aircraft, nearly killing her, according to her website. Despite her injuries, she served another decade in the U.S. Army, retiring as a lieutenant colonel before eventually becoming a senator representing Illinois.
Meanwhile, Vance—who also counts himself a vet—served four years in the U.S. Marine Corps Public Affairs Office. His service included a single six-month deployment to Iraq, during which—by his own admission—he did not see combat. He later used GI Bill benefits to attend Yale Law School.
In her rebuff, Duckworth took aim at Vance’s boss’s lack of combat experience.
“Forrest Gump ran toward danger in Vietnam. Your boss ran to his podiatrist crying bone spurs,” Duckworth wrote, referring to Donald Trump’s multiple Vietnam War draft deferments, including a questionable medical exemption for bone spurs.
She continued: “Petty insults at the expense of people with disabilities won’t change the fact that you’re risking troops’ lives to boost Chevron’s stock price. It’s my job to hold you accountable.”
Vance was quickly flooded with criticism online.
“Watching JD Vance gratuitously insult Tammy Duckworth is like watching a serial liar and opportunist insult a military helicopter pilot who lost both her legs when her helicopter was shot down in the Iraq War and then served 10 more years in the National Guard,” journalist Cathy Young wrote to her 70,000 followers on X.
Another X user, John Bourshceid, applauded Vance for consistency. “At least we can say one thing about JD Vance: He’s consistent about not giving a s--t about wounded combat veterans, Duckworth included. Unless pretending to care serves his own needs, of course.”
Democratic Gov. J.B. Pritzker dismissed Vance as a “random troll tweeting at her,” while California Rep. John Garamendi condemned the fellow attack on his fellow Democrat as “classless and disgraceful.”
“If you had any honor, you’d take this post down. But you work for Trump, so clearly you have none,” Garamendi added.
Rubio and Duckworth’s clash came after she pressed him on whether the United States was effectively at war with Venezuela following the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro, who was brought to New York to face drug- and weapons-related charges.
Rubio denied the U.S. was at war but bristled when Duckworth asked whether Trump would rescind the wartime Alien Enemies Act.
“Of course not,” Rubio said. “When it comes to narco-trafficking gangs and criminal gangs, there’s no doubt about the fact that we’re confronting them in a war-like setting.”
The Daily Beast has reached out to the White House and Duckworth’s office for comment.
