Sen. J.D. Vance (R–Ohio), Donald Trump's running mate, is sticking with the debunked story about Haitian immigrants who supposedly have been eating purloined pets in Springfield, Ohio. That tall tale provoked wide ridicule after Trump repeated it during his debate with Vice President Kamala Harris last week. Undaunted, Vance told CNN's Dana Bash on Sunday that he preferred "the firsthand account of my constituents who are telling me that this happened" to the denials from Springfield officials, who say there is no evidence to substantiate it.
Whether or not it is true that Haitians are dining on stolen cats and dogs, Vance said, the story has proven important in calling attention to the problems that Springfield is experiencing as a result of a migrant influx. "I've been trying to talk about the problems in Springfield for months," he told Bash. "The American media totally ignored this stuff until Donald Trump and I started talking about cat memes. 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."
