VERIFYING claims from Trump VP pick JD Vance’s RNC speech

Trump is expected to give his keynote address on Thursday night to formally accept the GOP nomination for president.

VERIFY fact-checked these claims from Vance’s speech.

THE CLAIM

Vance claimed President Joe Biden supported NAFTA and the invasion of Iraq. He claimed Trump opposed these policies, saying that “a real estate developer from New York City by the name of Donald J. Trump was right on all of these issues.” 

THE SOURCES

THE ANSWER   

It’s true that Biden supported these policies while he was a senator, as Vance claimed. He voted yes on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), which created a free-trade zone between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, and on the authorization for use of military force that became the legal basis for the Iraq War.

But Vance’s claim that Trump opposed these policies is misleading. 

Trump is on the record as one of the most prominent opponents of NAFTA at the time it was proposed. But he didn’t voice outright opposition for the Iraq War. 

At the start of the war in 2003, Trump waffled, calling the war a “tremendous success” in one case and later saying it was “a mess.”

By 2004, Trump said he was firmly opposed to the Iraq War. 

THE CLAIM

"[Worker wages] stagnated for pretty much my entire life until President Donald J. Trump came along. Workers wages went through the roof."

THE SOURCES

THE ANSWER

But this claim needs context because the large increase in real wages under Trump was due in part to low-wage workers being laid-off disproportionately during the COVID-19 pandemic, as the analysis notes. 

Real wages increased 7% during Trump’s first four years in office, the analysis, which uses data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), shows. Under former President Barack Obama, Trump’s predecessor, wages declined by 0.8% before growing in his second term to 3.2% above their level when he was inaugurated in January 2009, according to the analysis. 

Economist Josh Bivens of the liberal Economic Policy Institute also told Wisconsin Watch that the 7% figure is the highest for any single presidential term since former President Richard Nixon. But he called the increase under Trump “artificial” because fewer low-wage workers were employed, which drove up the average.

THE CLAIM

“China and the cartels sent fentanyl across the border.”

THE SOURCES

THE ANSWER

China and Mexican drug cartels both play a significant role in fentanyl coming into the United States, as Vance claimed.

Two Mexican drug cartels – the Sinaloa and Jalisco Cartels – are “responsible for the influx of fentanyl into the United States” and they work with companies based in China to get their raw materials, DEA Administrator Anne Milgram said in June 2023. 

Nearly all fentanyl precursors are manufactured and shipped from China, Milgram said.