JD Vance speaks 1-on-1 about lowering grocery bills, eliminating illegal immigration and lowering cost of child care

Thank you for taking the time to speak with us

Likewise

Thank you

Let's first talk about the economy

I know this is a topic

You're going to be speaking with supporters about today

Government data shows that inflation is cooling

Gas prices have dropped 17% in the last year

And the fed now saying that it's going to be

cutting interest rates by half a point

You continue to talk about the high price of grocery

bills

How specifically can you lower people's grocery bills Yes

So first of all we have to remember that prices

are still way high from what they were when Donald

Trump was president grocery prices are about 25% higher

Gasoline prices are about 45% higher

We could have such a better economy for working families

if we actually had smarter policies

And as much as Kamala Harris runs away from a

record but she did cast the deciding vote for the

Inflation Reduction Act

She has pursued a lot of policies that have increased

the cost of energy and when you increase the cost

of energy increase the cost of everything else

So a lot of this is simply about better leadership

We could do so much better

We just have to get a better person in the

White House

And that's of course why I'm here trying to get

people to elect Donald J Trump

Now specifically now that we're in this mess

What can we do on day one I think number

one is you have to unleash American energy

There's a lot of permitting reform that we could do

a lot of regulatory reform that we could do to

promote the construction of drills of refineries and importantly of

pipelines so that we can lower the cost of American

energy

Now you do that you both increase a lot of

manufacturing that lowers the cost of manufactured goods but it

also lowers the cost of everything else

I think a truck driver if he's paying 30 percent

less for gas then you're going to be paying less

for the groceries that are delivered at the grocery store

If he's paying 30 percent less for gas then lumber

is going to get cheaper which means that housing is

going to get cheaper

So there's a lot that we can do to lower

energy costs and that will benefit everybody in the long

run and that will impact people's grocery bills

Oh absolutely

In fact one of the biggest drivers of increased grocery

costs is actually delivery costs costs and all of that

stuff goes down

Another real driver of food costs in this country is

our farmers are really stressed out because when you raise

energy costs you make it less profitable to operate a

farm

So if we really unleash American energy that's the most

important thing that we can do to lower costs but

also build a lot more in this country

We are the proudest country in the world when it

comes to making things and building things

But we've done way too little building of roads and

bridges and airports of manufacturing

We got to get back to building things in this

country again that will lower cost but it also create

a lot of good jobs

Just getting to you mentioned farmers there's a huge agricultural

business here

Of course what do you say to the farmers who

rely on immigrant workers to perform their jobs Who may

be a bit nervous about this Strong some might say

exclusionary immigrant rhetoric that you and President Trump

I think it's exclusionary rhetoric

I think what we're talking about is you got to

the illegal immigration

I talked to farmers in my home state of Ohio

and all across the country

Farmers are really behind President Trump's agenda because they don't

want mass illegal immigration

They want us to control our border and they recognize

that it actually hurts a lot of their laborers when

you have uncontrolled unchecked illegal immigration

I mean one thing about farming is for the first

time in our history 2023 we actually imported more food

than we export

Another way of putting that is that we ate more

food than we grew here in the United States of

America

That's a for our farmers

That's really a catastrophe for our country

If you talk about relying on foreign countries for the

food that our Children eat that is going to lead

to declining prosperity and the lack of self reliance

We want our country to be able to make the

things that we need that starts most importantly with food

and that's another thing that's gotten worse

Thanks to Kamala Harris Senator one of the biggest hurdles

that families across North Carolina face is the cost of

child care

Of course what is your plan to make child care

more affordable for people Our big idea here is that

you just have to increase choice for young American families

if you think about there's the classic day care model

which of course a lot of families rely on that

justifiably

So but that maybe isn't the right solution for every

American family

If you for example want to have your grandparents or

your aunts and uncles help out

There's no federal support for those families

If you as a mom or dad would like to

take a couple of years off and stay at home

with the kids there's no federal support for those families

So we think that we take all of this federal

money that's being spent on child care and actually diversify

it a little bit open it up to people regardless

of what family model they choose that will lower pressure

on the day care centers

It will also give Americans more choices and lower costs

So just to be clear you want to take money

away from the child care centers and help distribute that

to families

No no no not at all

You want to increase the pot of money that's available

but you want to make it so that people can

use it however they want to

So there are a couple of programs a couple of

massive one is called the Community Development Block grant

A lot of those resources only go into one kind

of child care model

But let's say for example you want to get together

with your neighbors and try to make a child care

situation work in that way or let's say you want

to have your church provide child care

There's no money or very little money available to families

that want to choose those options

But if you expand those options you're actually not just

going to make families better off you're going to lower

the cost

Senator

Thank you

Appreciate it