Similar to many of you, I spend a significant amount of time engaging in text conversations with friends, and lately, these conversations have been flooded with images of JD Vance. You may have come across them – new ones emerge every day. The bearded Vice President is often depicted with exaggerated features, his eyes enlarged, and his chin widening, giving him a carnival-like appearance. Frequently, he is shown saying “pwease” in these pictures.

I must admit that I am fascinated by these images and have saved dozens of them on my phone and computer. They depict JD Vance in various forms, such as goth JD Vance, JD Vance with a giant lollipop, JD Vance as a dying Darth Vader, JD Vance as a nuclear explosion, and even JD Vance as chicken McNuggets.

Initially, the memes focused on Vance’s smoky eyes and chubby cheeks, but over time, the chubby Vance memes have become more prevalent. For months now, I have seen images of Vance circulating that exaggerate his features, typically depicting him as a grotesque, inflated figure with cold, dead blue eyes staring out with an unsettling intensity, reminiscent of a Cabbage Patch Doll that has been left in the sun.

Vance has become the Pepe the Frog of 2025 – a political figure who has been remixed and recontextualized in an endless memetic frenzy. His ever-expanding body and meme form remind me of the 4chan-driven meme magic of 2016. What ultimately became of Pepe? His creator won some lawsuits and ventured into NFTs, but the meme itself largely died and transformed into the Groyper, a symbol often associated with racist ideologies.

Vance’s current memetic form bears some resemblance to that of the Groyper, but with a key difference – it seems less human. While Groyper stares at the viewer with a subtle smile and a glint in his eye, chubby Vance’s huge eyes are devoid of any emotion except malice. What is striking about the bloated Vance memes is that they have managed to transcend the nation’s cultural divisions. I have seen his bloated form shared by individuals across the political spectrum, from Nazis to conservatives and liberals, and in various online communities, from anonymous image boards to queer-friendly Discords.

Vice Presidents often occupy a unique role in an administration, sometimes serving as a sort of jester. Dan Quayle, for instance, infamously misspelled “potato” during an elementary school spelling bee and never lived it down. Similarly, Harris, Biden, Mike Pence, and Al Gore have all had their turns as the perceived fool in public perception.

What is happening to Vance, however, seems more intense. I believe the reason these memes are so popular and have managed to cut across partisan lines is that there is something uniquely alien and off-putting about him. He has been a public figure and the subject of ridicule for over a decade. A parody excerpt of his memoir Hillbilly Elegy led to the Associated Press reporting on a baseless rumor that he had engaged in a bizarre and untrue act, showcasing how badly some people wanted to believe it and how readily the mainstream press reported on it.

The memes, in their own way, reflect an essential truth about Vance. My personal favorite among them is one that features a group of the chubby caricatures with the caption, “And yet a trace of the true self exists in the false self.” This captures the essence of it. I imagine the Vice President’s soul to be putrid, barren, and vile, and the memes offer a small, fictional glimpse into this darker truth.

Vance, being highly active online, has acknowledged seeing the memes. In an interview with a reporter from The Blaze, he expressed that he finds the trend to be very amusing.

I, however, am not laughing alongside him.