JD Vance comments on awkward doughnut-shop video, says he feels 'terrible' for employee

• Sen. JD Vance said he felt bad for the camera-shy worker he met while visiting a Georgia bakery.
• "I just felt terrible for that woman," the GOP vice-presidential nominee told NBC News.
• Vance's stop at a Valdosta, Georgia, bakery quickly went viral.

Sen. JD Vance of Ohio filled in some details about his awkward stop at a Georgia bakery last week, expressing sympathy for the camera-shy worker he encountered.

"I just felt terrible for that woman," Vance told NBC News in an interview published Wednesday. "We walked in, and there's 20 Secret Service agents, and there's 15 cameras, and she clearly had not been properly warned, and she was terrified, right? I just felt awful for her."

Vance visited Holt's Sweet Shop in Valdosta last week as part of a series of stops in South Georgia. Presidential hopefuls and their running mates often try to coordinate unannounced stops at local stores and restaurants during campaign swings. But as Vance learned, things don't always go smoothly when candidates venture beyond campaign rallies.

In recorded footage of the visit, Vance tried to introduce himself to workers as he ordered an assortment of doughnuts and cinnamon rolls.

"The zoo has come to town — thank you for letting us come in here," Vance told the worker, laughing as a pool of reporters looked on.

The worker glanced around and said, "I don't want to be on camera." Vance then urged the assembled press to try to avoid featuring her.

"I'm JD Vance, and I'm running for vice president. It's good to see you," Vance said. The worker, clearly not thrilled by all the onlookers, responded, "OK."

Social-media users on X immediately began trolling Vance over the visit. C-SPAN's short clip of his stop has over 4.2 million views on X.

The Republican vice-presidential nominee told NBC that he enjoys going out and meeting Americans.

"We don't have to have these scripted events — I don't want to go and do three takes of buying Doritos at a Sheetz," Vance said, referring to Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz's recent stop at the famous Pennsylvania gas-station chain. "I like to get out there and talk to people, and we want to make sure we're doing it, but definitely make sure that people are at least OK with being on camera, or we're going to walk in and you're going to have a person who has, practically, a panic attack because she's got 15 cameras in her face."

Walz and the second gentleman, Doug Emhoff, handed Harris bags of Doritos during her visit, one of her favorite snack foods. Harris went viral after her campaign sent out a fundraising appeal earlier this month saying she coped with Donald Trump's shocking 2016 presidential win by eating "a family-sized bag of nacho Doritos."

"I did not share one chip with anybody. Not even Doug, " Harris wrote in the email. "I just watched the TV with utter shock and dismay."

Before the press left the Georgia shop, Vance chatted up some other employees, asking them how long they'd been at the bakery and when the business opened.

"When we selected this place, I didn't know if it had been here for 20 years or four years — you never know, sometimes you drop in," Vance said.