JD Vance claims to sense spiritual 'darkness' from world leaders, addresses Trump's AI Jesus post

'It sort of sets off every spiritual alarm bell in my body'

By Jon Brown, Christian Post Reporter Tuesday, September 01, 2026

Vice President JD Vance said during a recent podcast with Gen Z Christian influencer Bryce Crawford that he has sensed spiritual darkness from world leaders, though he also dismissed concerns that President Donald Trump was being intentionally blasphemous when he posted an AI-generated image of himself as Jesus.

Speaking during an hour-long episode of the "Bryce Crawford Podcast" that aired Monday, Vance was discussing the spiritual battle between good and evil when Crawford asked him if he has ever sensed evil in the room when dealing with powerful people.

Vance replied by noting that the evil he has encountered usually emanates from individuals instead of particular places, though he stopped short of naming anyone.

"So, definitely, though less like a room itself and more sometimes, like, people that are around you sometimes give you a very, very bad feeling," he said. "Definitely, I've been in meetings with world leaders where various issues are being discussed, and somebody will say something or somebody will make an observation, and I will feel a certain darkness about it. It sort of sets off every spiritual alarm bell in my body."

"Like, whatever that person just said, I need to be very careful because that's not a great thing. So I would say I feel it more around people necessarily than places," he added, though he acknowledged he has sensed spiritual heaviness in places such as the battlefield at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.

"I've been to Gettysburg, I believe, once in my life and actually stood at the battlefield," he said. "And it's very clear, this is where Pickett's Charge was, and the guys were going up the hill, and that's the one place where I feel like a very dark spiritual energy is Gettysburg. And I think it's just because so many people died there. I remember being there and it made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up."

"So, I guess I do think that certain places have spiritual energy, because I felt that at Gettysburg. But most of the time, I would say when I feel something either positive or negative, it's usually centered around people rather than places," he added.

Vance also said he believes the Antichrist could be alive and that the world could be in the Last Days.

"I think that there are, like, things about the world that make me feel like I'd be not shocked if the Antichrist was walking among us," he said. "I mean, my view on it is — so, one, do I think that we're in the End Times? I don't know."

Later in the interview, Crawford pressed Vance to respond to the outrage Trump fielded from many Christians in April when he posted an AI-generated image of himself as a robed, Christ-like figure. Trump later deleted the post following backlash, claiming he thought the image "was me as a doctor and had to do with the Red Cross."

"I hear you, and I know that the president didn't mean any offense," Vance told Crawford, who said he was personally offended by the meme and didn't believe Trump's explanation.

"Obviously, he loves Christians and politically, like, has built, I think, has done a lot of good for religious liberty and certainly didn't mean anything by it," he continued. "I mean, I'm biased because I see this from the inside. So, it's like, did Donald Trump mean to post a meme of himself as God? No. Because I saw it happen in real time."

Vance said people routinely show Trump various memes and that he sometimes asks for the ones he finds funny to be posted to his TruthSocial account.

Q: Trump tweeted that AI photo of him as God. As a Christian, that photo made me upset. I don't know how he thought he was a doctor. What do you think?

Vance: He didn't mean any offense. Did Trump mean to post a meme of himself as God? No pic.twitter.com/zYgchCrJoX

— Headquarters (@HQNewsNow) September 1, 2026

"He did not mean to mock or mimic God. That's just not who he is. And then [after] he saw people responded negatively to it, he took it down. I understand what you're saying, but I really don't think the president meant anything by it. And I think that him taking it down was him sort of saying, 'You know what, this didn't come across the right way, so let's go in a new direction.'"

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., echoed Vance's assertion last April when he suggested Trump failed to understand how many people would take offense to his post and said he privately urged him to delete it.

"I talked with the president about it as soon as I saw it, and told him that I don't think it was being received in the same way he intended. He agreed and he pulled it down," Johnson told reporters at the time.

While some figures such as Franklin Graham and Eric Metaxas also dismissed the outrage over the AI Jesus meme, political commentator Tucker Carlson condemned Trump at the time for exhibiting what he described as an increasingly sacrilegious attitude toward Christianity and a spirit resembling the "man of lawlessness" from 2 Thessalonians.