Beverly Vance Aikins, the mother of Vice President JD Vance, says a chance encounter with the Democrat running for Senate in Michigan would not end politely. During the September 2, 2026, episode of the OutKick podcast “Tomi Lahren Is Fearless,” she told listeners that if she ever crossed paths with Abdul El-Sayed, she would probably take a swing at him — though she added, in the same breath, that she has no intention of doing anything of the kind.
That line came at the end of an extended defense of her son’s household. Lahren, 34, who also co-hosts Fox News’ “The Big Weekend Show,” had raised the subject by noting that El-Sayed, 41, keeps invoking the Vance family in his commentary about the vice president, his wife and their children.
“I think that man’s an idiot,” Aikins said. “Those are my babies. I love those babies and would do anything for any of them,” she said of the couple’s four children. Second Lady Usha Vance, 40, she added, ranks among the most genuine people she has ever encountered. “I love Usha as if she were my own daughter. She’s one of the best, most genuine people I’ve ever met. And she loves my son, and she’s a good mother,” she said.
An OutKick write-up of her remarks to Lahren recorded more of that praise for her daughter-in-law, whom Aikins called humble and described as “One of the nicest people I’ve ever met.” The subject came up after Lahren raised the recent online attention surrounding an inexpensive Old Navy maternity dress worn by the second lady.
“I’d probably punch the guy if I’d ever seen him, and then that would get me in trouble,” Aikins said. The criticism angers her — “It makes me mad, honestly” — partly because El-Sayed has no idea what her son is really like. Even so, she told Lahren, “I’m not gonna do anything about it.”
Asked why opponents go after relatives, Aikins gave a single-word explanation: jealousy. Her son, 42, holds the vice presidency and has a wife and four children, she pointed out, and she suggested El-Sayed’s jabs land nowhere, since nobody in the family gives the remarks any weight.
What El-Sayed Said About the Family
The back-and-forth followed months of sharp commentary from El-Sayed, who is the Democratic nominee in Michigan’s 2026 midterm Senate race. On the podcast “The Allen Analysis Show” in April, he said Vance “has brown kids who he thinks are less American than everyone else,” adding: “Like, that’s wild to look at your own kids and be like you don’t actually belong as much in this country that I brought you into.” He went on: “Bro, it must break you every time you hug your own kids.” Mediaite’s account of the same April episode renders the remark differently, quoting El-Sayed as saying: “Can you imagine, he’s got brown kids, at some point he’s going to have a really awkward conversation with his kids, like, you made your career hating people who are different.”
Western Journal, citing The Guardian, reports the dispute began after Vance said in a speech that if he went back in time to visit his “Papaw” and told him about the state of the Democratic Party in 2026. El-Sayed then raised the vice president’s family history on August 22 in a social media post: “So do we think JD is taking Usha with him back in time to meet Papaw, or no.” The message dragged the Vance family even deeper into the campaign brawl.
Vance Answers at a Detroit Rally
Speaking at a rally in Sterling Heights, Mich., outside Detroit, on Monday, August 31, Vance answered head-on, telling the crowd, “Keep my wife’s name the hell outta your mouth, because she’s way outta your league!”
At the same rally, the vice president went further. “There is something about Abdul El-Sayed that is very, very evil and on the rise in the United States of America today,” he said, describing what he opposed as “people who see themselves, not as citizens of a common nation fighting for every single person, whether they’re Jewish or Christian, whether they’re white or Black or Brown, but see themselves as fighting for one group at the expense of others.” He also characterized El-Sayed, according to accounts of the rally, as a man whose sympathy is reserved for “people who share his religion, but have nothing for people who don’t.”
The rally remarks put the Michigan contest at the center of a national argument over religion, identity and how far campaigns should go in talking about candidates’ spouses and children.
El-Sayed Points to a Trump Post
El-Sayed pushed back that night during an appearance on CNN, accusing the vice president of hypocrisy. He said he would rather not discuss spouses at all, then argued that President Donald Trump had made his own wife a target first, posting side-by-side pictures on Truth Social in August that paired Trump and the first lady with El-Sayed and his wife, Dr. Sarah Jukaku, who wears a hijab, under the caption reading “Two very different Americas.” “Donald Trump, almost as soon as I was nominated, tweeted a picture of me and my wife relative to him and his wife, trying to highlight the fact that my wife wears a hijab, as if to make an argument that that’s somehow less American,” El-Sayed said.
Neither side showed much appetite for de-escalation. Vance pressed his case from the stage outside Detroit, El-Sayed took his hypocrisy argument to CNN, and the vice president’s mother added her own voice — from a friendly podcast chair rather than a debate stage.
The interview ranged well beyond the feud. Fox News’ episode page shows Aikins also discussed Amy Adams’ portrayal of her in “Hillbilly Elegy,” her battle with opiate addiction and reclaiming her nursing license. Asked about Indian food, she said she enjoys it but doubted she could make it: “I have to admit, I don’t think I could cook it,” she said, adding, “But it’s pretty good.” OutKick published follow-up segments on September 5 covering her “Hillbilly Elegy” pay and a possible sequel, and on September 6 on her reaction to the vice president’s “childless cat ladies” exchange with Taylor Swift. A further segment from the same Lahren interview, published Sunday, Sept. 6, focused on the second lady, with Aikins saying, “She’s very humble,” calling her “very genuine, very authentic,” saying she loves her husband and is “a good mom,” and adding, “I can’t think of anything bad to say about her.”
For Aikins, the dispute is less about policy than about the people in the family photos. She framed her frustration around her grandchildren and her daughter-in-law, insisting the criticism will not shake them — with the caveat that a face-to-face meeting might test her restraint.
