JD Vance makes campaign stop in Glendale, set to tour border on Thursday

GLENDALE, AZ (AZFamily) — Republican Vice Presidential Nominee JD Vance appeared to a crowd of supporters Wednesday night as part of a campaign stop in Glendale at Arizona Christian University Event Center.

He spoke for about 30 minutes and right off the bat, he started with the attacks on President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris.

Vance said the Biden-Harris Administration had a disastrous record on the border.

He also talked about what is at stake in America.

“Kamala Harris is such a disaster that the dreams we have for our country and our families, they are on the ballot in November,” Vance told the crowd. “And this is why we’ve got to elect Donald J. Trump as president of the United States. We’ve got to do everything we can to get President Trump over that finish line.”

Earlier in the day, some people waited for hours in the heat to get into the event center.

The Glendale Fire Department said it responded to “several calls” about heat-related issues.

The rally happened just days before presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris is scheduled to appear in Arizona with her yet-to-be-named running mate.

Vance is scheduled to tour the border in Cochise County on Thursday to contrast himself with Harris, who Republicans have pinned as Biden’s border czar.

Harris has only visited the southern border once, in early 2021, when she toured U.S. Border Patrol facilities in El Paso, Texas.

House Republicans and some vulnerable Democrats voted earlier this month to rebuke Harris over the administration’s border policies.

Vance, the 39-year-old U.S. senator from Ohio, was born and raised in Middletown, Ohio.

He joined the Marines, served in Iraq, and later earned degrees from Ohio State University and Yale Law School. He also worked as a venture capitalist in Silicon Valley.

Vance made a name for himself with his memoir, the 2016 bestseller “Hillbilly Elegy,” which was published as Trump was first running for president.

After Donald Trump won the 2016 election, Vance returned to his native Ohio and set up an anti-opioid charity.

He also took to the lecture circuit and was a favored guest at Republican Lincoln Day dinners where his personal story — including the hardship Vance endured because of his mother’s drug addiction — resonated.

Vance’s appearances were opportunities to sell his ideas for fixing the country and helped lay the groundwork for entering politics in 2021 when he sought the Senate seat vacated by Republican Rob Portman, who retired.

Trump then endorsed Vance, and he went on to win a crowded Republican primary and the general election.

Associated Press writers Jill Colvin in Milwaukee and Mark Sherman in Washington contributed to this report.

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