(NewsNation) — People waited in the heat Tuesday to see Ohio Sen. JD Vance speak at a Nevada rally — his first public appearance in the battleground state since becoming former President Donald Trump’s 2024 running mate.
Vance spoke at Liberty High School in Henderson, Nevada. Nevada is often considered a purple state, where Democratic and Republican candidates for federal office receive similar amounts of support.
Attendees at Tuesday’s rally said they were excited about Vance as Trump’s vice presidential pick, and hopeful to turn the state “from purple to red.”
“He definitely adds value because I feel like he’s going to speak for us and for me, who’s an immigrant,” one woman told NewsNation. “I think he’s representative of the younger generation coming up as future politicians. He seems like a man of integrity. I loved his wife as well.”
Trump has seen success appealing to Nevada’s hospitality workers, who represent about one-fourth of the state’s taxpayers. The former president drew praise for floating the idea of not taxing tips.
President Joe Biden carried Nevada by 2.4% in the 2020 presidential election, even though the national popular vote had shifted left, NewsNation’s partners The Hill and Decision Desk HQ noted in a recent forecast. Current projections show a 50/50 split between Democrats and Republicans for the 2024 presidential election.
Democrats control both the state’s U.S. Senate seats and have majorities in both state legislative chambers. Democrats also fill all but one Congressional seat. Meanwhile, Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo flipped the governorship when he took office in 2023.
After his stop Tuesday in Henderson, Vance headed to Reno for a separate rally at the Reno-Sparks Convention Center.
Trump is also hitting the campaign trail with an expected visit Wednesday in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, followed by a scheduled joint appearance with Vance on Aug. 3 in Atlanta, Georgia.
Several world leaders denounced political violence and offered well wishes after the July 13 assassination attempt that injured Trump with a graze wound to the ear. One person was killed and at least two others were seriously injured.
Meanwhile, Vance has come under fire for comments he made during a resurfaced 2021 Fox News interview.
At the time, Vance told talk show host Tucker Carlson that the U.S. was being run “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”
The then-Senate candidate specifically named Vice President Kamala Harris, Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York as examples.
Vance now finds himself in direct competition with Harris, who is eyeing the Democratic nomination after Biden announced he would no longer seek reelection.
Some Republicans, who spoke to The Hill on the condition of anonymity, raised concerns about Vance’s foreign policy positions, lack of experience and inability to expand the Republican coalition beyond Trump’s base.
