JD Vance rejects Milton Friedman, embraces socialism?

Opinion>Opinions - Robby's Radar The views expressed by contributors are their own and not the view of The Hill JD Vance rejects Milton Friedman, embraces socialism? Comments: by Robby Soave, opinion contributor - 07/06/26 1:50 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Robby Soave, opinion contributor - 07/06/26 1:50 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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What does Vice President Vance believe, and what direction will he take the nation if he is elected president in his own right? I, for one, am worried about his viability as the next leader of the GOP, particularly because he seems too enamored with faulty left-wing thinking on the economy.

At a time when the Democratic Party is being conquered from within by actual socialists — even outright communists like Darializa Avila Chevalier, a Mamdani acolyte who simps for Soviets and terrorists — one might expect the Republican Party to capitalize on this strategic error and campaign against it. Unfortunately, President Trump continues to espouse an economic policy that itself contains far too many concessions to socialism. Even worse, the most likely inheritor of Trump’s throne is someone who is, if anything, considerably to the president’s left on economics.

Vance rarely misses an opportunity to make crystal clear that his embrace of progressive economics is more ideological and deeply held than Trump’s. In an interview last week with Michael Knowles of The Daily Wire, Vance took entirely unnecessary shots at the legendary economist Milton Friedman, whose laissez faire economic ideas were implemented by previous generations of conservatives to great success.

Vance begins by laughing at and defending Trump’s previous comments about seizing the profits of AI companies. It seems clear that Vance is more committed to this idea than Trump is — even though it is well in keeping with proposals from democratic socialists like Sen. Bernie Sanders (I–Vt.). Vance understands better than Trump that such a proposal contradicts long-held GOP economic dogma, and that’s precisely what he likes about it. He likes that it’s kind of socialist.

You think I’m being unfair? Vance goes on to advocate the shunning of Friedman, telling Knowles that the Republican Party of the future will enjoy spitting on his legacy. He specifically says that the party will consciously eschew Friedman-style economics in favor of centralized, government-controlled economic planning. He says this is necessary because: “It’s fundamentally about the dignity of the human person. The economy is a tool to service the dignity of the human person. If a set of economic policies make it possible to raise a family, to earn a living wage, to give back to their community, to maybe go to church on Sunday, or to actually spend some leisure time building the kind of life that matters, that is the sort of thing we want to be supportive of.”

Positing that free markets are somehow antithetical to human dignity is explicitly progressive framing. Sanders, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D–N.Y.), and the new cadre of far-left radicals likely to join the House of Representatives next year would not have worded the statement any differently. And to say that we can only enjoy free markets if we remain a Christian nation is backward. Free markets create prosperity; they are good policy regardless of how Christian or not Christian the nation is.

One can’t help but wonder why Vance thinks this pivot to the left is a good idea for the party. Friedman was the lodestar of former President Reagan and British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, two political figures who ran on laissez faire ideas and enjoyed huge political success. Reagan won 49 states in the 1984 election, and the country experienced spectacular economic growth. By contrast, Americans seem to hate Trump’s quasi-progressive economic policies: His approval rating on the economy is just 33 percent.

So it seems to me that pivoting away from Milton Friedman has not been a good bargain for the right. The economy is underperforming and people don’t like it. Vance thinks he’s come up with something better than the economic philosophy that undergirded the right for a generation and catapulted the Republican Party to its greatest successes in a century. Maybe Friedman and Reagan knew something and Vance should appreciate it.

And look, if he’s up against Gavin Newsom, or someone even more explicitly socialist like AOC or Ro Khanna, why try to sell the American people on a watered-down version of the same leftist agenda they are running on? To defeat the enemies of liberty and prosperity, it will take a full-throated defense of the principles that made America and the Republican Party strong. I hope that Vance is up for that task.

Robby Soave is co-host of The Hill’s commentary show “Rising” and a senior editor for Reason Magazine. This column is an edited transcription of his daily commentary.