The vice presidential candidates, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz and Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance, engaged in a rapid-fire and largely civil debate Tuesday on a variety of points. Here’s a take a look at some false and deceptive claims that emerged from the controversy.
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Iran didn’t obtain $100 billion in unfrozen property underneath the Biden-Harris administration
VANCE: “Iran, which launched this assault, acquired over $100 billion in unfrozen property because of the Kamala Harris administration. What do they use that cash for? They use it to purchase weapons which they now launch towards our allies.”
THE FACTS: The Biden administration agreed final yr to launch $6 billion in Iranian property as a part of a deal to free 5 U.S. residents held by Iran. But administration officers say not a greenback has but been given to Iran. It was a part of a deal negotiated by the Obama administration, earlier than Biden and Harris took workplace, that would have allowed Iran entry to frozen property in trade for accepting limits on its nuclear program.
In 2016, Iran mentioned it had accessed greater than $100 billion price of frozen property overseas following the implementation of a historic nuclear take care of world powers. The cash had been held in banks in China, India, Japan, South Korea and Turkey since worldwide sanctions had been tightened in 2012 over Tehran’s nuclear program. Then-Treasury Secretary Jacob Lew informed Congress that solely about $50 billion of the frozen property would really be accessible to Iran.
Walz overestimates the price of insulin earlier than the cap
WALZ: “They had been charging $800 earlier than this regulation went into impact.”
THE FACTS: Walz overestimated how a lot Americans paid for insulin earlier than a brand new regulation set costs at $35 a month for thousands and thousands of older Americans on Medicare. A December 2022 research discovered that individuals on Medicare or enrolled in non-public insurance coverage paid a mean of $452 a yr earlier than the brand new regulation took impact.
Vance hyperlinks unaffordable housing to immigrants who entered the nation illegally
VANCE: “There is housing that’s completely unaffordable as a result of we have now introduced in thousands and thousands of unlawful immigrants to compete with Americans for scarce houses.”
THE FACTS: Most economists attribute the reason for the regular rise in dwelling costs to the long-term decline in housing provide. The variety of new houses underneath development plummeted from an annual tempo of 1.4 million in April 2006 to only over 400,000 in August 2011, and didn’t return to 2006 ranges till 2021.
Vance and Walz focus their assaults on the highest of the ticket, not one another: The vice presidents’ debate factors
Vance mentioned no less than one main financial evaluation from the Federal Reserve helps his claims that immigrants are driving up housing prices, however he offered no particulars. He was seemingly quoting a May 2024 weblog submit by Neel Kashkari, president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. Kashkari argues that the long-term impact of immigration on inflation is “unclear,” however immigrants want a spot to dwell and their arrival has resulted in increased costs.
There could also be upward stress on dwelling costs in some markets because of the arrival of immigrants, however most economists say the issue is a scarcity of provide of houses in the marketplace. Homebuilders say they want immigrants to construct the houses. Fed Chair Jerome Powell mentioned in a September information convention that top mortgage charges imply individuals aren’t placing their houses up on the market and there is not sufficient provide.
Walz incorrectly claims that Project 2025 creates a being pregnant registry
WALZ: “Their Project 2025 may have a being pregnant registry.”
THE FACTS: That’s not true. The conservative initiative requires the gathering of “correct and dependable statistical knowledge on abortion, abortion survivors and abortion-related maternal deaths,” however not a registry of each being pregnant that happens.
More particularly, Project 2025 proposes that the Department of Health and Human Services require all states to report detailed data on abortions carried out inside their borders, together with whole variety of abortions, age, and state of residence of the mom, the gestational age of the fetus, the explanation for the abortion, and the strategy used to carry out the abortion. He means that this knowledge be separated into classes resembling miscarriages, intentional abortions, stillbirths, and different medical remedies that lead to fetal loss of life, resembling chemotherapy.
Vance overestimates immigration numbers
VANCE: “We have 20, 25 million unlawful aliens which might be right here within the nation.”
THE FACTS: This determine is very inflated. U.S. Customs and Border Protection reviews more than 10 million arrests for unlawful crossings from Mexico from January 2021 to September 2024.
It’s about arrests, not individuals. Under pandemic-era asylum restrictions, many individuals crossed the border greater than as soon as till they succeeded, as a result of there have been no authorized penalties for being returned to Mexico. So the variety of individuals is lower than the variety of arrests.
According to the most recent accessible estimate from the Department of Homeland Security, there have been around 11 million people reside within the United States illegally as of January 2022, 79% of whom entered earlier than January 2010.
Vance distorts Minnesota abortion regulation
VANCE: “It says that a physician who presides over an abortion by which the newborn survives has no obligation to offer life-saving care to a child who survives a failed late-term abortion.”
THE FACTS: This assertion misrepresents a invoice Walz signed into regulation in 2023, which updates language on new child care.
The new language makes use of the phrase “a baby born alive” as a substitute of “a baby born alive following an abortion.” It states that medical personnel are required to “take care of the kid who’s born alive” quite than “protect the life and well being of the kid born alive”.
Both the present model of the regulation and the amended 2015 model state that “a baby born alive shall be totally acknowledged as a human particular person and shall be accorded fast safety underneath the regulation.”
Infanticide is criminalized in each state, together with Minnesota, and the invoice doesn’t change that.
Vance on Trump and January 6, 2021
VANCE: “Remember he mentioned that on January sixth the demonstrators ought to protest peacefully.”
THE FACTS: It is true that Trump informed the gang gathered close to the White House: “I do know that everybody right here will quickly march to the Capitol to make your voices heard in a peaceable and patriotic method.”
But Vance ignored the incendiary language Trump used throughout his speech, throughout which he urged the gang to march to the Capitol, the place Congress was assembly to certify President Joe Biden’s victory. Trump informed the gang: “If you do not battle like hell, you will not have a rustic anymore.” This after his lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, declared: “Let’s have a trial by fight.”
