Ole Miss, I've got a question. Are you ready? [Audience cheers]
Wow, that that was impressive. They told me that would be impressive, and they were exactly right. So, let me say -- let me say a few words of thank you first to my dear friend and the widow of my dear friend, Charlie Kirk. Erika, you have been such an amazing inspiration to the entire country. How much do we love Erika Kirk?
She's done a hell of a job. I want to thank -- we have a couple of Mississippi Senators here. We have both Senator Roger Wicker and Senator Cindy Hyde-Smith. Thank you, guys, for being here. We have the governor of Mississippi with us. We've got an all-star crowd here. Governor, thank you for being here.
And most importantly, we have got over 10,000 students from across Mississippi. We are proud to have you, and we know that you are the future of Charlie Kirk's legacy. So, thank you for being here. You know, I've got this whole speech written and I'm not going to deliver any of what I had written.
I'm just going to speak from the heart because that's what Charlie would so often do. And I -- you know, when I think about what we lost six weeks ago, it feels like forever ago when I was in a meeting in the West Wing and one of my staff members came in and said that Charlie had been shot. And then I looked at my phone, and I saw all the text messages and realized that my dear friend had been very seriously injured.
Now in the West Wing at that time, we actually thought that Charlie had a chance. We didn't know that he was eventually going to pass away. There were initial reports from the medical team that maybe things were going OK. And of course, eventually Charlie took his last breath and went home to be with his Lord and Savior.
I remember thinking at that moment first, of course, about Erika and the children. They've got -- their oldest, their daughter is very similar in age to our youngest child. And I remember thinking what a terrible tragedy for that family. And the second thing that I thought was what a terrible tragedy for the United States of America, because Charlie wasn't just a political figure.
He wasn't just a guy who went around campus and said very interesting things and hosted all of these debates. He was a person who, particularly to the young people of this country, to all of you, he had the very best advice. And I think that's the most important way for me to honor Charlie, which is to repeat that advice, something I found true in my own life.
Charlie wanted all of you, whatever life path you chose, whatever career you chose, whatever you ultimately did for a living, Charlie wanted you, more than anything, to invest in the things that were worth having, to build a life that was worth building. And that started -- the most important advice he ever gave you was fall in love, get married and start a family.
And I can't honor Charlie without repeating that most important advice. Now most of you are probably too young to have found the person you're going to spend the rest of your life with. Some of you are lucky enough to have found that person already. But I will tell you, if you're as lucky and blessed as I have been, it hits you like a ton of bricks, and I found that person in my lovely wife, Usha, our Second Lady, who is here with us today.
She's sitting in the audience somewhere, I don't know where. But I love you, honey. And have children. That's something Charlie also always told. I grew up in a generation -- I'm 41 years old; I'm a millennial. And if you're being uncharitable, you would call me a geriatric millennial, which I really hate.
I really hate being called a geriatric millennial, but here I am at 41 talking to all of you like I've got great wisdom. Here's the thing. The one regret, the only regret that I really have in my entire life. And I've made plenty of mistakes, but the one regret that I have is that frankly, I wish we had started having kids sooner.
Because when you're a young father, you realize what an incredible blessing they are. But they're also very exhausting. And I know here at Ole Miss, we like to party a lot. And I know at Ole Miss, occasionally some of you will have a few drinks on a Friday or Saturday or hopefully not a Tuesday night. But I'm sure that happens from time to time here in SEC country.
But here's the thing, when you go out until three in the morning and wake up at 6 a.m. for class, the thing that I have learned in my old age is that incredible energy, God actually meant it for another purpose. And that purpose was to help take care of a family. So, while you're young, have those babies if you're able to, that's something Charlie said all the time.
But think of that advice -- if you think of that advice, Charlie wanted you to get married, he wanted you to fall in love, he wanted you to build a family, he wanted you to find a vocation. That was the advice that he gave on campuses. But that's not just about you, that's also about our country and about our government.
Because while you have the freedom to live life as you so choose, I have got a responsibility as your vice president to make the American Dream as accessible as possible. And this is why -- my friends, this is why we care about all the things that we care about. Why do I care so much about having a secure border in the United States of America?
It's because I believe that when you let in a flood of illegal immigration, what it does is it drives down the wages of young people and makes housing unaffordable for the entire American population. That's why we closed down the border. The left will say our immigration policy is about hating immigration, hating immigrants.
We don't hate anybody; we love our fellow citizens. And because we want them to have the American dream, we shut that border down the very first day that Donald J. Trump was the president of the United States. I care about you being able to afford a home, which is why we fought so hard to fix the broken policies of the Biden administration.
I want a lot of you -- I'm sure there are military veterans in this room right now. I'm sure there are a lot of people who will join the military in the future and we're proud of you. But part of America First is ensuring that we never ask you to go and do the American people's business unless it is in the interest of the United States of America.
And that's how we honor the sacrifice of our troops. And that's why -- my friends, that's why we care so much about free speech. As Charlie lived and died for the basic principle that we ought to be able to talk about our differences, we ought to be able to debate them, and we ought to have faith that the best way to make sure that the best idea wins is to actually just have a discussion.
And that is what this event is all about. That is what Turning Points USA is all about. And I am so proud and, most of all, I'm so grateful to each and every person, whether you're a Republican or a Democrat, for coming out and honoring one of the most important parts of Charlie's legacy because we're going to have a discussion tonight and that's what Charlie would want us to do. Now I want to get to questions, and I want to leave plenty of time for questions, but I want to make just a couple of final points about Charlie's legacy and politics.
The most important thing about Charlie is that he was a great husband and a great father. Erika told me probably 12 hours after Charlie had been pronounced dead, she was just absolutely devastated. She was unable -- you know, if you've ever known anybody who's grieving, sometimes it's unable -- they're unable to even hold a single thought for more than a few seconds.
And when Erika told me, and I'm going to get a little emotional, is that she said that Charlie never yelled at her, he never cussed at her. And that to me is a great legacy to leave as a husband and a father for your wife to be able to say that my husband was always good to me and Charlie was a good man.
But he also -- but he also had the legacy of believing in political debate. And he was the most effective person in politics that I have ever seen. And by the way, that's not because Charlie always agreed with me and the president's policies. I remember one time in particular where Charlie Kirk called me and, guys, he was mad.
It was one -- you know, I wouldn't say the last conversation that I had with him, but it was in the last few months of his life, and he called me, and he said, JD, I'm really worried. I'm really worried that what's going on in the Middle East right now is going to lead the United States into a protracted military conflict.
I've never told anybody that, that Charlie was really worried about that in the final months of his life. Now here's the thing, Charlie was so effective, and he was so trusted by both me and the president of the United States that when Charlie made that phone call, I didn't say screw you, you don't know what you're talking about -- I listened to him.
And I really believe that one of the reasons why the president of the United States knocked out the Iranian nuclear facilities, but never got the United States into a protracted military conflict and never lost a single American in a Middle Eastern conflict is because we had the wisdom and the good sense to recognize that the American people are done with American troops dying in unnecessary foreign conflicts.
But Charlie Kirk reminded me of that, Charlie Kirk. So, that was a great moment for our country. It was a great moment for my friendship with Charlie Kirk, because friendship is not just about telling everybody what they want to hear. It's not just about agreeing with everybody all the time. It's about having the trust in another human being that you can tell them they're wrong and actually encourage them to change their mind.
Or in that case, not necessarily even tell us we were wrong, but make sure that we were thinking about all the options. And of course, under the president's leadership, we were doing exactly that. But Charlie was so good at that. And I think that's one of the ways in which I want all of you to honor your legacy.
Obviously, you care about our great nation, or you wouldn't be here. A lot of you will go on to become future leaders in business or in politics. A lot of you will run campaigns, a lot of you will work on campaigns, a lot of you will be future leaders, there might even be a lowly future vice president of the United States in this very room.
But here's the thing that I want all of you to remember -- Charlie wasn't effective just because he had opinions. A lot of people have opinions. Charlie was effective because he was courageous, because he worked very hard, and because he made his vision a reality. And so, if you care about this country, as I know all of you do, don't just complain about social media, get up and get involved in a campaign.
If you want a better policy outcome, even from an administration you voted for, then get out and get involved and make your voice heard. If you care about this country, love it enough to get involved in the process in how we govern it. That is the only way we are going to save the United States of America, and that is perhaps the greatest contribution that you can make to Charlie Kirk's legacy is getting involved in saving this country.
I'm in the fight and I know every single one of you are with me. God bless you and thank you for having me. Thank you. Thank you. But like, hey, please -- I appreciate that, but we're not even halfway done. So, here's -- I don't know what you're saying, but it sounds awesome. [Audience cheers] Let's not get ahead of ourselves, ladies and gentlemen.
What we're going to do next is actually take some questions. And I remember one of my favorite things about Charlie, not that there aren't going to be some questioners who agree with me. But if you disagree with me, I would ask that you come to the front of the line because we want to talk to people we agree with.
We also want to hear from people we disagree with. It is hard for me to see because the spotlights are very bright. But whoever's in line, go ahead and ask your question. Oh, there we go. OK. Now I can see you. How are you doing?
Hi, Mr. Vice President, thank you so much for being here. My name is Lucy. And I'm Ellie and we're with the Turning Point chapter for this question.
Thank you, guys.
Yes. Can you tell us how your faith helps you in your role as vice president?
Well, I appreciate that, that is a very good question. And this is another way in which Charlie has affected my life. I would say that I grew up again in a generation where, even if people had very deep personal faith, they didn't talk about their faith a whole lot. And I grew up in a country where you just didn't hear political leaders talk about their faith.
But the reason why I try to be the best husband I can be, the best father I can be, the reason why I care so much about all the issues that we're going to talk about is because I believe that I've been placed in this position for a brief period of time to do the most amount of good for God and for the country that I love so much.
And that's the most important way that my faith influences me is we all get a limited opportunity to make a difference. And if you believe, as we believe, you believe that God, you believe that Jesus Christ has a plan. And sometimes we don't understand that plan. By the way, one way I don't understand that plan is why my friend lost his life six weeks ago.
Sometimes I get pissed off about that, but what I remind myself is that there is a deeper rhythm. That Jesus Christ is the author of the fate of human history. And we are charged to do everything that we can to effectuate that vision to make our country a more virtuous place, a more prosperous place where people can raise a family and not be persecuted for their faith but teach their children their faith.
That recognition that all of us have a duty, and I have two very important duties as vice president of United States, to the American people and to God. And that's the most important influence my faith has on me. Thank you.
I understand your view on illegal immigration is it should be a top priority, strengthening our southern borders and fighting the massive drug trafficking that's taking place while securing jobs for the working-class Americans. Also deporting every single person who's invaded our country illegally, which I 100 percent agree on. My question to you is what is your view on legal immigration?
Personally, I have a girlfriend who's studying in America off a visa. Our hope is eventually getting a green card. So, what is your view on legal immigration? Should we reduce it? Also, what is your plan for a merit-based system?
Yes, sir, well, I appreciate the question and look, my honest view is that right now America, thanks in part to the Biden border invasion, but also thanks in part to a lot of bad immigration policy, right now we have let in too many immigrants into the United States of America, that is just a fundamental reality.
Now look, legal immigration is complicated because we let in about a million legal immigrants into the United States of America every single year. And I think the evidence is pretty clear that a lot of those immigrants are actually undercutting the wages of American workers. It's one of the reasons why the president of the United States, and a lot of us in the administration, have encouraged H-1b reform.
Because if you look at the H-1b visa, what it's supposed to be, what it's supposed to be is that you have a super genius who's studying at an American university who's working at a great company. You want that super genius to stay in the United States of America and not go somewhere else. What it's actually used to do is hire an accountant at a 50 percent discount to an American citizen.
I don't think that we should be hiring accountants from foreign countries when we've got accountants right here in the United States that would love to work for a good wage. Now you asked about, I think your girlfriend, you said and I obviously don't know the full details about your situation, but my view is, look, there are people who want to come to the United States of America and some of them, I'm sure, can enrich The United States of America by coming here.
But we have got to get our overall numbers way, way down. Too many people have come into the United States of America. I am married to the daughter of immigrants who came to the United States in the 1980s. I do believe that some immigrants, many immigrants do in fact enrich the United States of America.
But here's the problem -- we have got -- we don't even know how many illegal aliens we have. We don't even know. The best guess is probably 25 million, 30 million people. I've heard estimates as high as 50 million. When something like that happens, you've got to allow your own society to cohere a little bit, to build a sense of common identity for all the newcomers to assimilate -- the ones who are going to stay, to assimilate into American culture.
Until you do that, you've got to be careful about any additional immigration in my view. Thank you, sir.
Thank you. Hello, I have a question about Israel and Trump's policy towards it. Do you think it's a conflict of interest for Miriam Adelson, an Israeli donor, to give millions of dollars to his campaign and then Trump have pro-Israeli policies?
Well, if you're asking, do I think the President of United States has a conflict of interest? No, I do not because I know how the president makes his decisions, and I see it behind the scenes. Now as the president himself has said, Miriam Adelson, who by the way I know, and I have a very good relationship with her.
She is very clear about the fact -- she doesn't hide the fact that she really loves Israel and that is part of what motivates her political giving. That is a reality. At the same time, the president of United States is America first through and through. And let me give you just a couple of examples of this.
Number one, we have heard from some pro-Israel voices, some people who really love the state of Israel, that they don't want us to have a relationship with certain Middle Eastern countries. Well, the president, his attitude is we need to build relationships with any country where we have shared interests and he's going to do it if it's in the interests of the American people, and he's done exactly that.
Number two, there were people, and I remember this criticism of the president of the United States, I just raised it in the context of a conversation I had with Charlie. I remember when people said that the president of the United States was going to get us into a multi-hundred thousand troop regime change war for Israel.
This was four months ago. This was six months ago. Now the people who accused the president of the United States of wanting to get us into a regime change war for Israel, I wonder if they stepped back and said, you know what, we were wrong about that because the president of United States did not want to get us into a regime change war for any other country.
He wanted to knock out a nuclear facility and get everybody back home and that's exactly what he did. So, I understand there's some frustrations out there, but I think the president of the United States, more than any president of my lifetime, is willing to stand up to anybody if he thinks it puts the interests of the American people first.
Thank you.
Hello, Vice President Vance.
How you doing?
Good. I have a question. Do you condone large private corporations such as Palantir hoarding data caches on US citizens?
No, I don't condone it and here's the thing. So, I get asked about Palantir a lot because there's this internet meme out there that somehow, I am super in bed with Palantir. And here's the thing that I'd say about this. Palantir is a private company. They sometimes do a useful service, and sometimes they're going to do things that we don't like.
You should be demanding that your Representatives do two things when it comes to Palantir or when it comes to any other technology company. Number one, protecting your data. What's going on with artificial intelligence is going to mean that there are massive inducements to steal your data, to harvest it and to use it against you to sell digital advertisements.
That is not what I believe in, and I've been fighting against it, whether it's Palantir or any other technology company, literally before I ran for office. When I ran for office, I was criticized by Republicans in my Republican Senate primary because I was talking then about Google and Facebook harvesting our data.
It's unacceptable. I don't care who does it, I don't want them to do it. Number two, and this is also very important. What's going on with artificial intelligence, we've got to be worried about large scale surveillance, OK. Everything -- you asked about Palantir, do you know that every time you make a credit card transaction, the credit card companies are collecting data on how you spend your money?
Do you know that every time you linger over a link on the internet for more than a half second, search engines are collecting data on you so that they can sell you advertisements. One of the biggest questions for American policy over the next 10 years is how to ensure that you are a sovereign citizen and you cannot be a sovereign citizen if any private corporation or any government can steal something from you that belongs to you.
Thank you.
Yes, sir. Thank you. Vice President JD Vance, good evening. My question is, the Republican Party, they stand for the right to bear arms, a lot of things the Founding fathers really made a priority.
Sure.
And I feel as if requiring Christianity in public schools goes against the Founding Fathers' wish of freedom of religion. What do you think about that?
Well, I guess what's -- who is saying that we require Christianity in public schools?
Just from what I've seen on the media and the news, it seems like the Trump administration had wanted to make praying in schools and Christian values incorporated.
Well, look, I think Christian values are a good thing, and I'll talk to you about why I think that's a good thing. But that's separate from forcing people to pray, which I don't think that anybody, certainly no Christian that I know would ever support or ever endorse. And let me just say something generally about all the people -- I see there's a big line and I hope I can get to everybody's question.
I remember when I was a sophomore in high school, I went to an event at my church, which was a book signing with Oliver North and Sean Hannity, the Fox News host. And this was back before -- I mean, this was, I guess, 25 years ago. And so, neither of these guys was maybe as big as they are today. And I remember standing in line and I'm about to say hello to Oliver North and Sean Hannity and I remember thinking to myself, I was so nervous.
All I need to do is shake my hand -- or shake their hand, give them a firm handshake and tell them my name. That's what I'm thinking, firm handshake, tell them my name. Firm handshake, tell them my name. And I get to the front of the line and Sean Hannity looks at me and he says how are you doing? And I totally panicked, and I go, uh, JD, because I had rehearsed shaking and saying my name.
My point is I admire your guy's courage, and please don't be nervous if you need to work through a question, think about it, speak it. We're all here to have a nice conversation and we're all supportive of it. Here's the thing when you talk about forcing -- I'm going to answer your question -- of forcing Christianity, forcing people to pray.
There's a real -- there's a liberal idea out there that I think is wrong and that's that Liberalism is the source of freedom of religion. And actually, if you go back to the original founding documents of the United States of America, if you go back to the Anglo legal tradition, well before there was ever a United States of America, what you find is that freedom of religion is actually a Christian concept.
And the reason and the reason it's a Christian concept is very simple, because Christianity, Imago Dei, the idea that we are all made in the image of our creator means that we must respect the free will of every single person. Now part of that as you have a conversation with people, having free will doesn't mean that you're not allowed to encourage somebody, that you're not allowed to talk to somebody about your faith, that you're not allowed to talk about certain values in school.
When our founders talked about freedom of religion, they didn't mean you weren't allowed to say a Christian prayer in a public school or that you weren't allowed to talk about Jesus Christ in a public forum. They just meant that nobody could force you to profess the Christian faith, that had to come from your own free will.
And I believe that, and I think every Christian who I've ever spoken to believes that the source is the Christian -- the source of your faith, the Christian understanding must be your own free will. But here's the thing about Christian values. There are a lot of Christian values out there that I think that we've just sort of assumed and we've in fact taken for granted.
Christian values are the idea that you should respect every single person as an individual, whatever the color of their skin, created in the Image of God, that's a Christian concept. And in fact, it was a Christian empire, Great Britain, that abolished slavery to begin with. The idea that we should eliminate child sacrifice.
What did the Christian settlers find when they came to the New World? They found a lot of civilizations that were murdering babies in weird religious rituals. It was Christianity that said we don't kill children just because they're somehow inconvenient to people. A lot of the things -- human rights, the very idea that human beings have rights are a Christian concept.
And so, I'd ask you -- my assumption, based on the question, is that you're skeptical of Christianity or at least of certain public professions of Christianity. One of my favorite Bible verses is by your fruits, ye shall know them. And I think that the fruits of the Christian faith are the most moral, the most just and the most prosperous civilization in history.
I make no apologies for believing that Christianity is the pathway to God. I make no apologies for thinking that Christian values are an important foundation of this country. But I'm not going to force you to believe in anything because that's not what God wants and that's not what I want either. Go ahead.
So, the school system, do you agree that there should be Christian implementation or do you think that school systems should be neutral and be focused on science, literature, reading, writing, arithmetic?
Well, I reject the idea that anything is purely neutral, OK? There are -- for example, let's say -- let's take a basic scientific fact, and this is a little spicy. I'm not trying to make this too controversial, but take the basic scientific fact of can you take a pill to change your biological gender, OK? Now that's something that 15 years ago, quite literally every single scientist in the Western world would have said absolutely not, that's crazy.
And now people will. I actually I think the premise of your question, I don't totally share it because I don't think perfect neutrality is possible. What is it -- you talk about history. Was Christopher Columbus a great explorer or was he a guy who committed genocide against the native populations? These debates, I'm happy to have them, but I reject the idea that there are truly neutral debates.
Anybody who's telling you their view is neutral likely has an agenda to sell you. And I'm at least honest about the fact that I think the Christian foundation of this country is a good thing. Next?
OK, thank you. And for the pill you're talking about, what do you mean specifically? Are you talking about testosterone and estrogen?
Yeah, I'm talking about hormone replacement therapy. That's what I'm talking about. Just to be respectful, let's keep it going.
Yes. Thank you. Have a good night.
You too.
Hello, Mr. Vice President, thank you so much for giving this opportunity to talk here today. I did not agree with many of the things that you said right ahead of this, but I don't think that's my point to discuss here. What I want to ask is you are married to a woman who is not Christian. In her Wikipedia -- I mean I just looked that up, I wanted to know what her faith was.
I didn't know this before. But she still calls herself Hindu. You are raising two kids -- three kids in inter-cultural, racial, religious household. How are you maintaining -- or how are you teaching your kids not to keep your religion ahead of their mother's religion? Or how are you teaching them that your kind, their dad kind who got here just a few years or a few hundred years -- a few decades ago is different or is better than your mom's kind who got here just a generation before?
How are you balancing that? And when you talk about too many immigrants here, what is -- when did you guys decide that number? Why did you sell us a dream? You made us spend our youth, our wealth in this country and gave us a dream. You don't owe us anything. We have worked hard for it. Then how can you as a vice president stand there and say that we have too many of them now and we are going to take them out, to people who are here rightfully so? By paying the money that you guys ask us, you gave us the path.
And now how can you stop it and tell us we don't belong here anymore? And one more thing, I'm sorry, one more thing. Do you have to be --
There's a lot there, I don't know if I'm going to remember all this, but I will try.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I had to say all of this and please take it with you. I mean, I'm saying all of this with respect.
No, go ahead, please. Thank you.
I have no intention of causing a scene here or anything. But --
We're not close to causing a scene, don't worry.
But we talked about Christianity, all of this. I'm not even Christian and I'm here standing to show support. Why are we making Christianity one of the major things that you have to have in common to be one of you guys. To show that I love America just as much as you do, why is that still a question? Why do I have to be a Christian or --?
OK, so there was a lot there and I'm going to try to respond to as much of it as I can. So, on the question of immigration, so first of all, I can believe that we should have lower immigration levels. But if the United States passed a law and made a promise to somebody, the United States of course has to honor that promise.
Nobody's talking about that. I'm talking about people who came in in violation of the laws of the United States of America. And I'm talking about in the future reducing the number -- reducing the number of people -- sorry, what?
May I continue on that? Because when you just said you are not stopping with the people who came here legally, right, but you are pushing out policies that hurt us. And these policies are not even solving the problems. These policies are just creating chaos.
OK, so again, I'm going to finish answering the question and then if -- you know, if I've answered all nine of your questions in less than 15 minutes, then we can keep on going. [Laughter] We've got to have a little fun, right? So, here's the thing, I can believe that the United States should lower its levels of immigration in the future, while also respecting that there are people who have come here through immigration -- lawful immigration pathways that have contributed to the country.
But just because one person or 10 people or 100 people came in legally and contributed to the United States of America, does that mean that we're thereby committed to let in a million or 10 million or 100 million people a year in the future? No, that's not right. We cannot have -- I'll go and finish. We cannot have an immigration policy where what was good for the country 50 or 60 years ago, binds the country inevitably for the future.
There are too many people who want to come to the United States of America, and my job as vice president is not to look out for the interests of the whole world, it's to look out for the people of the United States. Now let me -- now you asked -- you asked a personal question about our interfaith household.
And yes, my wife did not grow up Christian. I think it's fair to say that she grew up in a Hindu family, but not in a particularly religious family in either direction. In fact, when I met my wife, we were both -- I would consider myself an agnostic or atheist and that's what I think she would have considered herself as well.
You know, everybody has to come to their own arrangement here. The way that we've come to our arrangement is she's my best friend. We talk to each other about this stuff. So, we decided to raise our kids Christian. Our two oldest kids who go to school, they go to a Christian school. Our eight-year-old did his first communion about a year ago.
That's the way that we have come to our arrangement. But thank you my eight-year-old was also very proud of his First Communion. Thank you, guys. I'll tell him that Ole Miss wishes him the best. But I think everybody has to have this own conversation when you're in a marriage. I mean, it's true for friends of mine who are in Protestant and Catholic marriages, friends of mine who are in, you know, atheist and Christian marriages.
You've just got to talk to your -- the only advice I can give is you just got to talk to the person that God has put you with and you've got to make those decisions as a family unit. For us it works out. Now most Sundays, Usha will come with me to church. As I've told her and I've said publicly, and I'll say now in front of 10,000 of my closest friends.
Do I hope eventually that she is somehow moved by the same thing that I was moved in by church? Yeah, I honestly do wish that because I believe in the Christian gospel and I hope eventually my wife comes to see it the same way. But if she doesn't, then God says everybody has free will. And so, that doesn't cause a problem for me. That's something you work out with your friends, with your family, with the person that you love.
Again, the most -- one of the most important Christian principles is that you respect free will. Usha is closer to the priest who baptized me than maybe I am. They talk about this stuff. My attitude is you figure this stuff out as a family, and you trust in God to have a plan, and you try to follow it as best as you can.
And that's what I try to do. I want to make a final point. So, I don't want to cut you off. I want to be respectful to all the people behind you in line. But I want to make this point about immigration, OK. If you asked the question, what is the exact right number of immigrants for the United States to let in? It is just very specific on the context.
If you go back to the 1920s, the United States passed an immigration reform act that effectively cut down immigration to close to zero for 40 years in this country. And what happened over those 40 years, the many, many people who had come from many different foreign countries and different foreign cultures, they assimilated into American culture.
And there was an expectation that they would assimilate into American culture. I think we have two problems in our immigration system today. And my guess is you're probably a slightly more leftist political persuasion, liberal political persuasion. Maybe not. But here's the thing -- I remember back in my establishment GOP days when I was still very early getting involved in Republican politics.
I remember a conservative think tank person who told me that one of the reasons why immigration was really good is that if you had enough diversity in a country, people would mistrust each other, and they wouldn't join labor unions. OK. So, when I see a lot of left-wing people who theoretically support organized labor saying we need to flood the country with a limitless number of immigrants, they're unwilling to set any limitations on it. My response to that is you are destroying the very social trust on which American freedom and prosperity was built and that is really important to me. So, the honest answer to your question, what is the exact number of immigrants America should accept in the future?
Right now, the answer is far less than we've been accepting. We have got to become a common community again, and you can't do that when you have such high numbers of immigration, which is one of the reasons why we have the immigration policy we do. Thank you. Next?
Good evening, Vice President Vance. I just want to say it's an honor to actually be able to talk to you.
It's an honor to be here. Thank you.
Thank you. One of my biggest questions is I feel like one of the biggest problems that America is facing today is that ever-growing social political divide. And we're seeing this on the Republican and Democratic side. But we've seen that a refusal to cooperate with the other side has led to some major issues, including right now the government shutdown.
And I wonder, as the party in power, what are your plans to address that issue towards, you know, reaching that olive branch out to the other side to actually come to an agreement on how to go forward with our government?
Look, it's a very good question, and let me just say on the government shutdown in particular, the reality here is that there's a very simple bill that just reopens the government. It does it through pretty much the end of the year. That got every single Republican in the House of Representatives to support it. And then it got 52 Republicans in the Senate and three Democrats in the Senate to support it. But because of weird Senate procedural rules, it requires a 60-vote threshold.
So, on that issue in particular, when you have every single Republican with like two exceptions in both houses of Congress, I feel pretty confident. I know that I'm partisan, I know I have an R next to my name, but I feel pretty damn good saying the shutdown is the Democrats' fault, because we voted again and again to open it. Now on -- but there's a broader question there.
And I think most Americans, whatever their political persuasion, would actually like the country's political parties to work together better to solve the problems. And look, and I agree with that. And my approach when I was in the United States Senate was to try to find some issues where we could agree with the other side on and try to work with them on. And like let me give you one example.
I'm a really -- I really worry about concentration in the corporate sector. I worry about big corporate monopolies. I worry that when you have only one or two companies dominating an entire sector, it's bad for liberty and it's bad for prosperity. So, you may be shocked to hear this, but I actually worked with Elizabeth Warren on some anti-monopoly stuff when I was in the United States Senate.
But here's the problem. The problem is there are actually a lot of things where we could work across the aisle. There are a lot of Republicans, President Trump was -- is in my view, you haven't seen organized labor ever get behind a Republican at least in 100 years like they have behind Donald J. Trump. There are a lot of areas of common ground on that question.
The problem is as reasonable as some of these people can be in private, in public the current obsession of the Democratic Party in leadership -- I'm not saying every Democrat in the country, but the current obsession of every Democrat in Congress is get President Trump, fight President Trump, attack President Trump.
It is impossible for us to work across the aisle unless a person is willing to put down their partisan sword, shut the hell up about fake scandals related to Donald Trump, and actually work with us. That's the way you make this happen. Next. Thank you.
Thank you.
Next. We'll try to get through as many as possible, guys. Thank you.
Good evening, Mr. Vice President.
Hello?
Hi. I actually drove here all the way from Memphis, Tennessee. Go Tigers. So, I'm sure everyone here is aware of the Memphis Safe Task Force that has been in the city for about a month now. And I checked a little earlier; as of this morning, I believe they've arrested 1,700 people and seized about 300 illegal guns.
So, I want to ask how does this law enforcement objective jive with Attorney General Pam Bondi's pledge to make the Department of Justice a more pro-second amendment Department of Justice? Because I'm sure most people here support the Second Amendment. So, how can Republicans and this Department of Justice use the current gun laws that are on the books that a lot of pro-second amendment advocates disagree with, that we wanted to overturn in the Big, Beautiful Bill, but we didn't get it?
Yeah, so I understand the question. By the way, I supported some of those changes in the Big, Beautiful Bill. I know the president of the United States did too. We didn't have the votes to get them in there and that's as simple as that. But I know exactly what you're talking about because there were a couple of issues -- in particular, I talked to some of my Second Amendment friends.
But here's the basic issue. We don't want people who have violated the law, who have committed felonies -- the Second Amendment, like every other amendment, it's about due process. It's that you don't have your rights violated unless there is due process of law. If you're a person who's committed four felonies and a court has lawfully ordered that you shouldn't have a gun, and you're running around with a firearm.
I don't have any problem with law enforcement saying, you don't get to have that firearm that is illegally possessed, illegally obtained. I think that's basic law and order. Now again, if you had -- you know, if you had somebody come in and say, well, we don't think that person should have a firearm, but they haven't violated any law.
That's a totally separate question. That's not what we're focused on. What we're focused on is violent crime and people who have violated, you know the bodily autonomy of another human -- people, a person who has committed an act of violence against one of their fellow citizens. We're going to clean up the streets, get those people off the streets and make America safe for the American citizens again.
That is our entire law and order policy, and I think we're doing a pretty good job at it. Thank you.
Thank you for the opportunity to speak. I'm a Christian man and I'm just confused why there's this notion that we might owe Israel something or that they're our greatest ally or that we have to support this multi-hundred-billion-dollar foreign aid package to Israel to cover this, to quote Charlie Kirk, ethnic cleansing in Gaza.
I'm just confused why this idea has come around, considering the fact that not only does their religion not agree with ours, but also openly supports the prosecution of ours.
Yeah. So, let me say a few things about this. First of all, when the president of United States says America first, that means that he pursues the interests of Americans first. That is our entire foreign policy. And that doesn't mean that you're not going to have alliances, that you're not going to work with other countries from time to time.
And that is what the president believes is that Israel, sometimes they have similar interests to the United States and we're going to work with them in that case. Sometimes they don't have similar interests to the United States. And this example, the most recent Gaza peace plan that all of us have been working on very hard for the past few weeks, the president of the United States could only get that peace deal done by actually being willing to apply leverage to the state of Israel.
So, when people say that Israel is somehow manipulating or controlling the president of the United States, they're not controlling this president of the United States, which is one of the reasons why we've been able to have some of the success that we've had in the Middle East. Now you ask about sort of Jews disagreeing with Christians on certain religious ideas.
Yeah, absolutely. One of the realities is that Jews do not believe that Jesus Christ is the Messiah. Obviously, Christians do believe that. There are some significant theological disagreements between Christians and Jews. My attitude is let's have those conversations, let's have those disagreements when we have them.
But if there are shared areas of interest, we ought to be willing to do that too. For example, I really care about -- one thing I really, really care about is the preservation of the church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. Christians believe that that is the site where Jesus Christ was crucified and also that his tomb is right there as well.
My attitude is if we can work with our friends in Israel to make sure that Christians have safe access to that site, that's an obvious area of common interest. I am fine with that. What I'm not OK with is any country coming before the interests of American citizens, and it is important for all of us, assuming we're American citizens, to put the interest of our own country first.
That's what we're going to do. That's what we try to do every single day. I promise you. Thank you.
Hi, Mr. Vice President. I'm the president of our pro-life organization here at Ole Miss, Rebels for Life. And I myself as a president am 100 percent pro-life. And I know you've stated, you being Catholic, that you -- in the past you've stated that you're 100 percent pro-life. But since joining the presidential campaign as the VP you've kind of wavered how you see abortion.
So, I'm just wondering what your stance is right now. And do you think that someone else's right to liberty trumps someone else's right to life?
Well, first of all, I appreciate your question, and I appreciate the work that you do. You asked the question, do I think somebody else's right to liberty trumps somebody else's right to life? No, I do not. I in fact do not believe that. Now, you said -- and I'm going to take issue with something you said, just the premise of the question, which is that I've wavered on the pro-life issue.
I really do believe that the president has been the most pro-life president in the history of the United States of America. Now that said, there are two things that I think we have to keep in mind here. Now one is the very, very hard question of -- when we talk about abortion policy there are some very, very difficult edge cases.
There are cases where you've got, you know, an 11-year-old girl who was raped who it would be unsafe for her to bring the baby to term. You've got situations where bringing a baby to term would cause serious bodily harm, maybe death for the mother. That's one of the reasons why we believe in the exception in these cases where you have -- again, they're edge cases, they're rare.
I think the pro-abortion community would have you believe that's 90 percent of abortions, that's not true, but we've got to be honest about the fact that there are some edge cases. The second thing I'd say about this is that we have to be prudential and practical in what can get accomplished. And there may be disagreements about what exactly that is. But if you look at the pro-life victories that the president United States has been able to achieve, he's been able to achieve them because he has worked within the system that we have.
If your attitude is you are going to pursue the most aggressive pro-life option, even if it means you lose every election, and every outcome means that you're going to be in a situation where the Democrats have abortion on demand up to the moment of birth to the very end. You've got to work within the political constraints that we have.
Now here, let me just say something about this. And you know, somebody asked me earlier about my Christian values. And one of the points I made is that when the settlers came to the New World, they found very widespread child sacrifice. I imagine there are some people who don't agree with my view on the pro-life issue.
Let me just make an observation. If you go to historical archeological sites where there were brothels, and the two oldest businesses in the world are gambling and prostitution. So, there were brothels even in very ancient civilizations. If you go back to ancient brothels and you dig up the bones of the women who were working in these places, you will very often find a lot of children who were buried with them.
And the answer is that whenever a society decides to discard innocent babies, they also don't treat their women very well. And whenever a society mistreats its women, it is very often the babies who come right after that. There is a reason why Christian civilization ended the practice of child sacrifice all over the world and it's one of the great accomplishments of Christian civilization.
I believe that we should try to be protecting every unborn life. There's a question of exactly how we do it, but I would never say that anyone's life -- right to life should be sacrificed. Thank you, ma'am.
First, I just have to say I'm thrilled to hear you articulate Christian values on a stage like this. And to remind us that we -- things we take for granted and things we value so much have a Christian origin. So, thank you for that. I really mean that. However --
So much of liberalism, by the way, so much of the far left is a sort of -- if you really pay attention to it, it's a kind of perverted version of Christianity. Like there's nothing wrong, of course, with focusing on people who are disenfranchised, for example, that's the focus of liberalism. But if you completely separate it from any religious duty, any civic virtue, then that can actually become, for example, an inducement to lawlessness.
You can't just have compassion for the criminal, you also have to have justice too, which is why I think that a properly rooted Christian moral order is such an important part of the future of our country. But sorry, I interrupted you. Go ahead.
No, Amen, absolutely. Now as much as I hope and pray that we can be a nation of Christians, the idea of a Christian nation scares me. So, I'd like to hear your feedback on a pretty nuanced argument here, that perhaps there should be a wall of separation, as at least one of our founders advocated, for between church and state at the national level.
However, that line can and should get blurrier as we descend to the community level. And perhaps that is actually the system, the structure that our founders gave us when they said Congress shall make no law establishing a religious body. However, states did have close relationships with churches at that time.
Do you think that that is a rationale that works? Do you think that that is the way we should implement things around these Christian values?
So, this is a very nuanced point, and I want to just make sure that everybody's kind of on the same page here. So, if you go back to the First Amendment, it doesn't say separation of church and state, it says Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion. But if you go back to the founding time, there were actually a number of states that had formally recognized churches.
So, there was the Anglican Church of Virginia, that was the official state church of Virginia. Maryland at the time was the only majority Catholic colony or at least had a significant Catholic representation of the original 13 Colonies. There's a lot there. And yes, I do think that what happened is the Supreme Court interpreted Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion to effectively throw the church out of every public space at the federal, state and local level.
I think it was a terrible mistake and we're still paying for the consequences of it today. But if -- I think this is your point -- if you were to undo that, if you were to get back to a system actually meant by the founders where Congress is not setting up an established religion, but people in their local communities can kind of do whatever It is that they want to do, I think that would be a better system than what we have today.
But I think the most important principle that we have got to remember is you do not -- you do not have to completely kick God out of the public square, which is what we've done in modern America. It's not what the founders wanted. It's not good for the United States of America. And anybody who tells you it's required by the Constitution is lying to you.
Thank you.
Hello, JD, how are you doing today, man?
Good, how are you doing?
In the wise words of Ricky Bobby, I don't know what to do with my hands. [Laughter]
Don't feel bad, neither do I half the time, man.
OK, OK. First off, yeah, laugh it up, laugh it up. OK. First off, I just want to say I am a huge supporter of the Trump administration. I was three months too late to vote for you guys. But if I could have, I would have. So, I'm a huge supporter of you guys before I make my argument, but there is something you guys are doing that is kind of disturbing me a little bit.
OK, go ahead.
Thank you. You guys have sent the military into Washington DC and a few other cities that I can't think of off the top of my head, which first off, they've had wonderful results. Like no one -- no one can deny the results of that. It's wonderful, some might even say the greatest. [Laughter] I'm a comedian.
I like this guy. Who is this guy?
Thank you, JD. I like you too.
Now he's gonna -- now he's going to ask the question about all the shit that we did wrong, but that's OK. Go ahead and ask your question. [Laughter]
But yeah, I'm just wondering -- well, it's not necessarily something you did wrong, but it's what could someone else do wrong? Let's say we get a complete tyrant in office and let's say we're having, let's say Turning Point USA is having a huge protest against, you know, something really bad that we don't like.
And let's say he's -- a president is saying that it's getting violent. How can we -- what is -- I'm trying to think, my mind is kind of blank. Like how -- what is the difference between what you're doing and how could we prevent someone from abusing that power?
Yeah, so look, I understand where the question is coming from and I think it's a fair question. And it's going to sound like I'm being sarcastic, and it really is not meant in any offense. But when you talk about what could another administration do, to take a wild, hypothetical example, totally off the top of my head, what if Joe Biden sent the Federal Bureau of Investigation to start arresting his political opponents?
OK? So, here's something that I want conservatives -- I want every conservative to remember. It's an important part of my entire political philosophy is we cannot be afraid to do something because the left might do it in the future. The left is already going to do it regardless of whether we do it. That is the takeaway of the last 40 years.
And in particular, if you look at what we're doing, if Joe Biden wanted to deploy the National Guard to a red state in a place where the murder rate was twice what it is in third world countries to actually go after murderers. That would be a great use of the National Guard. Unfortunately, I don't think Joe Biden would use it like that.
What I'm worried about frankly is what the far left already did with American law enforcement and that is the thing that we have to prevent against. And the answer to that question is you make sure the people who did it face penalties for using the federal power against American citizens. And by the way, that's exactly what we're trying to do. Thank you.
Thank you, JD. Honor to meet you, man. Good to meet you too, man.
This will be the last question.
Ricky Bobby 2048, That's who I'm voting for. This is the last -- oh, wow! We've been here over an hour. That's amazing. OK. I'm sorry, those of you who I didn't get to answer a question. I tried to be as quick as I could. Go ahead.
Mr. Vice President, I'm humbled and honored to be here. Recently, President Trump endorsed a candidate to run against Republican Representative Thomas Massie, who has opposed and criticized some of the Trump administration's aims. How would you address those who fear that principled disagreement or independent thinking is discouraged within the party because of how it can be framed as a betrayal instead of as internal accountability or an opportunity for debate and negotiation?
So, it's a very good question. Let me say this one is hard for me. And the reason it's hard for me is because Thomas Massie and I -- he's one of the first people that ever reached out to me about my book or about political office. I've known Thomas Massie well before I ever got involved in politics. Thomas's wife died a -- well, maybe it was a year and a half ago, two years ago, it was a little while ago.
She died very unexpectedly, was a very sweet and kind woman and I was probably one of the first people that called Thomas to offer my condolences. I think the problem with Thomas, and I've told him this in private and now I guess I'll say it in public, is it's one thing to disagree with the party on a particular issue.
It's one thing to take -- to have your independent stand on a number of questions. And by the way, some of the stuff where Thomas Massie has been independent against the Republican Party I've agreed with him with. Thomas and I worked together during 2023 where I was trying to stop the limitless flow of American money to Ukraine, and Thomas was one of the people I was working closest with it. But that's one thing.
Being independent, having your own opinions is one thing. Voting against the party on every single issue, you're eventually going to make too many enemies, and that is the problem that Thomas has had. It's not one issue; it's not three or four issues. It's that every time that we've needed Thomas for a vote, he has been completely unwilling to provide it. That is why the president of the United States has trained his ire on Thomas Massie.
It's because we can never count on him for some of the most difficult votes. I wish that that weren't the case. I say that as somebody who has known Thomas well before I got into politics, but politics is politics. And when you always vote against the party, you can't expect the party to actually back you.
That's the reality. So, let me say just a couple of final things before I hit the road here. And one, it has been such an amazing honor to be with all of you this evening. I want to say two things. I want to say two things. Number one, when I was back in my agnostic days and I was thinking about returning to my faith, I remember talking to a friend of mine and actually talking about a number of things.
And he said something to me that was really interesting, and I was talking about all the things that were going wrong. I was looking to the future, I was talking about everything that was broken in the world, and I said to him, I said, you know, things are just really, really dark. And he said, and he stopped me in my tracks, he said JD, you're right, there are a lot of things that are really dark out there, but despair is a sin.
Now, I know not all of you are Christians, but for the Christians out there I think that it is very important to remember that despair is actually a sin. It's OK to disagree. It's OK to criticize. It's OK to think that things aren't going well with a particular issue, but we are called to never give up hope.
I think one of the critical lessons of Charlie Kirk's life to his dying breath, this was a man who never lost hope in his creator and never lost hope in the United States of America. So, let's remember that and carry that forward as a way to remember him. And the second thing that I want to say is in line with despair being a sin.
Look, I imagine that most -- I can tell most of you apparently agree with a lot of what I said. I'm sure that a lot of you disagree with some of the things that I've said. That's OK. We don't need in our political movement people who agree with us on every single issue. We got a couple of questions about Israel.
We got a couple of questions about the National Guard deployments. We don't need somebody who agrees with us on every single question or every single issue. What we need is people of good faith who love the United States of America and are willing to work hard to save it. So, when you look at all the accomplishments -- you look at the accomplishments of the last nine months -- we inherited the worst border crisis in the history of the United States of America.
We shut down the border and net immigration is 2.5 million lower today than it was in nine months. That means the total number of people that have been sent out of this country is 2.5 million. We have 2.5 million fewer illegal immigrants than we had. That's a great accomplishment. We inherited a terrible affordability crisis from Joe Biden and I'm not going to tell you everything's perfect because it was a real bad situation that we inherited.
But inflation is consistently below economists' expectations, and we are chipping away at it every single day. We inherited an economy where we had the largest trade deficit in the history of the United States of America. In nine months, Donald Trump's tariff policies have cut the American trade deficit by over half.
That means we're making more of our own stuff and we're actually employing American workers to do it. And all that is to say that very often Charlie Kirk would call me, and he would say not attaboy, but he would say do more, do more, do more. And I listened to Charlie because he was a dear friend and because I knew that he loved this country.
My point is the best way in your life to honor Charlie Kirk's legacy, it's not to despair, but to hope in the future of this country. If you disagree with something, then get involved in the movement to save this country. If you think that we could be doing more, then pick up the phone and get involved in the effort to change our minds and change the future of the United States of America in the process.
My friends, the rebels of Ole Miss, despair is a sin, do not give in to despair, let's keep fighting to save the United States of America. Thank you and God bless you.