A fresh round of online chatter broke out after MAGA commentator Benny Johnson floated an unexpected idea on Fox News: a “Vance–Sweeney 2028” ticket. His comment came while defending Sydney Sweeney over her latest interview, where she finally addressed the months-long controversy around the American Eagle “Great Jeans” advert.Johnson said Sweeney had “more balls than most politicians in DC,” arguing that her confident answers in the interview showed she wouldn’t cave to backlash. His reaction came right after Sweeney chose not to apologise or expand on concerns that the advert’s slogan sounded like a joke about “genetic superiority.” Instead, she said in the interview, “I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear,” and added that the advert “spoke for itself.” MAGA influencers celebrated that response, while liberals argued she dodged the main question. The interview also revived the culture-war debate from June, when critics said the “Great Jeans” tagline was too close to language associated with eugenics, especially because of Sweeney’s appearance as a typical blonde white female. Others said the whole row was exaggerated and that it was clearly meant to be a light-hearted denim pun. Fox News host Jesse Watters chimed in, saying Marco Rubio “might not like” the Vance-Sweeney 2028 ticket, a reference to speculation that Rubio, now serving as secretary of state, may run for vice president in the next term.Another wave of reactions pointed to Erika Kirk, who recently went viral after her warm on-stage moment with JD Vance at a Turning Point USA event. The clip showed her speaking highly of Vance and saying she saw “similarities” between him and her late husband Charlie Kirk. Because of that moment, people online joked that she “might not enjoy” seeing Vance paired with Sydney Sweeney on a fake 2028 ticket.
