ATLANTA — Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance used a round of Sunday news show appearances to disparage the Democratic ticket and promote Donald Trump’s record and second-term plans and defend himself from criticism over past remarks that have become a campaign issue.
The Ohio senator, in a series of taped interviews, said there was merit to Trump’s suggestion that presidents have more control of U.S. monetary policy and kept up the GOP line that Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, the Democrats’ vice presidential candidate, had exaggerated his military record.
Vance, who shadowed Vice President Kamala Harris and Walz during their visits to several battleground states last week, was quizzed about abortion and his past comments about American family life, among other topics.
Some highlights from his appearances:
Trump is right on Fed independence, Vance says
Trump recently suggested that presidents “should have at least a say” on monetary policy set by the Federal Reserve. He did not offer specific proposals.
Curtailing the Fed’s independence from political interference as it determines interest rates would be a fundamental change. Even as he tried to argue that Trump said nothing about taking “direct” control of rates, Vance endorsed Trump’s general idea.
“President Trump is saying I think something that’s really important and actually profound, which is that the political leadership of this country should have more say over the monetary policy of this country,” Vance said. “I agree with him. That should fundamentally be a political decision. Agree or disagree, we should have America’s elected leaders having input about the most important decisions confronting our country.”
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan questioned the wisdom of such a major change. “I think if you look around the world’s economies and you see where Fed central banks are independent and operate freely,” he said, “they tend to fare better than the ones that don’t.”
Mining Walz’s military record
Walz served 24 years in the Army National Guard and was once deployed to Europe, though never to an active war zone. In a video from 2018, he referred to carrying weapons “in war.” The Harris campaign said last week that Walz misspoke.
“Scandalous behavior,” said Vance, a military veteran.
When it was noted that Trump avoided Vietnam with dubious claims of bone spurs, Vance said that “obviously a lot of people have reasons for not serving. I criticize somebody for embellishing their record, for lying, saying, ‘I went to war.’”
Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, a combat veteran and a top Harris ally, said Republicans are circulating “the one time” that a long-serving veteran “slipped up” talking about his military service.
Medical abortion and Florida’s referendum
Vance dodged when asked about his position on an upcoming Florida referendum that would repeal Republican-passed abortion restrictions and ensure more access to abortion services.
Speaking broadly about states and reproductive rights, Vance said Trump “has said explicitly they’re going to make this decision on a state-by-state level.”
Vance struggled to clarify Trump’s position on whether he would support federal limits on the medical abortion drug mifepristone.
Trump said in his June debate with Biden that he would not block it. At his Florida news conference last week, he offered a disjointed answer and said, “You also have to give a vote” on the matter. Vance suggested that “maybe” Trump had difficulty hearing and understanding a reporter’s question.
Walz responded in a statement through the Harris campaign that Trump and Vance “are going to ban medication abortion. … Vice President Harris and I will make sure that you make your health care decisions because we have a rule, whether you’d make the same decision as someone else: Just mind your own damn business.”
Vance and Buttigieg’s back-and-forth on family
During Vance’s Senate campaign in 2021, he said in a Fox News interview that “we are effectively run in this country via the Democrats,” and referred to them as “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”
He said that included Harris, who has two adult children, and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, who is gay and a married father of twins but had no children at the time of Vance’s comment.
The senator said a “sarcastic remark I made three years ago” has obscured a serious debate about “pro-family” policies, explaining that “I criticize people for being anti-child” in their policy pursuits.
Vance also in the past has suggested giving extra votes for people with children.
“It’s not a policy proposal. It’s a thought experiment, right?” he said in a Sunday interview, arguing that he was reacting to others’ ideas to lower the voting age.
“Anybody who disagrees with him is anti-child?” Buttigieg countered in a news show appearance. “He seems incapable of talking about a vision for this country in terms of lifting people up. … It’s always about disparagement.”
