Former President Donald Trump’s running mate, Sen. JD Vance, on Sunday expressed confidence in Georgia’s election security, a contrast with Trump’s recent attacks against Republican state officials Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger.
During an interview on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” Vance was pressed on how comfortable he is with the progress being made by the Republican National Committee and Republican-led states to ensure a fair election in November as Trump continues to cast doubt on the legitimacy of the 2020 election results.
Vance pointed to Georgia’s voter ID requirements, which he said makes the battleground state’s elections “much more secure.”
“I think that we’ve got some good court cases, some good legal changes going all across the country,” he said. “The RNC has been more aggressive about this in 2024 than they have been in 2020.”
“The basic principle here is every American citizen’s vote should count. But if you’re not an American citizen and you’re not casting a legal ballot, your vote shouldn’t count, right?” he added. “It’s sort of common sense that the Republican Party believes in.”
Vance has repeatedly echoed Trump’s baseless claims about a rigged 2020 election and has argued that lawmakers would have had legitimate reasons to fight the results. At the time, Trump and his allies filed a series of lawsuits in an effort to overturn the 2020 election results, but none succeeded due to a lack of evidence.
Ahead of the 2024 election, the Trump campaign and the RNC have pledged to enlist 100,000 volunteers and attorneys to monitor votes in battleground states.
In a post to his Truth Social platform on Saturday, Trump criticized Kemp and Raffensperger, both of whom fought against Trump’s efforts in 2020 to delegitimize the results of the presidential election. Trump wrote that Raffensperger should “do his job” and “make sure this election is not stolen,” while telling Kemp to “focus his efforts on fighting crime, not fighting Unity and the Republican party.”
“He should be seeking UNITY, not Retribution, especially against the man that got him the Nomination through Endorsement and, without whom, he could never have beaten Stacey Abrams,” Trump wrote, referring to Kemp’s Democratic rival in the 2018 and 2022 Georgia governor’s race.
In a phone call to Kemp weeks after he lost the 2020 election to Joe Biden, Trump attempted to pressure Kemp to call a special session of the state Legislature in an effort to overturn Biden’s narrow victory in the state.
On Jan. 2, 2021, Trump also called Raffensperger, a Republican, urging the top Georgia election official to “find” the votes to toss out Biden’s victory in the battleground state.
Kemp pushed back on Trump’s attacks in a post to X later Saturday, saying that he is focused on winning in November and “saving our country from Kamala Harris and the Democrats — not engaging in petty personal insults, attacking fellow Republicans, or dwelling on the past.”
“You should do the same, Mr. President, and leave my family out of it,” he wrote.
Raffensperger also refuted Trump’s attacks in another post to X saying that the state’s elections were “secure.”
“The winner here in November will reflect the will of the people. History has taught us this type of message doesn’t sell well here in Georgia, sir,” he wrote.
Trump and 18 co-defendants last year were charged with racketeering in connection with their efforts to overturn Trump’s 2020 election loss in Georgia. Trump has denied wrongdoing in the case. A Georgia appeals court has paused the case until at least October.
This article was originally published on NBCNews.com
