Vice President JD Vance roasted Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Tuesday after she was stumped by a question on Taiwan at the Munich Security Conference.
“You bring me on your show, you show me the most uncomfortable 20 seconds of television I’ve ever seen,” Vance told Fox News host Martha MacCallum after watching the cringeworthy clip.
Ocasio-Cortez fumbled the question and made other gaffes throughout her tour of the conference, meant to display her foreign policy chops as a young Democratic socialist who is in position to take up the standard of 84-year-old Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders. Vance said that Ocasio-Cortez’s display shows that she, as a politician, relies too much on scripted answers.
“I think it’s a person who doesn’t know what she actually thinks, and I’ve seen this way too much in Washington with politicians where they’re given lines, and when you ask them to go outside the lines they were given, they completely fall apart,” the vice president said.
“Look, that was embarrassing,” said Vance. “If I had given that answer, I would say, ‘You know what, maybe I ought to go read a book about China and Taiwan before I go out on the world stage again.’ I hope that Congresswoman Cortez has the same humility. I’m skeptical.”
.@VP just COOKED @AOC for her answers in Munich:
“I think it’s a person who doesn’t know what she actually thinks … if I had given that answer, I would say, ‘You know what, maybe I oughta go read a book about China and Taiwan before I go out on the world stage again.’” pic.twitter.com/UfUcjfZSei
— Trump War Room (@TrumpWarRoom) February 17, 2026
As Ocasio-Cortez flashed her smile around Munich last week, she was asked about the United States’ relationship with Taiwan and whether Washington should come to the island nation’s aid if it is attacked by China. For about 20 seconds, Ocasio-Cortez grasped about for a coherent thought before stumbling on an answer that appeared to rehash the United States’ longstanding policy of strategic ambiguity about a potential conflict between Beijing and Taipei.
While Ocasio-Cortez’s flub of the question over Taiwan was perhaps the most embarrassing of her Munich tour, it was not a one-off. The New York Democrat also mistakenly claimed that Venezuela is south of the equator. Ocasio-Cortez also attempted to mock Secretary of State Marco Rubio for pointing out that the American cowboy and much of the culture that surrounds him has its roots in Spain.
“Rubio’s speech was a pure appeal to Western culture. My favorite part was when he said that American cowboys came from Spain. I believe the Mexicans and descendants of African slave peoples would like to have a word on that,” Ocasio-Cortez said, mistakenly attempting to correct Rubio. Even the word cowboy is a literal translation of the Spanish word “vaquero.”
.png)
.png)
