Just How Lincoln-y Is J.D. Vance’s Beard?
I’ll be the judge of that.
In the culmination of one of the more bewildering political transformations in recent memory, Donald Trump has named J.D. Vance—former feckless Atlantic magazine Republican, current Peter Thiel–backed bloodsucker—as his vice presidential nominee. From what I can tell, the response on both sides has been pretty tepid. Smarter political thinkers than I have speculated that Vance might turn off the moderate suburban voting blocs, which were the demographics that carried Biden to victory in 2020. I’m not sure exactly why that is, but there is certainly something about Vance’s overall gestalt—puffy, squinty, red-in-the-face, deploying a counterfeit Kid Rock affectation that can never truly outrun his law school bona fides—that I personally find repellent. (He brings to mind the most sinister frat guy you’ve ever met.) But whatever—we’re not here to talk about Vance’s policy platform. I want to talk about his facial hair.
Here it is, on full display:
Yep, that’s a full beard! Not a mustache, not a goatee, and certainly not that weird set of mutton chops that have taken up permanent residence on Ted Cruz’s face. Nope, Vance is giving himself a vintage 19th-century treatment, which is relevant for two reasons. First, the last vice president to wear any facial hair whatsoever was Charles Curtis, an irrelevant appendage of the Hoover administration who sported a neat mustache between 1929 and 1933. (Fun fact: Curtis was also the first biracial veep in history, as a member of the Kaw Nation.) Second, if you are familiar with Trump’s wide inventory of baffling quirks and tics, you will know that the man apparently hates beards of all variations of grooming. Naturally, in the run-up to the RNC, Fox Radio host Brian Kilmeade asked Trump if he would have any reservations picking Vance because of his desecrated visage. Here was Trump’s response:
“He looks good. He looks like a young Abraham Lincoln.”
There is somehow a lot to unpack in this 10-word affirmation. First, J.D. Vance in no way looks like a young Abraham Lincoln, or an old Abraham Lincoln, for that matter. But that’s to be expected, because I’m pretty sure that Trump could identify, I don’t know, maybe three of the former presidents by their faces? Four? More importantly, J.D. Vance was a beardless guy for ages before he plowed into Ohio’s open Senate seat, so we’re actually capable of determining whether Vance looks better with facial hair. Here is he pre-beard:
This is definitely less presidential to me. Beardless Vance looks like a particularly agitated Deloitte Consultant—Patagonia vest vibes—perhaps hired to sweatily rearrange the finances in Mar-a-Lago. Bearded J.D., on the other hand, is much more of a memorable presence. He regains a whiff of pastoral ruggedness by obfuscating his hedge-fund bone structure and his slightly weak chin. I can see why he pivoted. He does look better with a beard.
The only other question is where we put him on the Lincoln scale, which is relevant because it seems like the GOP is dead set on branding their newest star as the heir apparent to the greatest Republican who ever lived. (Seriously, the party has been talking quite a bit about Lincoln lately.)
I’m sorry man, it’s not even close. If anything, Vance looks much more like Lincoln’s right-hand man, the underrated and perennially furry Ulysses S. Grant. (Both men are from Ohio!) The only difference is that Grant spent much of his presidency prosecuting Reconstruction, while Vance is destined to spend the rest of his political career looking over his shoulder, wary of whatever grisly collateral Peter Thiel has on him. Maybe that brings us to the real lesson here: Nobody in the modern incarnation of the Republican Party should be allowed to extol parallels with their Civil War–era ancestors in any way, shape, or form—even if they’re just talking about the beards.
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