JD Vance’s cousin, who fought for Ukraine, unleashes what he really thinks about his Russia-loving relative

There’s one in every MAGA family. Not so much a black sheep as a blue sheep — the one relative who combats the beliefs of their far right-wing family with their much more liberal views. You know of Elon Musk’s estranged daughter, Vivian. Now get ready to meet the secret in the Vance clan’s closet — JD Vance’s Ukraine-ing cousin, Nate.

Nate Vance, who used to spend summers with his first cousin JD when they were kids, is a former U.S. marine who wasted no time in volunteering to fight for Ukraine once the Russian invasion occurred in 2022. Within a month of the war’s commencement, the 45-year-old had put his military experience to good use by volunteering to train Ukrainians in Lviv. Soon, he was invited to “Da Vinci’s Wolves,” a group of international volunteers who became absorbed into the Ukrainian army.

Since then, he’s fought in numerous vicious battles to protect Ukraine’s democracy, which Nate noted in an interview with The Independent is something he ionately believes is a fight that reflects the ideals of his native nation. So it’s unsurprising to hear that he has some strong thoughts about his cuz and President Trump’s egregiously anti-Ukraine stance.

“I was angry, let’s be honest I was angry,” Nate Vance itted, regarding Trump and JD’s shouting match with President Zelenskyy on live television, which he describes as an “ambush.” In the heated exchange, Zelenskyy memorably challenged JD on if he had ever actually been to Ukraine, to which the vice president assured him he was very knowledgeable about the country. According to Nate, however, JD doesn’t seem all that interested in learning from his cousin’s first-hand experience. “JD never asked me anything,” he stressed.

“I think that Trump does not understand that region of the world as well as he likes to pretend he does. He almost views it as two adolescent boys roughhousing in the living room and he’s going to walk in like the dad and say ‘Ok guys knock it off it’s time for dinner,'” Nate Vance continued, when asked for his take on why Trump has got the situation all wrong. “And they’re going to be like ‘OK’ and then go back to being friends again and that is nowhere near what is going to happen.”

Nate Vance explained that he doesn’t necessarily believe Trump and Cousin JD are colluding with Russia explicitly, but that the duo are keen to make good on their campaign promise to end the war as soon as possible. And so, looking at “who can we bully into stopping” between Putin and Zelenskyy, the obvious choice was the latter. Nate has a dire warning for the president and his relative, though, who he had no qualms describing as “idiots.”

“They’re starting to look like Putin’s useful idiots. I’m sure Putin’s laughing his ass off behind closed doors at all these concessions that are being made, knowing he’s not going to do what the current istration wants him to do… Any concessions you make to him will come back to bite you. They will.”

We’re all used to having heated political debates with family these days, but two people in the same gene pool being on entirely different ends of an international conflict — one on the ground and knee-deep in violence and tragedy while the other helps call the shots on a governmental level — is about as polarized as you can get. Honestly, a film about the Vance family these days would probably be more entertaining than Hillbilly Elegy.