Ohio Republican Sen. JD Vance and Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz met in an Oct. 1 vice presidential debate hosted by CBS Information that was cordial and heavy on coverage dialogue — a putting change from the Sept. 10 debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump that always devolved into private assaults.
Vance and Walz acknowledged occasional settlement with one another on coverage factors and respectfully addressed each other all through the talk. However in addition they blamed one another’s operating mates for issues dealing with the U.S., together with immigration and inflation.
The moderators, “CBS Night Information” anchor Norah O’Donnell and “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan, had stated they deliberate to encourage candidates to fact-check one another, however typically clarified after candidates’ solutions.
In addition they pinned down the candidates once they evaded solutions, with Brennan urgent Walz to say he misspoke up to now about being in China’s Tiananmen Sq. through the lethal 1989 protests. Brennan additionally pushed Vance for specifics on Trump’s mass deportation plan and whether or not he would separate mother and father from youngsters, however didn’t get a selected reply.
Through the debate, Walz misspoke throughout a dialogue about faculty shootings. He described altering his place on an assault weapons ban after the 2012 bloodbath at Sandy Hook Elementary Faculty in Connecticut that killed 26 folks, together with 20 youngsters.
“I sat in that workplace with these Sandy Hook mother and father. I’ve turn out to be associates with faculty shooters,” Walz mistakenly stated. The gaffe prompted derision on social media, together with from Trump, who mocked Walz on Truth Social.
The candidates sparred on quite a few subjects, together with immigration, faculty shootings, reproductive rights and the economic system. We fact-checked a number of of their statements.
PolitiFact fact-checks statements of individuals in energy, no matter political occasion. We’ve rated claims with a wide range of Reality-O-Meter scores from the Republican presidential nominee, former President Donald Trump, and the Democratic nominee, Vice President Kamala Harris. This is how we choose claims to check.
Vance: “We have now 320,000 youngsters that the Division of Homeland Safety has successfully misplaced. A few of them have been intercourse trafficked.”
Principally False.
This isn’t what a federal oversight report stated. The declare refers to a federal oversight report about unaccompanied minors — youngsters who got here to the U.S. with out a guardian or authorized guardian. The report lined fiscal years 2019 by means of 2023, which incorporates a part of Trump’s presidency.
The report talked about 32,000 youngsters who failed to look for his or her immigration court docket hearings and 291,000 youngsters whom Immigration and Customs Enforcement had not served a “Discover to Seem.”
A Discover to Seem is a charging document authorities subject and file in immigration court docket to begin elimination proceedings. The report stated that by not issuing these notices to the youngsters, Immigration and Customs Enforcement limits its possibilities of verifying their security after the federal authorities releases them.
The report led Republican lawmakers and conservative information shops to say that Immigration and Customs Enforcement “lost” the youngsters or that they’re “missing.” However the report didn’t make that declare.
The report stated the youngsters are prone to trafficking, nevertheless it didn’t current a quantity.
Vance: “So there’s an software known as the CBP One app, the place you’ll be able to go on as an unlawful migrant, apply for asylum or apply for parole and be granted authorized standing.”
Principally False.
U.S. Customs and Border Safety launched the CBP One cellphone app in 2020, when Trump was president. Biden expanded its use. As of January 2023, folks can use the app whereas in Mexico to make appointments with immigration officers for processing at official ports of entry.
The app is a scheduling software, not an software for asylum or parole; a prolonged course of follows. Vance is improper to characterize the folks making the appointments as “unlawful” migrants, as a result of the folks utilizing the app haven’t crossed into the U.S. illegally.
At ports of entry, immigration officers can provide folks humanitarian parole, for as much as two years, permitting them to dwell and work within the U.S. as they apply for asylum. Beneath U.S. immigration regulation, folks can apply for asylum, however they have to be bodily within the nation. From January 2023 to August 2024, 813,000 folks have scheduled appointments on the app, the Division of Homeland Safety said.
Humanitarian parole is an official permission to briefly dwell within the U.S., however it’s not a lawful standing. To remain within the U.S. after protections expire, or ultimately achieve citizenship, folks should safe legal status by means of different avenues, similar to asylum, marriage or employment.
Walz: “Their Mission 2025 is gonna have a registry of pregnancies.”
Mission 2025 recommends that states submit extra detailed abortion reporting to the federal authorities. It requires extra details about how and when abortions came about, in addition to different statistics for miscarriages and stillbirths.
The guide doesn’t point out, nor name for, a brand new federal company tasked with registering pregnant ladies.
Vance: “As I learn the Minnesota regulation that (Walz) signed into regulation … it says that a health care provider who presides over an abortion the place the infant survives, the physician is beneath no obligation to supply lifesaving care to a child who survives a botched late-term abortion.”
Consultants stated instances wherein a child is born following an tried abortion are uncommon. Lower than 1% of abortions nationwide happen within the third trimester. And infanticide, the crime of killing a toddler inside a 12 months of its start, is prohibited in all U.S. states.
In Might 2023, Walz, as Minnesota governor, signed laws updating a state regulation for “infants who’re born alive.” It stated infants are “totally acknowledged” as human folks and due to this fact, protected beneath state regulation. The change didn’t alter laws that already require docs to supply sufferers with acceptable care.
Beforehand, state regulation stated, “All affordable measures per good medical apply, together with the compilation of acceptable medical data, shall be taken by the accountable medical personnel to protect the life and well being of the born alive toddler.” The regulation was up to date to as a substitute say medical personnel should “take care of the toddler who’s born alive.”
When there are fetal anomalies that make it doubtless the fetus will die earlier than or quickly after start, some mother and father resolve to terminate the being pregnant by inducing childbirth in order that they will maintain their dying child, Democratic Minnesota state Sen. Erin Maye Quade instructed PolitiFact in September.
This replace to the regulation means infants who’re “born alive” obtain acceptable medical care depending on the being pregnant’s circumstances, Maye Quade stated.
Vance: “Iran, which launched this assault (on Israel), has obtained over $100 billion and unfrozen belongings, because of the Kamala Harris administration.”
False.
Beneath President Barack Obama, Iran did take possession of $100 billion in unfrozen belongings after the signing of the Iran nuclear deal, which Trump later overturned. However Harris was not concerned within the Obama administration.
One thing that occurred on Biden and Harris’ watch was a hostage-release settlement with Iran that was speculated to free $6 billion in frozen Iranian belongings. There isn’t any proof that any of the $6 billion reached Iran.
In August 2023, the U.S. introduced an settlement with Iran to safe freedom for 5 U.S. residents who’d been detained within the nation in alternate for permitting Iran to entry $6 billion of its personal funds that had been frozen in South Korean banks.
The cash consisted of Iranian oil income frozen since 2019, when Trump banned Iranian oil exports and sanctioned its banking sector. It was not U.S. taxpayer cash. In April 2024, Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo stated that these funds had been frozen after the Oct. 7, 2023, Hamas terrorist assaults on Israel and had not reached Iran.
Walz: “When Iranian missiles did fall close to U.S. troops they usually obtained traumatic mind accidents, Donald Trump wrote it off as ‘complications.’”
True.
Walz was referring to a Jan. 8, 2020, Iran attack on U.S. troopers in Iraq. More than 100 soldiers had been identified with traumatic mind accidents, in response to the Pentagon.
Trump has repeatedly known as the accidents “complications.”
In 2020, Trump said he had “heard that they’d complications” and added it “just isn’t very critical.” Trump repeated this claim in an Oct. 1 press convention in Wisconsin.
After Iran attacked Israel Oct. 1, Trump responded to a query about whether or not he ought to have been stronger on Iran after the 2020 assault that injured U.S. troops. He stated: “What does injured imply? You imply as a result of they’d a headache as a result of the bombs by no means hit the fort?”
Walz stated he ‘misspoke’ about being in Hong Kong throughout 1989 Tiananmen Sq. protests
Walz as soon as described being in Hong Kong through the Might 1989 pro-democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Sq. that turned lethal that June. However contemporaneous information reviews contradict that timeline. The CBS Information debate moderators requested Walz to elucidate this discrepancy, and Walz stated he “misspoke.”
Within the subsequent sentence, he stated: “So, I’ll simply, that’s what I’ve stated. So, I used to be in Hong Kong and China through the democracy protests, went in.”
Minnesota Public Radio News and APM Reports discovered a 1989 Nebraska newspaper report that stated Walz deliberate to depart for China in August of that 12 months, months after the Tiananmen Sq. protests.
Walz’s first journey to China in 1989 was to show English and U.S. historical past for a 12 months at a highschool. He and his spouse, Gwen, each highschool lecturers, led faculty journeys to China within the Nineties and early 2000s. Walz stated in 2016 that he had visited China about 30 occasions, however a Harris-Walz marketing campaign spokesperson clarified in September that Walz has been to the nation “nearer to fifteen occasions,” in response to Minnesota Public Radio News and APM Reports.
Vance: “What (Harris has) truly carried out as a substitute is drive the price of meals larger by 25%, drive the price of housing larger by about 60%.”
Half True.
Grocery costs have risen by 22% since Biden and Harris took workplace. Housing costs, in response to the Case-Shiller residence value index, have risen 38%.
Economists have instructed PolitiFact that the principle components driving the height inflation in 2022 had been postpandemic provide chain backups and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Biden’s pandemic aid invoice, the American Rescue Plan Act, exacerbated this inflation, economists say, nevertheless it didn’t trigger it.
This additionally leaves out the simultaneous improve in wages, which have outpaced costs because the begin of the pandemic. Wages have additionally outpaced costs for the previous one-year and two-year intervals.
Vance: “Kamala Harris let in fentanyl into our communities at report ranges.”
Principally False.
Illicit fentanyl seizures have been rising for years and reached report highs beneath Biden’s administration. In fiscal 12 months 2015, for instance, U.S. Customs and Border Safety seized 70 kilos of fentanyl. As of August 2024, brokers have seized greater than 19,000 kilos of fentanyl in fiscal 12 months 2024, which led to September.
However these are fentanyl seizures — not the quantity of the narcotic being “let” into america.
Vance made this declare whereas criticizing Harris’ immigration insurance policies. However fentanyl enters the U.S. by means of the southern border primarily at official ports of entry, and it’s mostly smuggled in by U.S. residents, in response to the U.S. Sentencing Fee. Most illicit fentanyl within the U.S. comes from Mexico made with chemical compounds from Chinese language labs.
Drug coverage specialists have stated that the illicit fentanyl disaster started years before Biden’s administration and that Biden’s border insurance policies are to not blame for overdose deaths.
Consultants have additionally said Congress performs a job in decreasing illicit fentanyl. Congressional funding for extra car scanners would assist regulation enforcement seize extra of the fentanyl that comes into the U.S. Harris has called for elevated enforcement in opposition to illicit fentanyl use.
Walz: “And the excellent news on that is, is the final 12 months noticed the most important lower in opioid deaths in our nation’s historical past.”
Principally True.
Overdose deaths involving opioids decreased from an estimated 84,181 in 2022 to 81,083 in 2023, based mostly on the latest provisional information from the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention. This lower, which came about within the second half of 2023, adopted a 67% improve in opioid-related deaths between 2017 and 2023.
The U.S. had an estimated 107,543 drug overdose deaths in 2023 — a 3% lower from the 111,029 deaths estimated in 2022. That is the first annual decrease in total drug overdose deaths since 2018. However, the opioid demise toll stays a lot larger than only a few years in the past, according to KFF. It’s too quickly to foretell whether or not the downward pattern will proceed.
Walz: “Look, I acquired a, I acquired a 17-year-old and he witnessed a taking pictures at a neighborhood middle enjoying volleyball.”
The Walz marketing campaign instructed PolitiFact that Walz’s son, Gus Walz, witnessed a January 2023 shooting exterior St. Paul’s Oxford Neighborhood Heart, which houses the Jimmy Lee Recreation Heart. The marketing campaign spokesperson stated Gus Walz witnessed the taking pictures however wasn’t concerned within the altercation that preceded it.
Exavir Dwayne Binford Jr., a 26-year-old recreation middle worker, acquired into an argument with a 16-year-old boy that “mushroomed right into a struggle exterior the middle that ended with the employee taking pictures the boy within the head and fleeing,” Minnesota’s public radio station MPR Information reported.
In February, Binford was sentenced to 10 years and 5 months in jail, MPR News reported.
MPR Information reported that youngsters had been current through the taking pictures, and details reported from the criminal complaint help that was the case.
Throughout a Sept. 12 marketing campaign cease in Grand Rapids, Michigan, Walz talked about this taking pictures: “My very own son was in a location the place somebody was shot within the head,” he said. “Too many people have this.”
Vance: “Donald Trump might have destroyed the (Reasonably priced Care Act). As an alternative, he labored in a bipartisan means to make sure that Individuals had entry to reasonably priced care.”
As president, Trump labored to undermine and repeal the Reasonably priced Care Act. He lower tens of millions of {dollars} in federal funding for ACA outreach and navigators who assist folks join well being protection. He enabled the sale of short-term well being plans that don’t adjust to the ACA client protections and allowed them to be offered for longer durations, which siphoned folks away from the well being regulation’s marketplaces.
Trump’s administration additionally backed state Medicaid waivers that imposed first-ever work necessities, decreasing enrollment. He additionally ended insurance coverage firm subsidies that helped offset prices for low-income enrollees, he backed an unsuccessful repeal of the landmark 2010 well being regulation and he backed the demise of a penalty imposed for failing to buy medical health insurance.
Affordable Care Act enrollment declined by greater than 2 million folks throughout Trump’s presidency, and the number of uninsured Americans rose by 2.3 million, together with 726,000 youngsters, from 2016 to 2019, the U.S. Census Bureau reported; that features three years of Trump’s presidency.
Walz: “Sen. Vance has stated that there’s a local weather downside up to now. Donald Trump known as it (local weather change) a hoax after which joked that this stuff would make extra beachfront property to have the ability to put money into.”
True.
In a 2020 speech at Ohio State College, Vance stated, “We have now a local weather downside in our society.” However Vance has grown more dubious of local weather change lately. In 2022, he instructed the American Management Discussion board, “I’m skeptical of the concept local weather change is brought about purely by man. … (The local weather has) been altering, as others identified, it’s been altering for millennia.”
Additionally that 12 months, Vance stated he had “turn out to be persuaded that local weather change is definitely taking place,” however that “among the alarmism is somewhat overstated.”
Trump tweeted that local weather change is a “hoax” in 2012, although he made efforts in 2016 to explain that comment as a “joke.” However in 2014 and 2015 Trump repeatedly known as local weather change a “hoax” in speeches, tweets and media appearances. He additionally made comparable “hoax” feedback in 2022.
In an August 2024 interview with X owner Elon Musk, Trump stated, “The largest risk just isn’t world warming, the place the ocean goes to rise one-eighth of an inch over the subsequent 400 years … and also you’ll have extra oceanfront property.” (The declare about sea stage rise is vastly understated and Pants on Fire!)
Walz: “We’re producing extra pure fuel and extra oil at any time than we ever have.”
True.
U.S. pure fuel manufacturing has reached new highs throughout Joe Biden’s presidency, as has U.S. crude oil manufacturing, U.S. Vitality Info Administration information exhibits.
Walz: “Donald Trump hasn’t paid any federal tax within the final 15 years. The final 12 months as president.”
Principally False.
Trump paid no federal earnings tax some years, together with his final 12 months as president, however not yearly within the final 15 years — and we don’t know what he’s paid since 2020 as a result of his tax returns haven’t been made public.
In September 2020, The New York Occasions reported that it obtained copies of Trump’s tax returns. They confirmed that Trump paid $641,000 in 2015, $750 in federal earnings taxes in each 2016 and 2017, and, as of that 2020 report, “no earnings taxes in any respect in 10 of the earlier 15 years.”
In 2022, the House Ways and Means Committee released Trump’s tax returns from 2015 to 2020. In response to these returns, Trump reported paying $999,456 in taxes in 2018, $133,445 in taxes in 2019 and $0 in taxes in 2020, ABC Information reported.
Walz: Trump “gave the tax cuts that predominantly went to the highest class. What occurred there was an $8 trillion improve within the nationwide debt, the most important ever.”
Principally True.
Saying which earnings class earned a larger share of the tax cuts varies relying on the 12 months studied.
A 2017 analysis of the Republican tax regulation by the nonpartisan City-Brookings Tax Coverage Heart stated that by 2027, the tax invoice would ship 82.8% of its advantages to the highest 1% of earnings earners.
The distribution of the benefits earlier than 2027 additionally skewed towards wealthier Individuals, however by a decrease share. As an example, in 2018, the invoice was projected to ship 20.5% of the advantages to the highest 1%, the middle’s evaluation confirmed. And as late as 2025, 25.3% of the advantages would move to the highest 1%.
Wanting on the improve in federal debt on a president’s watch, Trump currently ranks first for debt accrued in a single time period, at $7.8 trillion. Nevertheless, Biden is projected to cross Trump’s whole by the point he leaves workplace in January 2025.
Utilizing a unique methodology — counting how a lot future debt a president’s actions created — Trump’s insurance policies are projected to build up roughly double the quantity of future debt as Biden’s.
Vance: Donald Trump “peacefully gave over energy on January the twentieth as now we have carried out for 250 years on this nation.”
Principally False.
Trump left the White Home on Jan. 20, 2021, and one other president was sworn in that day. However Vance’s assertion ignores Trump’s words and actions that led as much as the violent Jan. 6, 2021, assault on the U.S. Capitol.
In December 2020, Trump repeatedly encouraged his supporters to fight the election outcomes and gather on the Capitol. On Jan. 6, 2021, Trump used his “Save America” rally to repeat inaccurate claims that he received the election. He regularly urged the gang to “struggle” earlier than inviting them to march to the Capitol.
“Our nation has had sufficient,” Trump stated. “We won’t take it anymore and that’s what that is all about. To make use of a favourite time period that every one of you folks actually got here up with, we’ll cease the steal.”
The group later chanted: “Combat for Trump! Combat for Trump! Combat for Trump!”
On the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, supporters mobbed the constructing and assaulted regulation enforcement officers. The riot injured about 150 federal and native cops and brought about greater than $1 million in damages to the Capitol. Greater than 1,500 defendants have been charged.
PolitiFact govt director Aaron Sharockman, chief correspondent Louis Jacobson, senior correspondent Amy Sherman, employees writers Grace Abels, Kwasi Gyamfi Asiedu, Maria Briceño, Jeff Cercone, Madison Czopek, Marta Campabadal Graus, Samantha Putterman, Sara Swann, Loreben Tuquero, Maria Ramirez Uribe, researcher Caryn Baird, KFF Well being Information senior editor Stephanie Stapleton and KFF Well being Information senior correspondent Stephanie Armour contributed to this story.
Our debate reality checks depend on each new and beforehand reported work. We hyperlink to previous work at any time when attainable. In some instances, a reality examine ranking could also be totally different tonight than in previous variations. In these instances, both particulars of what the candidate stated, or how the candidate stated it, differed sufficient that we evaluated it anew.
This reality examine was initially published by PolitiFact, which is a part of the Poynter Institute.
