Republican vice-presidential candidate J.D. Vance challenged CNN’s portrayal of the illegal immigration situation in an Ohio town during a tense appearance on “State of the Union.” Anchor Dana Bash repeatedly accused Vance of misrepresenting reports from Springfield, Ohio, where claims about pets and local wildlife being consumed by Haitian immigrants have surfaced. The town, with a population of 40,000, has seen an influx of approximately 20,000 Haitians who were granted legal status by the Biden-Harris Administration. The decision bypassed Congress and provided the immigrants with subsidized housing, healthcare, and education, which Vance argued has been at the expense of local citizens.
“Well Dana, first of all, what’s putting the residents of Springfield at risk, which was a town completely ignored by the American media until Donald Trump and I started surfacing some of these concerns, is that they can’t afford housing, they can’t afford health care, the schools have been overwhelmed, the hospitals have been overwhelmed, and they’re overwhelmed because Kamala Harris allowed 20,000 Haitian migrants to get dropped into a small Ohio town of about 40,000 people, and it’s completely overwhelmed the services,” Vance said.
When asked about Haitians consuming pets and wildlife, Vance stated that he would continue to listen to constituents’ concerns. “Now you ask, why have I talked about some of the things that I’ve been talking about? Let me just say this. My constituents have brought approximately a dozen separate concerns to me. Ten of them are verifiable and confirmable and a couple of them I talk about because my constituents are telling me firsthand that they’re seeing these things. So I have two options, Dana. I could ignore them, which is what the American media has done for years to this community, or I can actually talk about what people are telling me,” Vance said.
“And of course, many of the things that the media says are completely baseless have since been confirmed. For example, I was told, Dana, by the American media, that it was baseless that migrants were capturing the geese from the local park pond and eating them. And yet there are 911 calls from well before this ever became a viral sensation of people complaining about that exact thing happening. So my attitude is listen to my constituents,” he added.
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During the interview, tensions escalated when Vance and Bash engaged in a heated exchange after the GOP senator objected to Bash’s frequent interruptions. “Dana, would you like to ask me questions and then let me answer them? Or would you like to debate me on these topics,” Vance said. “I noticed when you had Kamala Harris and Tim Walz, you gave them multiple choice answers to the questions you asked and you allowed them to answer the questions. I’m happy to be here to talk about policy, but if you’re gonna interrupt me every single time that I open my mouth, then why am I even doing this? So please, ask a question and I’d ask you to be polite enough to let me answer it.”
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