THE STORY
Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance on Sunday admitted he is willing “to create stories” to attract media attention amid the backlash over the conspiracy theory of pets being eaten in a town in his home state of Ohio by Haitian migrants.
Speaking on CNN’s State of the Union, he was pressed by Dana Bash about the story that has caused bomb threats to Springfield’s City Hall and schools be evacuated. Bash pointed out city officials have refuted the claims and she asked if the Ohio senator made up the claims.
“If I have to create stories so that the American media actually pays attention to the suffering of the American people, then that’s what I’m going to do,” Vance said.
Bash pressed Vance on the remark of “creating stories”, asking him to be clear. Vance doubled down.
“Dana, it comes from first-hand accounts of my constituents,” Vance said. “I say that we’re ‘creating a story,’ meaning we’re creating the American media focusing on it.”
GOING IN DEPTH
Several city officials, including Springfield’s mayor, city manager, police chief, and Ohio Republican Gov. Mike DeWine have all said that there haven’t been any credible reports of immigrants taking or eating local pets.
“There’s a lot of garbage on the internet and this is a piece of garbage that was simply not true, there’s no evidence of this at all,” DeWine told ABC News on Sunday.
“Let me tell you what we do know: what we know is that the Haitians that are in Springfield are legal. They came to Springfield to work,” he added.
Transportation Secretary, Pete Buttigieg, quickly responded to Vance’s stunning admission with a post on X, calling his comments “remarkable”.
“Remarkable confession by JD Vance when he said he will ‘create stories’ (that is, lie) to redirect the media,” Buttigieg wrote on X. “All this to change the subject away from abortion rights, manufacturing jobs, taxation of the rich, and the other things clearly at stake in this election.”
