Vice presidential nominees Tim Walz and JD Vance sparred over which party standard-bearer is best positioned to be commander-in-chief, looking for the upper hand in clashes over foreign policy, immigration, abortion and climate change in what is likely the final debate of the 2024 election.

Walz, the Democrat, opened with sharp criticism toward Donald Trump, noting that many of the former president’s own national security aides — and Vance himself — had previously questioned the Republican presidential candidate’s suitability for office.

Vance, for his part, repeatedly targeted Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris, suggesting she should have done more over the past four years to address chaos abroad and a economy that has struggled to emerge from the pandemic.

Walz appeared nervous at times, stumbling in particular during responses to tensions in the Middle East and past misstatements. Vance spoke more steadily and appeared more comfortable in the early stages — but also triggered the first muting of microphones, by interjecting to challenge the moderators over the legal status of Haitian immigrants in his own state.

The debate follows last month’s lone showdown between the party standard-bearers and marks the first time Minnesota Governor Walz, 60, and Ohio Senator Vance, 40, appeared onstage together.

The contest opened with a sharp exchange over Iran after Tehran fired about 200 ballistic missiles at Israel on Tuesday in reprisal for a dramatic series of attacks on Lebanon in recent days and the killing of Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah. The brief escalation threatened to trigger a fresh round of attacks as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to retaliate.

“It’s those that were closest to Donald Trump that understand how dangerous he is when the world is this dangerous,” Walz said at the forum hosted by CBS News in New York.

Vance diverted the conversation to talk about his own biography, looking to soften his image by saying that he had “extraordinary gratitude for this country.” But he defended his running mate.

“As much as Governor Walz just accused Donald Trump of being an agent of chaos, Donald Trump actually delivered stability in the world, and he did it by establishing effective deterrence,” Vance said.

Immigration

Vance attacked Harris on immigration, one of the Democratic presidential nominee’s biggest political vulnerabilities — and argued for Trump’s pledges to finish building the border wall and deport illegal migrants.

“We have a historic immigration crisis because Kamala Harris started and said that she wanted to undo all of Donald Trump’s border policies,” he said. “I’ve been to the southern border more than our ‘border czar,’ Kamala Harris, has been.”

Walz criticized Vance for stoking tensions in Springfield, Ohio, where the Republican ticket has promoted unfounded claims that Haitian migrants are eating people’s pets.

The Minnesota governor accused Republicans of “blaming migrants for everything” and criticized Trump for killing a bipartisan immigration bill that would have brought more resources to handle the border crisis and bolster border security. He noted that schools in the town had received bomb threats, forcing Ohio’s governor to send law enforcement to escort children.

Vance countered, saying that “the people that I am most worried about in Springfield, Ohio, are the American citizens who have had their lives destroyed by Kamala Harris’ open border.”

“You’ve got schools that overwhelmed, you’ve got hospitals that are overwhelmed, you’ve got housing that is totally unaffordable because we brought in millions of illegal immigrants to compete with Americans for scarce homes,” Vance said about Springfield.

The senator cast the settling of Haitians in Ohio, the vast majority of whom are in the US under legal status, as “facilitation of illegal immigration.”

Missteps and misstatements

Vance’s populist economic roots — which align him with Trump more than the traditional Republican party — came out in an exchange over whether to trust experts.

Walz criticized Trump for stoking doubt in experts, and Vance seized on that moment.

“Those same experts for 40 years said if we shipped our manufacturing base to China, they lied about that,” Vance said, criticizing overreliance on imports for goods like pharmaceuticals. “This has to stop, and we’re not going to stop it by listening to experts.”

Walz also stumbled when pressed over a previous claim that he was in Hong Kong during the 1989 pro-Democracy protests in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square — among past misstatements that Republicans have seized on to cast the governor as exaggerating details of his past.

Walz gave a meandering answer that also nodded to some of his other exaggerations.

“I’ve not been perfect and I’m a knucklehead at times,” he said.

Pressed by the moderators about his answer, Walz added: “All I said on this was as I got there that summer and misspoke on this.”

Final debate

Both vice presidential picks are Midwesterners who bring a populist worldview to an election where the state of the economy is a defining issue and where the parties are courting blue-collar voters in battleground states like Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania. And they faced similar challenges: rallying their side’s supporters while avoiding any misstep that could damage the candidates atop the ticket.

A September Bloomberg News/Morning Consult poll of swing states found Harris ahead of Trump by 50% to 47% among likely voters across the seven battlegrounds likely to determine the race — a close contest with five weeks until Election Day and early voting already underway in some states.

The candidates also debated climate change policies in the wake of Hurricane Helene, which has devastated states across the US southeast.

Vance repeatedly sidestepped questions about whether he believed climate change was real, saying that either way he wanted to reshore manufacturing and produce domestic energy because it was cleaner than energy production overseas.

“Kamala Harris’ policies actually led to more energy production in China, more manufacturing overseas,” Vance said.

Walz touted “massive investments” in electric vehicle technologies and solar manufacturing.

Abortion, IVF

Walz criticized Vance and Trump over the wave of restrictions to abortion in the wake of the US Supreme Court overturning Roe v. Wade’s federal protections, raising the cases of women who were denied access to the procedure — one after a failed pregnancy and another after being raped by her stepfather.

“Donald Trump put this all into motion. He bragged about how great it was that he put the judges in and overturned Roe v. Wade,” Walz said.

Vance responded by acknowledging the Republican party needs to do more at “earning the American people’s trust back on this issue, where they frankly just don’t trust us.”

“I think that’s one of the things that Donald Trump, and I are endeavoring to do. I want us as a Republican Party to be pro- family in the fullest sense of the word,” Vance said, expressing support for procedures like fertility treatments but saying abortion should be left up to the states.

Turning to gun control, Vance called for schools to have more protections, like stronger door locks, rather than restrictions on firearm ownership.

“The idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it just doesn’t fit with recent experience,” Vance said.

Walz countered that “there are reasonable things we can do to make a difference” without “infringing on your Second Amendment.”

But the governor also misspoke during the exchange, seemingly saying he had become friends with school shooters instead of the families of victims of school shootings.

“I sat in that office with those Sandy Hook parents. I’ve become friends with school shooters. I’ve seen it,” Walz said.

The two also sparred over high housing costs with Walz defending a proposal from Harris that would give downpayment assistance to some first-time homeowners and insisting it would not drive prices higher. And he pointed to efforts in Minnesota to invest in building more homes and reducing red tape.

Vance though highlighted immigration, saying it was contributing to rising housing costs.

Capitol attack

About 90 minutes into the debate, the topic turned to the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the US Capitol by supporters of Trump seeking to stop then-Vice President Mike Pence from allowing certification of President Joe Biden’s election victory.

“Mike Pence made the right decision,” Walz said, and he asked Vance directly if Trump had won or lost the 2020 election.

“I’m focused on the future,” Vance replied. The senator sought to shift the conversation to censorship, which he cast as a greater threat to democracy.

Walz cast the response as a “damning non-answer.”

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