Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance fires back at Tim Walz during campaign stop in Michigan
SHELBY TOWNSHIP, Mich. (CBS DETROIT) – Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance made his second campaign appearance in Michigan Wednesday since becoming former President Donald Trump's running mate.
Vance's remarks centered on crime and immigration, but one question CBS News Detroit asked is driving the conversation on the campaign trail Wednesday.
On Tuesday evening, during a rally in Philadelphia, Vice President Kamala Harris' running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, labeled his opponent essentially as an elite, given his Ivy League education, among other factors.
"Like all regular people I grew up with in the Heartland, JD studied at Yale, his career funded by Silicon Valley billionaires, and then wrote a best seller, trashing that community. Come on, that's not what Middle America is," Walz said during that rally.
CBS News Detroit asked Vance Wednesday morning what his impressions were of those remarks.
"Well, look, I came from a family where nobody in my family had ever gone to law school. I was. I grew up in a poor family. The fact that Tim Walz wants to turn it into a bad thing, that I actually worked myself through college, through law school, and made something myself. To me, that's the American dream. And if Tim Walz wants to insult it, I think that's, frankly, pretty bizarre," Vance said.
Walz has indicated he "can't wait to debate the guy," but Vance is already going on the offensive.
Vance's second campaign stop in Michigan wasn't open to the general public but mostly to members of law enforcement and leaders from across Macomb County.
"I promise you, in just six months, the calvary is coming. You're going to have a federal government who makes your life makes your life easier, not harder," Vance said.
Vance claimed that policies under the Biden-Harris administration have led to a rise in crime.
"Shouldn't we want to throw people who commit the most heinous crimes in our communities in prison and throw away the key, and yet, Kamala Harris is making it easier for people to get out of jail," Vance said.
Vance pledged that a second Trump administration would bring mass deportations beginning with the "most violent criminals."
"I can't believe that anyone would actually think that you should open up the American Southern border to all of these criminals. You should let them commit crimes in our communities, and then you should refuse to deport them afterward," Vance said.
Vance also accuses Harris of making it harder for police to do their jobs.
"In a 30-day period recently, they lost three police officers, three police officers who lost their lives in the line of duty because Kamala Harris has sent out this message that it's open season on American police officers," Vance said.
Vance believes these kinds of crimes will only continue if Harris and Walz win in November.
"If it continues to go the way it's going, it's not about is it a problem today. Is it a problem tomorrow? How do I tell victims that the individual that took the lives of their family shouldn't have been here in the first place?" Macomb County Prosecutor Peter Lucido said.