Man with Same Name as VP Arrested for Threatening to Kill President, Vice President

A Michigan man with the same name as Vice President JD Vance was arrested for threatening to kill the President and vice president, the Justice Department announced. Grand Rapids resident James Donald Vance, Jr., age 67, was sentenced to two years in federal prison for posting threatening communications online, including threats to kill the President and vice president of the United States, according to the U.S. Attorney’s Office, Western District of Michigan.
Vance was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Paul L. Maloney in Kalamazoo, Michigan, who described the crime as “grievous conduct” that required a prison sentence to deter others from making similar threats. The advent of the internet gives us all an opportunity to engage in the healthy exchange of ideas that are so important to a democracy, but some would rather use this tool to threaten and intimidate, conduct that causes fear and damages our democratic ideals. When Vance said he planned to kill our president and vice president simply because he disagreed with them, he crossed a line we all understand and had to be punished, the U.S. Attorney Timothy Ver Hey said.
In March and April 2025, Defendant James Vance, using the alias “Diaperjdv,” posted several threatening posts on the social media service Bluesky in which he made specific threats to kill four people, including President Donald J. Trump and vice president JD Vance. In one message, he proclaimed that he did not care whether he was shot by Secret Service or would spend the rest of his life in prison for his actions. He pled guilty to two felony offenses: threatening to kill or injure the president and vice president and interstate threatening communications. Each violation carries a maximum of five years in prison and a fine of $250,000.
This is the second time in one month that a defendant has been sentenced in the Western District of Michigan for threatening to kill the president. On October 20, 2025, Richard James Spring of Comstock Park was sentenced to serve 18 months in prison and fined $2,000 by U.S. District Judge Jane M. Beckering in Grand Rapids. Spring pled guilty to threatening to kill President Trump after committing rape.
“If trump, Vance, or Musk ever come to my city again, they will leave it in a body bag,” Vance allegedly wrote in one post, according to the New York Post. The case was only the second investigated by the Grand Rapids office of the US Secret Service in recent weeks. Last month, Richard James Spring, of Comstock Park, was sentenced to 18 months in prison for a post on X where he threatened to sexually assault a woman in front of Trump and then kill him, prosecutors said. Springer made similar threats on TikTok, telling users on the platform, “You’re going to watch your god DIE,” according to court records.