ABC’s This Week host, aging Clintonite muppet George Stephanopoulos, found himself playing the role of a rotisserie chicken as he attempted to talk about anything but the Schumer Shutdown with Vice President JD Vance.

You’d think the government shutdown would be a major item for Stephanopoulos, but as the administration is refusing to break ranks and seems to be turning the crisis of no appropriations into an opportunity to slash the government workforce.

Stephanopoulos led off with a nonsense assertion that U.S. troops would be peacekeepers in Gaza. From there, he went to National Guard deployment and the flaccid resistance of a federal judge and Illinois’s morbidly obese governor, J.B. Pritzker. There was some both-sides-ism comparing a federal grand jury’s indictment of New York Attorney General Letitia James to an off-the-wall story by ProPublica, a “left-wing blog,” according to Vance, claiming some Republican officials have done the same thing. Stephanopoulos tried to wind up the segment with a nothingburger story about Tom Homan allegedly taking a $50,000 fee to broker business deals from people who seem to have been FBI agents. Vance was not having it.

This is the setup. 

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: The White House Border Czar Tom Homan was recorded on an FBI surveillance tape in September 2024 accepting $50,000 in cash. Did he keep that money or give it back?

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: George, you’ve covered the story ad nauseum. Tom Homan did not take a bribe. It’s a ridiculous smear. And the reason you guys are going after Tom Homan so aggressively is because he’s doing the job of enforcing the law. I think it’s really preposterous. I know Tom, I think that he’s a good man. He gets death threats, he gets attacked, he gets constantly threatened by people because he has the audacity to want to enforce the country’s immigration laws. I think that it would be a much more interesting story about why is it that Tom Homan, who is simply enforcing America’s immigration laws, is getting constantly harassed and threatened to the point of death threats? That’s a much more interesting question that I think journalists should focus on. We can agree to disagree on that.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: Well, wait, you said he didn’t take a bribe, but I’m not sure you answered the question. Are you saying that he did not accept the $50,000?

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: George, this story has been covered ad nauseum. He did not take a bribe. Did he accept $50,000? I’m sure that in the course of Tom Homan’s life, he has been paid more than $50,000 for services. The question is, did he do something illegal? And there’s absolutely no evidence that Tom Homan has ever taken a bribe —

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: No, I’m asking a different question. I’m asking you did he accept —

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: — or done anything illegal, which is why he’s working in the administration.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: I’m asking you, did he accept the $50,000 that was caught on the surveillance tape? Did he accept that $50,000 or not?

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: George, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Did he accept $50,000 for what?

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: He was recorded on an audiotape in September 2024, an FBI surveillance tape, accepting $50,000 in cash. Did he keep that money?

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: Accepting $50,000 for doing what, George? I’m not even sure I understand the question. Is it illegal to take a payment for doing services? The FBI has not prosecuted him. I’ve never seen any evidence that he’s engaged in criminal wrongdoing. Nobody has accused Tom of violating a crime, even the far-left media like yourself. So I’m actually not sure what the precise question is. Did he accept $50,000? Honestly, George, I don’t know the answer to that question. What I do know is that he didn’t violate a crime.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: So you don’t — what was caught on the tape, you’re saying right now you don’t know whether or not he kept that money?

As an aside, I haven’t followed the Homan story terribly close because my gut is that if Homan has broken the law, Biden’s FBI would’ve arrested him before leaving office. As former RedStater Bill Shipley says:

It wasn’t bribe at the time because Homan had nothing to offer them in return.

In the legal field we call that a “retainer.” https://t.co/HQUVkWMVBu

— Shipwreckedcrew (@shipwreckedcrew) September 21, 2025

Anyway, Vance wasn’t having it.

.@VP nukes George Slopidopolous for obsessing over made-up Fake News BS while not asking a single question about the Democrat Shutdown: “Here’s, George, why fewer and fewer people watch your program…”

George gets big mad, cuts @VP off, and goes to commercial 🤣 pic.twitter.com/VVm2FV5ujd

— Rapid Response 47 (@RapidResponse47) October 12, 2025

VICE PRESIDENT JD VANCE: I don’t know what tape you’re referring to, George. I saw media reports that Tom Homan accepted a bribe. There’s no evidence of that. And here’s George, why fewer and fewer people watch your program and why you’re losing credibility: because you’re talking for now, five minutes with the Vice President of United States about this story regarding Tom Homan, a story that I’ve read about, but I don’t even know the video that you’re talking about. Meanwhile, low income women can’t get food because the Democrats and Chuck Schumer have shut down the government. Right now, we’re trying to figure out how to pay our troops because Chuck Schumer has shut down the government. You are focused on a bogus story. You’re insinuating criminal wrongdoing against a guy who has done nothing wrong instead of focusing on the fact that our country is struggling because our government is shut down. Let’s talk about the real issues, George. I think the American people would benefit much more from that than from you going down some weird left-wing rabbit hole where the facts clearly show that Tom Homan didn’t engage in any criminal wrongdoing.

GEORGE STEPHANOPOULOS: It’s not a weird left-wing rabbit hole. I didn’t insinuate anything. I asked you whether Tom Homan accepted $50,000, as was heard on an audiotape recorded by the FBI in September 2024. And you did not answer the question. Thank you for your time this morning.

As Vance tries to respond, Stephanopoulos does a fantastic imitation of Monty Python’s “Brave Sir Robin” and runs away. He cuts Vance’s microphone and moves on to another topic. 

The entire interview was an object lesson in how toxic the shutdown has become to Democrats, who have been conditioned to expect to win the PR battle. Reuters reports that people are blaming both parties nearly equally. A Harvard/Harris poll is even worse for Democrats.

The wording on this is a bit annoying, but in this recent poll, two-thirds of people said Democrats should stop holding out and just accept the current deal to end the shutdown. pic.twitter.com/8CbaL8aO9z

— Crémieux (@cremieuxrecueil) October 7, 2025

The fact that Stephanopoulos doesn’t even touch the “Obamacare subsidies” nonsense and Vance was spoiling for a fight on the issue of “low income women can’t get food because the Democrats and Chuck Schumer have shut down the government,” shows you just how bad the internal polling is.

Editor’s Note: The Schumer Shutdown is here. Rather than put the American people first, Chuck Schumer and the radical Democrats forced a government shutdown for healthcare for illegals. They own this. Help us continue to report the truth about the Schumer Shutdown. Use promo code POTUS47 to get 74% off your VIP membership.