 The American conservative praised it as a powerful new memoir that uncovers an America many do not see. WNIS Newstime, 838. The New Republic trashed it as little more than a list of myths about welfare queens repackaged as a primer on the white working class. During the 2016 election, Vance emerged as a vocal critic of Donald Trump. I'm a never Trump guy, he told Charlie Rose in 2016. My God, what an idiot, he tweeted about Trump that same month.