Executive Summary
MRC Free Speech America previously exposed Wikipedia editors for meddling with the pages of Pete Hegseth, Tulsi Gabbard and Kash Patel. Vice President JD Vance wasn’t spared poor treatment either.
Wikipedia editors piled on negative content to Vance’s page right after major political developments—including when President Donald Trump named him his running mate, and after the infamous U.S. Supreme Court decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization.
Here’s what MRC uncovered:
- Wikipedia Editors Set Out to Crush JD Vance Right When He Became a Potential Vice Presidential Candidate. Wikipedia editors flooded Vance’s page with 883 edits during the GOP vice presidential sweepstakes in the lead-up to Vance’s debut at the Republican National Convention—far more activity than the mere 500 edits made in a five-year span from March 2017 through May 2022—signaling a clear attempt to negatively reshape his public image. This mass editing began soon after legacy media floated Vance as a possible Trump running mate.
- Wikipedia Effectively Framed Vance as a Radical Across Key Issues.
- Poor Treatment of Vance Ramped Up after He Became a Potential Vice Presidential Candidate. From immigration to his support for MAGA, Wikipedia ensured that Vance was depicted as being as fringe as possible. This also applied to his not-for-profit work. In some instances, Wikipedia even referenced Vance’s opposition to support their criticisms, ignoring the unreliability of such a source.
- Wikipedia editors attempted to portray Vance’s immigration policy as motivated by “far-right, white nationalist” views, including the so-called Great Replacement Theory.
- Wikipedia editors claimed that the “biggest accomplishment” of Vance’s non-profit work to get people off of opioids was connected to Big Pharma money, citing The Associated Press.
- In an obvious attempt to make Trump not want to choose Vance, Wikipedia editors framed Vance as an active never-Trumper in a “Relationship with Donald Trump” section. This was despite Vance’s own admission that he supported the MAGA movement after 2016. While he had criticized Trump early on, Vance later said he was “wrong” and would go on to praise Trump’s first term in various statements.
- Ill-Treatment of Vance Began after He Launched His GOP Senate Candidacy. Vance, the popular author of the best-selling book Hillbilly Elegy, had a far more positive Wikipedia page until he decided to run as an outsider for the Republican nomination for Senate. Among the edits that came after he began his Senate run were accusations over his immigration comments, his past opposition to Trump and attacks on his book.
- Wikipedia editors tried to frame Vance’s pro-life stance as radical, inserting his policy views the day after the Supreme Court’s Dobbs decision was preemptively leaked to Politico on May 2, 2022.
- Wikipedia editors labeled Vance’s accurate claim about Biden’s porous border causing Ohio to be flooded with fentanyl as false, omitting key context and citing an extraordinarily obtuse fact-check from leftist outlet The New York Times.
- Wikipedia editors cited ABC News to introduce Vance’s “never-Trump” past, threatening to create divisions between Vance and MAGA voters—a voting block Vance needed to win his Ohio seat. Wikipedia would repeat this tactic in the 2024 election cycle.
- Wikipedia editors highlighted a negative review of Vance’s best-selling book from Bloomberg Opinion, suggesting that the book was part of a “Sloppy analysis of collections of people,” including “flyover America.” This review was not featured on Vance’s page before his Senate bid.
- Poor Treatment of Vance Ramped Up after He Became a Potential Vice Presidential Candidate. From immigration to his support for MAGA, Wikipedia ensured that Vance was depicted as being as fringe as possible. This also applied to his not-for-profit work. In some instances, Wikipedia even referenced Vance’s opposition to support their criticisms, ignoring the unreliability of such a source.
How Wikipedia Attacks on JD Vance Increased from Author to VP Pick
MRC Free Speech America has already exposed Wikipedia editors for marring the pages of several of President Donald Trump’s nominees. A new MRC study confirms that they have also worked to denigrate now-Vice President JD Vance.
MRC researchers found rank bias in side-by-side comparisons of Wikipedia’s treatment of Vance before and after key moments in his political career. MRC compared his page before and after there was legacy media speculation he could become the 2024 Republican vice presidential nominee and analyzed changes made to his page after he announced his 2022 Senate campaign. In both instances, Wikipedia repeatedly made edits seemingly designed to disparage and embarrass Vance, but the obvious attacks and page edits ramped up once speculation began to swirl about his chances of becoming Trump’s running mate.
MRC’s findings are striking.
Wikipedia Editors Set Out to Crush JD Vance Right When He Became a Potential Vice Presidential Candidate.
MRC researchers found a relentless campaign of negative edits to Vance’s page in the short period (not even three months) leading up to Vance’s Republican National Convention speech as the vice presidential nominee for the GOP.
Wikipedia editors made 883 edits from the first editor citation of legacy media coverage of Vance’s potential vice presidential nomination on April 28, 2024, until the end of the day on July 17, 2024, when Vance addressed the RNC—a period of 81 days. By comparison, only 500 edits were made during the first five years after Vance’s page was created on March 6, 2017. These 883 edits included choices that accentuated Democratic angles of attack or choices that could dampen enthusiasm for Vance among Trump supporters. Additionally, MRC concluded that the edits covered below follow a certain pattern: they smear Vance negatively.
While numerous changes were initiated when Vance entered the Ohio GOP primary for Senate in 2021, the volume and harshness of the edits quickly intensified as he emerged as a potential contender for the 2024 vice presidential nomination.
How Wikipedia Handled Vance Before Vs. After Speculation He Could Be Named Vice President.
Wikipedia editors overhauled Vance’s page with changes that could have harmed his image with Trump, MAGA supporters and the general public following legacy media coverage of a potential vice presidential nod.
Wikipedia editors hyped information likely to cause friction between Vance and Trump — all while adding negative details, uncharitably describing events and applying a polarizing “neoreactionary” label to Vance.
For example, the online encyclopedia entry for “JD Vance” specifically cited an article by The New York Times on April 28, 2024, discussing a potential vice presidential nod for Vance from a day earlier. Wikipedia added that “Vance described Trump as ‘cultural heroin’ and ‘an opioid of the masses.’” The latter comment did not even appear in The Times article, indicating Wikipedia editors went fishing for a second source that would emphasize Vance’s criticism of Trump.
Soon after Trump announced Vance as his running mate on July 15, Wikipedia editors went to work on his page, inserting political positions into the top introductory section of his page.
In a July 16 edit of Vance’s page, an editor added Vance’s opposition to aborting babies to the biography at the top of his page, using the dehumanizing euphemism “abortion rights.” The editor highlighted that Vance also wants to protect unborn babies “even in cases of rape or incest.” The word “even” denotes a tell that the line was included to help the left paint Vance as callous and extreme in his pro-life stance.
And then came the onslaught on Wikipedia on July 17 with Vance slated to accept the vice presidential nod from Trump at the RNC.
Wikipedia editors added more political positions into Vance’s biography at the top of his page in a July 17 version of Vance’s page, this time including that he “promoted strongly conservative policies, opposing abortion, same-sex marriage” and wanted to ban things like “pornography” and “transgender healthcare for minors.”
In a later July 17 edit to Vance’s page, an editor added a report from the leftist rag Slate about who Vance follows on X. When an editor removed references that Vance followed pages “Bronze Age Pervert” and “Raw Egg Nationalist,” a different editor accused him of vandalism and restored the reference.
Wikipedia editors even went so far as to apply a “neoreactionary” label to Vance’s introduction, while also adding a connection between Vance and a writer, Curtis Yarvin, who the Wikipedia editors also labeled a “neoreactionary.” This descriptor was also inserted into his “Political positions” section. Wikipedia also added the claim that Vance supports a ban on pornography after vice presidential speculation began. It was still in both the introduction and his “Political positions” section on his Wikipedia page the evening of Vance’s convention speech.
A new “Advocacy” section, added after the announcement of Vance as Trump’s vice presidential pick, attacked a nonprofit Vance founded. The new section included the language: “The group was closed after less than two years with sparse achievements.” The editors relentlessly attack the nonprofit “Our Ohio Renewal,” including by citing Vance’s 2022 Senate opponent former Rep. Tim Ryan (D-OH) to undercut Vance in the section. The section concluded by trying to connect Vance’s nonprofit fighting “addiction, and other ‘social ills’” to Big Pharma by citing leftist outlet The Associated Press and a 2019 investigation by Soros-funded ProPublica.
Wikipedia also employed a well-worn leftist tactic of enabling Democrats’ use of Project 2025 as an attack in an apparent attempt to create a wedge between Trump and potential allies. In the “2024 vice presidential campaign” section, Wikipedia editors again cited The AP to shoehorn in this line: “The Heritage Foundation, which drafted Project 2025, had been privately advocating for Vance to be Trump's vice presidential pick.”
Further apparent attempts to kneecap Vance followed.
In the “Political positions” section, the biased online encyclopedia gave Vance’s pro-life views a heading (“Abortion”) and listed it prominently as the second issue under the section. The editors even retained an outrageous attack on Vance’s immigration views that was attributed to his Democrat Senate opponent Tim Ryan during the Senate campaign. The Wikipedia page initially claimed that Vance was accused of endorsing the “Great Replacement conspiracy theory.” However, this wasn’t enough for one editor who “strengthened wording” to suggest Vance embraced a “white supremacist Great Replacement conspiracy theory.” After keeping the characterization, Wikipedia editors doubled down, worsening the language the day Trump picked Vance to suggest Vance was endorsing the “far-right, white nationalist Great Replacement conspiracy theory.” Elsewhere, Wikipedia editors implied Vance had changed his views on Iran to placate Trump.
Further down the “political positions” section, Wikipedia also removed key context from a hypothetical argument Vance made for how people who believe in climate change should support producing more fossil fuel energy in the U.S. Wikipedia editors removed Vance’s explanation for the statement, deleting: “implying that outsourcing energy production would cause more pollution.” This change helps ensure that the left and others equally uninformed will dismiss Vance’s remark as nonsense.
Wikipedia’s biased crew also added lots of critical remarks to the section “Relationship with Donald Trump,” adding several additional sentences to an already negative paragraph from July 16, ostensibly to create a wedge on the ticket:
“In April 2016, Vance said, ‘Trump is unfit for our nation’s highest office’. In the Atlantic and on a PBS show hosted by Charlie Rose, Vance called Trump ‘cultural heroin’ and ‘an opioid of the masses.’ In August 2016, Vance asserted that Trump is ‘noxious and is leading the white working class to a very dark place.’”
One area in which Wikipedia editors held back in the attacks against Vance was in a section on labor unions. While editors added material that might reduce the Trump-Vance appeal to labor unions, noting that Vance received a zero percent on the AFL-CIO Legislative Scorecard, they also provided some positive comments. Positive reinforcement of Vance’s views included a quote from Teamsters President Sean O’Brien, and a notation that Vance has been critical of “‘right-to-work’ anti-trade union laws.”
How Wikipedia Handled Vance Before Senate Announcement Vs. After Winning 2022 GOP Senate Primary.
Vance’s nomination for vice president wasn’t the first time that Wikipedia set out to trash one of his campaigns. Wikipedia editors marred Vance’s page with changes that undermined his original claim to fame and hamstrung his outreach to Trump supporters during his 2022 Senate run.
MRC researchers analyzed Vance’s page prior to the official launch of his Senate run on June 28, 2021 (the last edit before his official announcement on July 1, 2021) and found that it was treated largely neutrally, but after Vance announced his campaign, things quickly changed.
An analysis of Vance’s page almost two months after the Ohioan secured the GOP primary (June 27, 2022) shows how Wikipedia editors added criticism of Vance’s book Hillbilly Elegy that was not present prior to his foray into the political sphere. The online encyclopedia editors also inserted lots of negative commentary into added sections on Vance’s Senate campaign.
Additionally, Wikipedia added attacks on the book that doubled as an assault on Vance’s worldview. From the “JD Vance” Wikipedia page on November 4, 2021: “Economist William Easterly, a West Virginia native, criticized the book, ‘Sloppy analysis of collections of people—coastal elites, flyover America, Muslims, immigrants, people without college degrees, you name it—has become routine. And it's killing our politics.’”
The June 27, 2022 version also contained a chunky paragraph stuffed with past Vance attacks on Trump, whose endorsement and supporters were crucial to Vance winning not only the primary but the general election in November. These included Vance calling Trump “reprehensible,” referring to Trump policies as “immoral” and “absurd” and generally emphasizing his “never-Trump” past. Wikipedia also referenced similar Trump criticisms in a later paragraph. Wikipedia would repeat this tactic in the 2024 election cycle
In addition to these harmful additions, Wikipedia editors also took it upon themselves to throw in a biased and incorrect fact-check.
Outrageously, the page included a statement that Vance “falsely claimed that President Biden was flooding Ohio with illegal drugs.” Wikipedia editors not only failed to provide the crucial context of the Biden administration’s lax border policies and the trafficking of lethal drugs like fentanyl into the country but chose to state that Vance’s accurate statement was false without providing evidence in the write-up itself.
On November 10, 2022, Wikipedia editors provided some context and replaced their absurd allegation with an extraordinarily obtuse fact check from The New York Times. The leftist newspaper labeled, without explanation, Vance’s claim about Biden’s open border policy and illegal drugs as “blatantly false” while directing readers to an article that “explains Vance’s rise in an evenhanded way.” This second article was headlined: “The Decline of Ohio and the Rise of J.D. Vance.”
When the page discussed Vance’s Senate announcement, editors juxtaposed past remarks on immigration with remarks from his announcement to suggest Vance was a hypocrite. The editors took issue with Vance supposedly calling immigration “dirty” after previously criticizing how Trump discussed immigrants. Editors also accused Vance of “falsely” repeating claims made by Trump about election fraud in 2020.
Additionally, Wikipedia editors inserted Vance’s position on abortion on May 3, 2022, the day after the Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization decision leaked, adding: “Vance opposes abortion, and when asked whether abortion laws should include exceptions for rape and incest, he stated ‘two wrong don’t make a right.’” Democrats heavily campaigned on abortion in the 2022 elections.
In summary, the editors responded to Vance’s run for office by mauling a page that had scarcely any negative material beyond a few criticisms of Hillbilly Elegy to counter-balance its glowing reviews. The online encyclopedia editors targeted apparent vulnerabilities, added to existing attacks and smeared Vance with fresh nonsense. It’s the same treatment that Wikipedia gave Trump’s nominees, and according to Wikipedia co-founder Larry Sanger, even Trump himself.
Methodology:
MRC Free Speech America reviewed the archived copies of Vice President JD Vance’s Wikipedia page (“JD Vance”) as well as the page’s edit history to find out how Wikipedia editors treated Vance’s page throughout his national political career, including before and after he won the GOP primary for U.S. Senate in Ohio, and before and after the first Wikipedia editor citation for legacy media speculation that he could be named then-Presidential Candidate Donald Trump’s vice presidential nominee.
MRC researchers analyzed the April 16, 2024 Wikipedia edit to determine what now-Vice President JD Vance’s page looked like before it was impacted by legacy media speculation that he could, and later did, become Trump’s running mate. The next edit on Vance’s page occurred on April 28, 2024. The April 28 version of Vance’s page included the first mention by a Wikipedia editor citing legacy media (The New York Times) speculation on Vance’s chances of being named Trump’s pick for Vice President.
MRC researchers compared the April 16 Wikipedia edit with the 3:07 PM July 17, 2024 archived version of Vance’s page. Vance addressed the Republican National Convention as the 2024 Republican vice presidential nominee on July 17. The page versions were chosen to ensure the report captured changes Wikipedia editors made in response to legacy media speculation that Vance could be named Trump’s running mate as well as changes made in response to his eventual selection. The July 17 version was also chosen to show what users who wanted to learn about Vance before his speech saw on his page on that same date (July 17).
MRC researchers also analyzed the 5:29 PM June 28, 2021 Wikipedia edit of Vance’s page. June 28 was the last Wikipedia edit before Vance announced his Senate campaign on July 1, 2021.
MRC Researchers compared the June 28, 2021 Wikipedia edit with the 10:15 AM June 27, 2022 archived version of Vance’s page. The June 27 version was the first archived version available after a major political inflection point in U.S. politics when the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade’s national abortion protections in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization on June 24, 2022.
For tallying Wikipedia edit totals, MRC researchers counted the number of edits starting with April 28, 2024 and ending with the final edit on July 17, 2024. The total number of edits was 883 for that time period. MRC researchers also counted the number of Wikipedia edits from the date of the “JD Vance” page’s creation (March 6, 2017) through May 3, 2022, totalling 500 Wikipedia edits for the five year, almost two months' span of time.
Conservatives are under attack! Contact your representatives and demand that Big Tech be held to account to mirror the First Amendment while providing transparency, clarity on hate speech and equal footing for conservatives. If you have been censored, contact us using CensorTrack’s contact form, and help us hold Big Tech accountable.
MRC Free Speech America Director Michael Morris and MRC Free Speech America Associate Editor Luis Cornelio contributed to this report.
