Democratic Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear has issued an apology for his comments about Republican Senator JD Vance and Diet Mountain Dew—and got in another good jab at Vance in the process.
After Vance, Donald Trump's Vice Presidential running mate, made headlines for all the wrong reasons for using his love of Diet Mountain Dew to make a feeble dig at Democrats, Beshear later clapped back by mocking Vance for liking the soda in the first place.
During a press conference, Beshear, a potential running mate of Vice President Kamala Harris for her presidential run, decided to set the record straight and own up to his unkind words with an apology. Not to Vance, though. To Diet Mountain Dew.
Beshear said:
"I’ve been a person that when I’ve sometimes gone over the line, I’ve wanted to make sure that I set the record straight. So, I do owe an apology to… Diet Mountain Dew."
Beshear's crack was in reference to his appearance on CNN, in which he was asked by CNN's Kaitlan Collins about insults Vance had lobbed at him about not having earned his job as Governor of Kentucky.
Instead, Beshear just made fun of Vance's rather dumb joke that Democrats are so obsessed with race, they'd probably call him "racist" for drinking Diet Mountain Dew.
Beshear told Collins:
"What was weird was him joking about racism today and then talking about Diet Mountain Dew. Who drinks Diet Mountain Dew?"
In his press conference, Beshear also raked Vance over the coals for writing about his roots in Kentucky in his memoir Hillbilly Elegy despite mostly growing up in Ohio.
Beshear said:
"This is a guy who would come maybe in the summers for some period of time, or to weddings or funerals."
"And then he claims to be from eastern Kentucky, writes a book about it to profit off our people. And then he calls us lazy."
"...[He] acts like he understands our culture and he's one of us. He's not. This is a guy who went out to Silicon Valley and [is] trying to be an Every Man. He ain't one of us."
He then gave a shout-out to local Kentucky soda Ale8One, but told Diet Dew lovers that he "supports" them.
Just as they loved his original wisecrack about Diet Dew, people online loved Beshear's shady apology and dig at Vance.
Beshear was thought to be one of several politicians under consideration by Vice President Harris as a potential running mate, but that field is said to have narrowed in recent days to three contenders: Arizona Senator Mark Kelly, Pennsylvania Governor Josh Shapiro, and Minnesota Governor Tim Walz.
