July 28, 2024, presidential campaign news

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Republican vice presidential candidate Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, speaks at a campaign rally in Middletown, Ohio on July 22.

GOP vice presidential nominee JD Vance on Sunday said his comments about “childless cat ladies” were a “quip” and not a criticism of people without children.

“But there are a whole host of people who don’t have children for a whole host of reasons, and they certainly are great people who can participate fully in the life of this country, and that’s not what I said,” the Ohio senator told Fox News’ Trey Gowdy.

Vance said in 2021 that the US was being run by “a bunch of childless cat ladies.” He said: “And it’s just a basic fact — you look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) — the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children. And how does it make any sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?”

But on Sunday night, Vance said, “This is not a criticism and was never criticism, Trey, of everybody without children,” accusing Democrats of taking his comments “out of context.”

What he was attempting to convey, Vance said, was that it’s “important for us to be pro-family as a country.”

“Of course, for a whole host of reasons, it’s not going to work out for some people. We should pray for those people and of course have sympathy for them. I still think that means we should be pro-family, generally speaking, as a party,” he argued.

With 100 days to go until the election, former President Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris spent Sunday largely allowing their political allies to spread their messages after the two candidates hit the campaign trail the day earlier.

Here’s what both candidates’ teams were up to Sunday:

Harris announces fundraising haul: The vice president’s campaign said in a memo that it has raised $200 million since President Joe Biden dropped out of the race and endorsed her, with 66% of those donations coming from first-time donors.

Trump and Harris take a breather: Trump, the Republican nominee for president, and Harris, the presumptive Democratic nominee, both held off from hosting large campaign events after they each hit the trail Saturday to fundraise and rally potential voters.

Harris and allies call Republicans “weird”: Minnesota Democratic Gov. Tim Walz, seen as a contender to be Harris’ running mate, told CNN’s Jake Tapper on “State of the Union” that he’s been labeling Trump and his running mate, JD Vance, “weird” in an attempt to “ratchet down some of … the scariness” he sees in the campaign’s policy proposals. It’s a motif other Democrats have latched on to, with Harris saying Saturday that some of what Trump and Vance are saying is “just plain weird.”

Running mate hopefuls back Harris: Democratic officials who have been floated as possible vice presidential picks took the opportunity to defend the vice president on morning news programs and campaign events. Walz, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker all went on the attack for Harris as the vice president vets potential running mates.

Vance hits a diner: Trump’s running mate, meanwhile, passed through a diner in Waite Park, Minnesota, as the Ohio senator seeks to sway voters in the Midwestern battleground away from Harris. Vance argued that voters will turn on the vice president’s liberal record and will “turn Minnesota red.”