section_path: 2024 presidential election/Vice-presidential campaign
section_name: Vice-presidential campaign
paragraph_text: Vice-presidential campaign
  
  On January 31, 2023, Vance endorsed former president Donald Trump in the 2024 Republican Party presidential primaries. On July 15, 2024, the first day of the Republican National Convention, Trump announced on Truth Social that he had chosen Vance as his running mate. On July 17, the third day of the convention, Vance accepted the nomination to be Trump's running mate.
  
  Trump's two eldest sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, advocated for their father to choose Vance. Several media and industry figures are said to have lobbied for Vance to be on the presidential ticket, including Elon Musk, David O. Sacks, Tucker Carlson, and Peter Thiel, who first introduced Trump to Vance in 2021. The Heritage Foundation, which drafted Project 2025, privately advocated for Vance to be Trump's vice-presidential pick. Musk responded to Trump's vice-presidential pick hours after its announcement, saying the ticket "resounds with victory". David Sacks, a prominent GOP donor and Silicon Valley venture capitalist, wrote on Twitter: "This is who I want by Trump's side: an American patriot." In 2022, Sacks gave a super PAC supporting Vance's Senate campaign $900,000, and Peter Thiel added $15 million. It was initially reported that Elon Musk would contribute $45 million monthly to the Trump-Vance campaign, but Musk later said he planned to donate "much lower amounts".
  
  On May 15, 2024, Trump attended a $50,000 per head private fundraising dinner with Vance in Cincinnati. Guests included Chris Bortz and Republican fundraiser Nate Morris. Vance appeared at significant conservative political events and in June was described as a potential running mate for Trump. In July, a former friend of Vance's from Yale Law School exposed to the media communications between them and Vance from 2014 to 2017, with the friend alleging that Vance has "changed opinion on literally every imaginable issue that affects everyday Americans" in pursuit of "political power and wealth".
  
  In late July 2024, after President Joe Biden withdrew his candidacy for reelection and Vice President Kamala Harris became a presidential candidate, Vance said at a private fundraiser that the "bad news is that Kamala Harris does not have the same baggage as Joe Biden... Kamala Harris is obviously not struggling in the same ways that Joe Biden did"; a day later, Vance told the media: "I don't think the political calculus changes at all" whether Harris or Biden was the Democratic nominee. Following criticism of his past remarks and political positions, Vance said in an August 2024 interview that a vice president "doesn't really matter" and that "Kamala Harris has been a bad vice president". This came after Trump said that the "vice president, in terms of the election, does not have any impact". In late August, after the Trump campaign was embroiled in controversy for allegedly bringing cameras into a restricted area of Arlington National Cemetery during Trump's visit there, Vance first said that Harris "can go to hell" because "she wants to yell at Donald Trump because he showed up", and then said "Don't do this fake outrage thing". At the time of his comments, Harris had not publicly discussed the incident.
  
  In August 2024, Vance said that Trump "said that explicitly that he would" veto a national abortion ban. In September 2024, during his debate with Harris, Trump was asked about Vance's statement about the veto, and responded: "I didn't discuss it with JD... I think he was speaking for me—but I really didn't."
  
  In late September 2024, Vance spoke at a western Pennsylvania town hall event organized by Lance Wallnau, who has promoted election denialism and called Kamala Harris a "demon". In October 2024, Vance said he did not believe Trump lost the 2020 presidential election and that he believed "Big Tech rigged the election" through censorship.