RECAP: JD Vance and Tim Walz square off in US vice presidential debate
The two men vying to be the next vice president of the US have gone head-to-head in what is likely the last debate of the election campaign.
Republican JD Vance, Donald Trump’s running mate, debated Democrat Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’ VP pick live on CBS.
Ms Harris was widely viewed as the winner in her only debate with Mr Trump on September 10, which made this debate crucial for Republicans.
Ms Harris’ successes, something Mr Trump disputes, followed a catastrophic first debate for the Democrats, with US President Joe Biden forced to stand down as the Democratic nominee not long after his performance.
Walz, 60, a liberal governor and former high school teacher, and Vance, 40, a bestselling author and conservative firebrand senator, portrayed themselves as sons of America’s Midwestern heartland but polar opposites on the issues gripping the US.
Things could have got ugly, but the two candidates were surprisingly, even uncharacteristically kind to each other.
There were uncomfortable stumbles from both Mr Vance and Mr Walz, but for two candidates who are happy to walk about from times they have “misspoken” and not be held to their word, they might not sweat it.
Scroll through the updates below to catch up on the biggest moments.
Key Events
‘Make the windows stronger’: Vance’s solution to gun violence
Mr Vance claimed the majority of gun violence in America was carried out with illegal weapons. Saying the issue was mainly caused by migrants and crime groups bringing guns into the US.
Mr Vance wanted to focus on gun protection for schools.
“What do we do about the schools? What do to protect our kids?” Mr Vance asked.
“I don’t want my kids to go to school in a school that feels unsafe.
“I feel that we have to increase security in our schools.
“We have to make the doors lock better.
“We have to make the doors stronger.
“We have to make the windows stronger.
“We’ve got to increase school resource officers, because the idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it doesn’t fit with recent experience.”
Vance says America is a ‘messy divided country”
Donald Trump has been very clear that on the abortion policy specifically, that we have a big country,” Mr Vance said.
“It’s diverse.
“California has a different viewpoint on (abortion) than Georgia.
“Georgia has a different view point from Arizona, and the proper way to handle this, as messy as democracy sometimes is, is to let voters make these decisions.
“Let the individual states make their abortion policy.
“I think that’s what makes themost sense in a very big, a very diverse and let’s be honest, sometimes a very, very messy and divided country.
Will Trump and Vance create a federal pregnancy monitoring agency?
Moderators asked if Trump and Vance would create a federal pregnancy monitoring agency.
“No, we certainly won’t,” Mr Vance said.
“I grew up in a working-class family in a neighbourhood where I knew a lot of young women who had unplanned pregnancies and decided to terminate those pregnancies because they felt like they didn’t have any other options.
“I want us, as a Republican Party, to be pro-family in the fullest sense of the word.
“I want us to support fertility treatments. I want to make it easier for moms to afford to have babies.
“I want to make it easier for young families to afford a home toafford a place to raise a young family.
Walz rehashes Harris’s talking points in discussing reproductive rights
Mr Walz was asked if he supported abortion in the ninth month, as suggested by Mr Trump.
“No,” Mr Walz said.
“This issue is what’s on everyone’s mind.
“Donald Trump put this all into motion.
“He brags about how great it was that he put the judges in and overturned Roe v Wade- 52 years of personal autonomy.
“Then he says, we send it to the states, it’s a beautiful thing.”
Mr Walz then spoke about Amber Thurman, a woman who died after she was not given treatment due to the change in abortion law.
Although it’s a valid case, Mr Walz just repeated Ms Harris’ points that she made at the DNC and on an Oprah special.
‘Donald Trump: America’s Hitler’
Mr Vance was asked about his 2016 comments calling Donald Trump “America’s Hitler”.
“Sometimes I disagree with the president but I have been extremely open about the fact that I was wrong about Donald Trump,” Mr Vance said.
“First of all, because I believed some of the media stories that turn out to be dishonest fabrications of his record but most importantly Donald Trump delivered for the American people.
“Rising wages, rising take-home wages, secure southern border.
“A lot of things frankly I did not think it would be able to deliver on.
“When you screw up and speak, and you change your mind, you ought to be honest with the American people.
“One of the reasons I have done somany interviews to explain to the American people.”
Walz taken to task on Tiananmen Square deadly protest in 89
“Governor Walz, you said you were in Hong Kong during the Tiananmen Square deadly protest in 89,” the moderator said to Mr Walz.
“But other media outlets have reported you actually did not travel to Asia until August of that year. Can you explain that discrepancy?”
“I got the opportunity in the summer of 89 to travel to China, I came back home and then started a program to take young people there,” Mr Walz said.
Mr Walz then went into a near-two-minute monologue, talking about how “people know who he is”, talking about COVID and how he “talks a lot”.
Mr Walz had to again be asked if he could explain the discrepancy.
“I got through that summer and we spoke. That is what I have said. I misspoke. So I was in Hong Kong and China during the democracy process and from that I learnt a lot of what needed to be in governance.”
Mr Walz appears thrown by the question and being unable to answer it clearly.
‘The audience can’t hear you because your mics are cut’
Moderators fact-checked Mr Vance about the community in Springfield, clarifying if they were legal or illegal aliens.
“Ohio, does have a large number of Haitian migrants who have legal status temporary protected,” Ms Brennan said.
‘But,” Mr Vance interjected before being cut off immediately.
“Thank you, Senator, we have so much to get to.”
However Mr Vance would not be stopped.
He demanded he be given an opportunity to speak before going into a lengthy description of the legal process around migrants applying for asylum or legal status.
“Thank you for describing the legal process. We have so much to get through,” a frustrated moderator Brennan said.
However, Mr Vance still did not drop it, continue to talk and clarify his point.
“The audience can’t hear you because your mics are cut,” she said.
The moderator then moved onto the next question, with Mr Vance clearly frustrated.
Walz is sick of immigration being spoken about with no action
Speaking about Harris plan to bring order to the order, Mr Walz said he was sick of debating immigration.
“They know that we need to do this,” he said.
“Look, this issue of continuing to bring this up, of not dealing with it, of blaming migrants for everything.
“But it becomes a blame game.
“Look, this bill also gives the money necessary to adjudicate.
“I agree - it should not take seven years for an asylum claim to be done.
“This bill gets it done in 90 days.”
JD Vance will start ‘with deportations’ of criminal migrants
“We have 20, 25 million illegal aliens here in the country,” Mr Vance said.
“What we do with them? We start with the criminal migrants.
“About a million of those people have committed some form of crime, in addition to crossing the border illegally.
“I think that you start with deportations of those folks.”
A ‘historic immigration crisis because Kamala Harris started’
Mr Vance said the US has “a historic immigration crisis because Kamala Harris started and said that she wanted to undo all of Donald Trump’s border policies.”
“That has opened the flood gates and what it means is that a lot of Fentanyl is coming into our country.”
