Remarks by Vice President Harris Before Air Force Two Departure | Joint Base Andrews, MD

Joint Base Andrews
Prince George’s County, Maryland

4:42 P.M. EDT

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Hi, guys.

Q    Hi, Madam Vice President.

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  So, you saw I — I released my medical records today. 

Q    (Inaudible.)

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I appreciate you.  (Laughs.)

So, today I released my medical records, as has, I believe, every candidate for president of the United States except Donald Trump in this election cycle.  And it’s just a further example of his lack of transparency — that on top of his unwillingness to debate again, his unwillingness to do an interview with “60 Minutes,” which, again, is part of the norm of what anyone running for president of the United States does. 

And I think that it’s obvious that his team, at least, does not want the American people to see everything about who he is.  And you put that on top of even the most recent reports of General Milley, one of the people who worked the closest with Donald Trump, referring to him as being “unstable.”  And it is clear to me that he and his team do not want the American people to really see what it is that he is doing and whether or not he actually is fit to do the job of being president of the United States.  So —

Q    And are — you obviously don’t have insight into what his health is, but from watching him, do you think he’s fit for office?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I will not give you a medical analysis of his fitness.  But on every other le- — level, when it comes to what we should expect in a president of the United States around having the ability to actually exercise good judgment, both as commander in chief and as the leader of this great country, we know that he does not have the ability to do the job.  He is unfit for office. 

He talks at his rallies about fictional characters.  He constantly is in a state of grievance about himself.  He has no plans for the American people.  And then he just makes things up on a full-time basis with the intention to make the people afraid, to make people fear that which they should not be afraid of.  But he does it in a way that he thinks, I think, will compel them to believe that somehow he is the savior, when, in fact, he is quite unfit to do the job.

Q    For all the discussion that he had about President Biden’s mental acuity, in particular, what do you think about President Trump’s acu- — mental acuity and whether it’s declined since, say, his 2016 campaign?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I invite the public to watch his rallies and be the decision-maker on his acuity, and you will see in his rallies how he goes off on tangents, how he is not focused on the needs of the American people with solutions to the issues that concern them the most.

Q    Can you give us a sense of what you want to do in North Carolina this weekend?  And also, just broadly, the race is very tight still.

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Yeah.  Yeah.

Q    Some Democrats are getting nervous and anxious.  What’s your message to them?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  So, I am looking very forward to returning to North Carolina.  I’ve been spending a lot of time there, both during this el- — election cycle but as vice president and even before. 

I look forward to talking with the people of North Carolina on a number of levels, first and foremost to see how they’re doing in the wake of the hurricane but also to talk with folks about how they are thinking about the election and what they need. 

I’m going to be having some discussions with voters and folks who are on the ground there and listening to them but also talking about my plan for what we’re going to do to create an opportunity economy, what we’re going to do to bring down the price of groceries, what we’re going to do to put investments in small businesses and in the industries of the future, what we are doing to invest in the American family through an expansion of the Child Tax Credit. 

That’s what I’ll be talking with them about on the ground. 

Q    And Democratic fear —

(Cross-talk.)

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I think — but let —

Q    (Inaudible.)

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Here, let me just finish — yeah. 

Listen, this is a — there’s no question — I say it in my rallies — this is a tight race.  It is a margin-of-error race.  And that’s why I’m out here and will continue, for the next 24 days, to be traveling around our country, talking with folks about the issues that matter most to them, and offering them what I believe to be solutions to the challenges that they are facing. 

I’m going to be talking with them continuously about, for example, how some of the most respected economists in the country — whether they be the 16 Nobel Prize laureates or Goldman Sachs — have referred to my economic policy as one that would strengthen America’s economy, as compared to Donald Trump’s policies, which would weaken America’s economy. 

I will be talking about the fact that I have the support of Republicans who worked with both presidents Bush, Mitt Romney, John McCain, and Donald Trump, who are supporting my candidacy because they believe that it is important to put country above party when we are looking at the other side of this equation, at a Donald Trump who has been clear that he would terminate the Constitution of the United States and be a dictator on day one. 

So, this is a tight race, but the choice is clear.  The voters have a choice between what we are offering, which is to look to the future of America and invest in the American people or a Donald Trump, who is constantly trying to take us backwards. 

Thank you all.

END                 4:48 P.M. EDT