U.S. Vice President J.D. Vance warned conservatives against “purity tests” and decried “deplatforming” people on the right during his closing night address at Turning Point USA’s AmericaFest on Dec. 21 in Phoenix.
Addressing attendees at the event, which the conservative student movement said drew about 31,000 people, Vance did not address Jew-hatred or condemn publicly antisemites in the movement, amid ongoing debate among conservatives.
“President Trump did not build the greatest coalition in politics by running his supporters through ‘endless, self-defeating purity tests,’” Vance told the crowd at the Phoenix Convention Center. “Every American is invited.”
The vice president said that he did not “bring a list of conservatives to denounce or to deplatform,” an apparent reference to a speech, during the event’s opening night, by Jewish commentator and Daily Wire cofounder Ben Shapiro, who named Tucker Carlson, Megyn Kelly and Candace Owens as among those who ought to be beyond the pale.
“I don’t really care if some people out there—I’m sure we’ll have the fake news media denounce me after this speech,” he said.
Invoking late Turning Point cofounder Charlie Kirk as a unifying figure, Vance urged the audience to resist internal cancellation campaigns. “We have far more important work to do than canceling each other,” he said.
