‘Disgraceful’: Vance Responds to Madison Square Garden Rally Attacks

HOLLAND, Mich.—Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance said it is “disgraceful” that the Harris-Walz campaign branded Donald Trump and his supporters Nazis after Sunday’s Madison Square Garden rally.

“I don’t care that Kamala Harris and Tim Walz attacked me, and I don’t care that they criticize us for this policy or that policy,” Vance said. “But I think it is disgraceful for a person who wants to lead this great nation to call half of her fellow citizens Nazis because she disagrees with their policy.”

Vance spoke at a rally outside conservative stronghold Holland, Michigan, on Tuesday afternoon, a week before Election Day. The West Michigan counties of Allegan, where the rally took place, and nearby Ottawa are typical Republican strongholds. 

He took issue with Harris likening Trump to Hitler and calling him a “fascist.”

Former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Trump’s campaign rally at Madison Square Garden in New York was similar to the infamous February 1939 Nazi rally at the arena.

Vance said the “Kamala Harris strategy” is to call her opponents Nazis.

“Here’s what Kamala Harris and her team have decided to do over the last couple of days,” he said. “They’ve decided to compare Donald Trump’s rally in Madison Square Garden to a literal Nazi rally almost 100 years ago in this country, even though I believe Bill Clinton, just a few short years ago, accepted the Democratic nomination in Madison Square Garden. When a bunch of people who just want to close down the border and get back to affordable prices gather to celebrate the future of our country, they called us literal Nazis.”

“Kamala Harris doesn’t know that at Madison Square Garden that night, there was a 94-year-old Holocaust survivor who was about as MAGA as it gets, and he was there to support Donald J. Trump,” Vance said to a cheering crowd. “How dare Kamala Harris call that brave man a Nazi!”

“How dare she attack the citizens of her own country for daring to tell her that she’s done a bad job!” Vance continued. “How dare she call her citizens, her fellow citizens, racist for wanting to secure the southern border! How dare she call us fascists for wanting more affordable groceries for our children!”

Vance called Harris the “face of disloyalty.”

“If you were to look at the face of disloyalty to the United States of America, look in the mirror,” he said as if he were speaking to her. “Don’t attack your fellow citizens.”

Vance urged supporters not to “take the bait” from Harris.

“I asked for this. Donald J. Trump, he asked for this,” he said. “But our fellow citizens, whatever they’re ultimately going to vote for, we love our fellow citizens, and we want Trump to be president, so that they can have a better life.”