JD Vance talks end times, Antichrist and AI on faith podcast

Vice President JD Vance said Tuesday he would not be 'shocked' if the Antichrist were walking among us and warned that some uses of artificial intelligence carry 'really, really weird spiritual dark energy,' in an interview with Christian podcaster Bryce Crawford. Vance, a proponent of building data centers for AI development, cited AI marriage counseling as 'kind of satanic' and rated his chances of getting into heaven as 'a seven or an eight.'

Vice President JD Vance https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/2026-election/vance-democratic-senate-abdul-el-sayed-evil-michigan-rcna594871 warned about the dangers of artificial intelligence Tuesday and said he wouldn’t be “shocked” if we were living in the “end times” and the Antichrist was walking the Earth. Vance made the remarks in a wide-ranging interview https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=41RTb dWORg on faith with popular Christian podcaster Bryce Crawford. During the hour long sitdown, Crawford asked Vance his perspective on whether the end times are coming — or here. “Do I think that we’re in the end times? I don’t know, and I think that it’s probably bad for me spiritually to focus too much on it because there are like things you got to do. I got to be good to my wife. I got to be good to my kids. I have to be, you know, as good of a leader as I can for the United States of America,” Vance replied. “I think that there are, like, things about the world that make me feel, like, not shocked if the Antichrist was, was walking among us. But again, I try not to focus too much on it,” he said. “While I wouldn’t be shocked if we are living in the end times, what I’m trying to focus on is doing as much of God’s work as possible right now, and if that leads to the end times, okay,” Vance said. The vice president, who like President Donald Trump has been a proponent of building data centers https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/trump-administration/live-blog/trump-congress-2026-midterm-election-iran-live-updates-rcna595202/rcrd119625?canonicalCard=true to support AI development, pointed to some uses of AI as having “really, really weird spiritual dark energy.” Referring to a friend with a spouse who was using AI for marriage counseling, Vance said, “there’s no real human feedback. It sort of short circuits that social part of our brain where we respond to other people’s wants and needs, and just completely — like I think that’s kind of satanic.” Asked to rate on a scale of 1 to 10 his chances of getting into heaven, Vance said, “That is a tough question. It’s high, but it’s not 10, right? I mean, it’s it’s it’s a it’s a seven or it’s an eight. Like I’m always one of these people who is is always going to have little doubts. And like, if you’d asked me that question a year ago, probably was like a five or a six.” Crawford asked Vance if he’d come across any evidence the spiritual world is real since becoming VP. “I don’t have the the file that says, oh, this wasn’t a UFO; it was actually a demon,” Vance said, and “I don’t have like a top secret file that sort of proves that one way or the other.” He said he did see something before he became vice president — Trump surviving an assassination attempt in Butler, Pennsylvania, in 2024. “He points to a chart, just so happens to be at the exact moment that the guy took a shot. Now, again, there is a physical explanation for that,” Vance said. “He turned his head. The guy fired the bullet. Crazy coincidence, right? These things happen. But I think that that’s a very spiritually impoverished way to look at things. Like whatever the reason is, whatever God was trying to accomplish, like it is just so obvious to me that coincidences like that don’t happen without the hand of providence.” Had Trump not survived, Vance said, he would have viewed it as part of a “broader conspiracy.” “I would have assumed very dark forces had taken out Donald Trump, right as he was about to come back into the White House,” Vance said. “There would have just been an illegitimacy to our entire political system.” Crawford asked Vance about Trump’s post on social media of an AI-generated image of himself as Jesus https://apnews.com/article/trump-pope-leo-xiv-02f6b4554ea4b83af02af15987ae1f2d earlier this year, which Crawford said offended him. Trump initially contended he thought the image was of him as a doctor, then took down the post amid widespread criticism from even some of his own backers. Vance defended the president. “He did not mean to, like, mock or mimic God, that’s just not who he is,” Vance said, adding that the president often tries to keep things light and constantly makes jokes. “He’s a bit of a ballbuster, for those of us who work with him, and he just likes to have a good time. And I think that if people appreciated that, they would recognize, he’s not trying to offend people, he’s trying to keep things light,” he said.