White House deletes JD Vance’s social media post referring to Armenian genocide

The White House has deleted a social media post in which the vice-president, JD Vance, referred to the Armenian genocide, prompting anger from members of the Armenian diaspora as well as opposition politicians across the US.

The post was made during Vance’s two-day trip to Armenia to mark a visit by Vance and his wife, Usha Vance, to a memorial for the up to 1.5 million Armenians killed by Ottoman troops more than a century ago. The now-deleted post on Vance’s official X account said he was visiting the memorial to honour “the victims of the Armenian genocide”.

It marked the first time the Trump administration had used the word genocide to describe the massacres. An aide to Vance later told reporters that the message had been posted in error on social media by staff who were not travelling with Vance.

It was the second time in the past week that the administration cited staff error to explain its social media content; last week, after Donald Trump sought to dismiss the uproar over a racist video depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes, the US president said it had been erroneously posted by a staffer.

On Tuesday Vance – the first sitting US vice-president or president to visit the country – avoided any mention of the word genocide, instead describing the atrocities as “a very terrible thing that happened a little over 100 years ago” in comments to reporters. Vance said the visit had been carried out at the behest of the Armenian government, adding that it was a “sign of respect” for the victims and the local government.

Until recently, the US government refrained from using the word genocide to describe the historical incident, amid concerns about alienating Turkey, a key regional ally and Nato member. Turkey has long contested the figures of how many Armenians were killed and denied that those killings were carried out in a systematic way.

This stance was reversed by Joe Biden, who in 2021 became the first US president to formally recognise the Armenian genocide. His statement, which highlighted the 1.5 million Armenians who were “deported, massacred, or marched to their deaths in a campaign of extermination”, reportedly led to a tense phone call with the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.

The Trump administration has since returned to the previous stance, with Trump avoiding any mention of the word of genocide as he marked the April day of remembrance in a statement last year.

This week, as news broke of the deleted post, members of the Armenian diaspora and opposition politicians reacted with anger.

“Vance is a coward for deleting this post,” Alex Galitsky, the policy director for the Armenian National Committee of America, a prominent advocacy group, wrote on social media. He described the deleted post as an “insult to the memory” of those who had died and “an affront” to a community that had long fought for recognition.

The director of the same organisation, Aram Hamparian, suggested pressure from Ankara was behind the incident. “While it’s no surprise to see Turkey still strong-arming global leaders to enforce its Armenian Genocide gag-rule,” he wrote on social media: “It is deeply troubling to witness Vice President Vance – a man who loudly proclaims solidarity with Christian victims of persecution – display such weakness in the face of this foreign pressure.”

The Armenian Assembly of America called on the administration to explain its stance. “We deserve better from our elected officials and call for a public explanation for the apparent flip-flop,” co-chairs Talin Yacoubian and Oscar Tatosian said in a statement.

The move also prompted scorn from several opposition lawmakers, including the congressman, Jim McGovern, who described the move as “disgusting and pathetic”. On social media, the Democratic representative added: “The Armenian Genocide is a fact. I helped lead a bipartisan coalition calling for US recognition, which President Biden finally did in 2021. By deleting this post, @VP & @POTUS show they care more about their authoritarian buddies than the truth.”