JD Vance Says ‘Absolutely’ About Raids, Mass Deportation Actions

PHOENIX — In the wake of another school shooting that killed two students and two teachers at Apalachee High School in Georgia, Republican vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance said gun reform legislation is not the answer and instead wants to strengthen school security. ABC15 spoke with Vance ahead of his rally at the Arizona Biltmore in Phoenix on Thursday, where he spoke about border security and immigration.

“We know that our schools have become easy targets for people who want to say something and kill a lot of people, and that means we need to make our schools more secure,” Vance told ABC15. “If you pass a gun reform bill that doesn’t reduce school shootings, you’re not going to accomplish anything, if you actually make these schools a little safer, increase security, I think that has a much better chance of actually working.”

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A school resource officer detained the shooter at Apalachee High School, but he still managed to bring a gun onto school grounds and kill four people and wound nine others before being arrested. Asked whether he would support any gun reform legislation, Vance said, “The question is not whether the solution is perfect, but whether the solution will reduce gun violence in our schools.”

Vice President Kamala Harris posted on social media Thursday evening in response to the shooting, saying, “It doesn’t have to be this way. We can take action to protect our children — and we will.” President Joe Biden has called for universal background checks for all guns and a ban on assault weapons.

As for former President Donald Trump’s immigration plan to carry out mass deportations, Vance responded “absolutely yes” when asked if it would involve conducting widespread raids to find the estimated 11 million illegal immigrants living in the United States.

“Once you secure the border and you stop the bleeding, you stop the flow of illegal immigrants, you have to figure out what to do with the people here,” Vance said. “I think your focus is, you start with the most violent criminals, the people who have not only broken our border laws but have committed violent crimes — you go after those people as much as you can because we don’t want violent criminals going after our communities.”

Watch Vance’s full Thursday one-on-one interview in the player below:

ABC15 Talks One-On-One with Senator JD Vance

Harris, who has previously called a border wall “useless” and “un-American,” said later she would support a bipartisan border bill that has failed in Congress that allocates funds to build more walls on the southern border. The proposal would also impose restrictions on migrants seeking asylum.

The New York Times reports that Vance wrote the introduction to a 2017 Heritage Foundation report that supported restricting access to in vitro fertilization and abortion, and also outlined the ideal age for women to have children.

Vance said he has not changed his mind from what he wrote in the introduction to the 2017 report, and while writing an introduction does not constitute an endorsement of the report, Vance has previously shared similar views on some of the discussion points — including a federal abortion ban and voting against a Senate bill that would have codified protections for in vitro fertilization.

“I didn’t have to distance myself from anything, I wrote the introduction to the report in 2017, which was number one, before Project 2025 was created, and from the very beginning we’ve consistently said that Project 2025 is separate, it has nothing to do with the Trump administration,” Vance said. “Now there are some good ideas in there, but there are also some really bad ideas, it’s a 900-page report. The bottom line is that it doesn’t speak for the Trump administration.”

Vance has softened his stance on abortion access, agreeing with Trump’s view that the decision should be left to the states. Trump has also called on insurance companies to pay for in vitro treatments.

Harris is a staunch supporter of abortion rights, denouncing the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. Harris has said that if elected, she would sign a restoration of reproductive freedoms and enshrine into law the protections of Roe v. Wade.

During a speech Thursday at the Economic Club of New York, Trump outlined a plan to create a government efficiency program that would aim to curb wasteful government spending and conduct a “full financial and efficiency audit of the entire federal government and make recommendations for drastic reforms.”

Trump also reiterated his pledge not to collect taxes on tips or Social Security benefits and announced he would lower the corporate tax rate to 15%.

Questions are being raised about how to fund these proposals and whether they could lead to larger federal deficits. When asked if this government efficiency commission is a way to fund the Trump-Vance economic proposals, Vance said, “if you eliminate this fraud, you have more resources to focus on the American people.”

“We’re trying to make the government more efficient, there’s so much fraud, there’s so much abuse in our system. Some independent analysts say that hundreds of billions of dollars a year go to illegal immigrants, or Social Security/Medicare payments to illegal immigrants,” Vance said. “We have to stop this fraud, and part of that is making the government more efficient, and if you eliminate this fraud, you have more resources to focus on the American people.”

Harris also faces questions about how she will pay for her economic proposals, including expanding the child tax credit and offering $25,000 in down payment assistance for first-time homebuyers. The vice president has also proposed tax deductions for small businesses, including start-up expenses ranging from $5,000 to $50,000. Harris also wants to target price gouging to lower the cost of goods. Harris has called for a 28% capital gains tax and has backed tax proposals outlined by Biden in his fiscal 2025 budget, which includes a 25% minimum tax on total income, including unrealized gains, for people with more than $100 million in assets.