“Our message to illegal aliens who have come to this country, who have driven up the cost of housing, who have made it more expensive for Americans to afford a good life, to the drug cartels who have brought in pounds and pounds, tons and tons of fentanyl to this country, our message is simple — in six months, pack your bags because you’re going home,” Vance told a full house of supporters at Union Hall in Raleigh on Sept. 18.

Voters strongly support Republican positions on immigration and border security, so it wasn’t surprising for Vance to focus his remarks on the divisive issue. Trump has called for mass deportations on day one of his administration, should he win.

Vance postulated that there are 25 million unauthorized migrants in the country illegally. Data from the Pew Research Center from 2022, the most recent available, suggests the number of unauthorized migrants currently in the United States is around 11 million, although it can be hard to pin down real numbers among such an elusive demographic. A 2019 report by the Migration Policy Institute put the number at 11 million, but the largest recorded number was 12.2 million in 2007.

Whatever the number, Vance believes they have contributed to inflation and unaffordable housing costs.

“We let in 25 million illegal aliens to compete against Americans,” Vance said. “And here’s the thing, when you take the same number of houses and you bring 25 million people who shouldn’t even be here and you force Americans to compete against those 25 million, then that’s going to drive up the cost of housing for everybody.”

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Economists disagree with Vance, who has repeated the claim since at least August, by citing a widely acknowledged lack of supply as the reason for skyrocketing housing costs — and they don’t seem eager to connect that lack of supply to increasing demand by unauthorized migrants.

Vance also believes migrants are responsible for an increase in car insurance rates and accuses them of disregarding traffic laws.

“You think it has something to do with the fact there are 25 million drivers on the road who shouldn’t be here? And if they didn’t follow our laws to get here the first place, you think they’re following the stop signs? Absolutely not,” Vance said.

Earlier this year, reports indicated a 21% average price jump in car insurance rates for the year ended February. Market analysts again disagree with Vance, pointing to the rising cost of car repairs, more frequent and more devastating accidents, and of course, lawyers, as the real reason for the bump. A CNN report from March said that North Carolina’s car insurance rates have increased the least in the nation, about 5.5%.

Although Vance didn’t double down on his thoroughly discredited  assertions that Haitian migrants were eating household pets in Springfield, Ohio — a claim Vance made and Trump repeated, leading to bomb threats and social tension there — he did spread more misinformation about Haitians in Springfield, calling them “illegal immigrants.”

Haitian migrants in the United States enjoy temporary protected status through Feb. 3, 2026, although they remain unauthorized. Springfield officials suggested that they were brought to the town by businesses, to work. At least one CEO in Springfield employs 30 and said he wishes he had 30 more.

About the only thing Vance didn’t blame on unauthorized migrants was energy costs, instead placing the onus on the Biden administration and therefore Harris. Trump did the same thing in Asheville on Aug. 17, calling for energy independence by resurrecting Sarah Palin’s “drill, baby, drill!” mantra from 2008, but both Trump and Vance remain misleading at best — until 2019, the United States produced less energy than it consumed and imported more than it exported. That year, exports first topped imports in a meaningful way, and the trend has continued through all four years of the Biden administration.

One of Vance’s final points, and perhaps his most accurate, was Harris’ failure to engage in a meaningful way with the press, as Trump has certainly done on numerous occasions.

“I happen to believe that if you want to be the American people’s president, you ought not be afraid of friendly American media, and that’s exactly what they are of course for Kamala Harris,” he said. “Think about this — how is she going to sit in a room with Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping?”

Vance doesn’t trust Harris to deal with dictators, but Walz certainly doesn’t trust Trump, either.

Minnesota governor and Democratic Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz speaks to a rain-soaked Asheville crowd on Sept. 17. Cory Vaillancourt photo

Walz told a large crowd outside Asheville’s Salvage Station on Sept. 17 that Trump’s debate performance against Harris, in which Trump was reluctant to say he wanted Ukraine to win its war against Russia, suggested he may be more closely aligned with Russia than with his own European allies.

“This guy admires Putin, he admires Kim Jong Un, he admires Xi Jinping,” Walz said, also mentioning Hungarian strongman Viktor Orbán. “Here’s the thing. He thinks those guys like him. Can you imagine if those four get together, when they talk about what a weak and what a sucker Trump is, to be played. You know they do it. Oh my God, he’s so easy. Just tell him his hair looks nice, and he’ll give you — just tell him he’s handsome and he’ll pull out of NATO.”

Walz continued to run down a long list of grievances with the former president’s tenure.

The Affordable Care Act, which Trump promised and attempted to dismantle through multiple means, survives, but Trump is now falsely taking credit for saving it. Tax cuts, enacted in 2017 and skewed toward the wealthy, will expire in 2025 without action, but preserving them will cost $400 billion  a year. The national debt, now at $35.7 trillion, increased at roughly double the rate under Trump as it has under Biden.

Largely silent on the Republicans’ biggest issue, immigration, Walz did call out Vance for what he characterized as “vicious, hurtful lies about immigrants.” 

Instead, Walz trained his focus on what many believe is one of the biggest issues for Democrats. Increasing Republican interference in personal healthcare decisions made possible by Trump’s judicial appointments pose a threat to individual freedoms, he said, co-opting a traditional Republican talking point.

“When [Republicans] talk about [freedom, they say] government should be free [to] invade your doctor’s office, make decisions for you. Invade your bedroom, tell you who should love. Invade your school library. And now Trump is trying to create this new government entity that will monitor all pregnancies to enforce their abortion ban,” Walz said, repeating a false claim he’s made before.

Walz mentioned not trusting Trump, Vance or North Carolina Republican gubernatorial nominee Mark Robinson with monitoring the reproductive health of women, singling out scorn for past comments Robinson made and calling him the worst person in the United States.

“If you search those 330 million people, you would not find a worse candidate than Mark Robinson,” Walz said. Although he probably didn’t know it at the time, two days later, CNN would break the news that Robinson had allegedly made a slew of tawdry comments on a pornographic website, referred to himself as a “black NAZI!” and pined for the return of slavery so he could purchase a few slaves of his own.

Robinson was noticeably absent from Vance’s rally the day after Walz’s — one day before the CNN story was published — in perhaps the first public sign that something scandalous was coming.

Vance and Walz will meet in person for a debate hosted by CBS in New York City at 9 p.m. Tuesday, Oct. 1. As of press time, it is believed to be the only debate scheduled by the two vice presidential candidates.