Remarks by Vice President Harris in Press Gaggle in Moon Township, PA

Primanti Bros. Restaurant and Bar
Moon Township, Pennsylvania

6:26 P.M. EDT

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Okay.  Hi, guys.

     Q    Madam Vice President.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Hi.  Hi.  What you got?

     Q    Can you (inaudible) —

     AIDE:  Go ahead.  Right here.  Go ahead.

     Q    Hi.  Thank you.  Could you tell us how you’re preparing for your speech on Thursday night?

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Yeah, it’s almost done.  I mean, I’m — there’s some little tweaks, and I’m going to, you know, work on it, probably starting tomorrow, for the next couple of days.  But it’s coming along.  I feel good about it. 

I mean, essentially, it’s much of what you’ve probably heard me talk about before in terms of just what I believe to be the promise of America and the fact that we’re all in this and
there’s obviously a lot at stake, but there’s also a lot to feel good about in terms of the future of our country.

So, there will be a lot that is about what I believe is a way forward — a new way forward and bringing everyone along in that.

(Cross-talk.)

AIDE:  Right here, ma’am.

Q    Madam Vice President, you unveiled your — some economic policies last week.

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Yeah.

Q    Can you explain how you’re going to pay for those?  And can you give us a sense of what other policies you want to unveil going forward?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Sure.  Well, I mean, you just look at it in terms of what we are talking about, for example, around children and the Child Tax Credit and extending the EITC that — it’s — at $6,000 for the first year of a — a child’s life.  The return on that investment in terms of what that will do and what it will pay for will be tremendous. 

We’ve seen it when we did it in the first year of our administration: reduced — we reduced child poverty by over 50 percent.  So, that’s a lot of the work. 

And then what we’re doing in terms of the tax credits — we know that there’s a great return on that investment.  When we increase homeownership in America, what that means in terms of increasing the tax base — not to mention property tax base — what that does to fund schools.  Again, return on investment. 

I think it’s a mistake for any person who talks about public policy to not critically evaluate how you measure the return on the investment.  When you are strengthening neighborhoods, strengthening communities, and, in particular, the economy of those communities and investing in a broad-based economy, everybody benefits, and it pays for itself in that way.

Q    Madam Vice President —

Q    Madam Vice President, CBS News has a new poll, shows that you’re three points up nationally.  What’s your response to this?  Do you still consider yourself the underdog here?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I very much consider us the underdog.  We have a lot of work to do to earn the vote of the American people.  That’s why we’re on this bus tour today.  And we’re going to be traveling this country, as we’ve been, and talking with folks, listening to folks, and hopefully earning their votes over the next 79 days.

Q    This is your second time in —

     AIDE:  Darlene, one more.  Last one, Darlene.

Q    — Pennsylvania since you became the Democratic nominee.  Do you feel like you have ground to make up here?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I feel like we need to earn everyone’s vote.  And that means being on the road; being in communities where people are, where they live — whether it be a high school football team and being there at their public school while they’re there at practice and talking to their coaches; whether it means going to the local fire station and talking with our incredible firefighters about what they need and what they have a right to expect, such as that we are going to pay attention to how they give up so much to keep communities safe, what they do to preserve what we want in terms of a quality of life — and we need to give it back to them in terms of better equipment — and the work they do every day. 

So, I’m going to be out here with Tim, with the second gentleman, with Mrs. Walz, and we’re going to be working on earning every vote between now —

     Q    Do —

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  — and November. 

Q    Sorry.  Do you think —

AIDE:  Darlene, last question.

Q    Do you think Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu is ready to — to agree to a ceasefire deal?

THE VICE PRESIDENT:  I will not speak for him, but I will tell you that these conversations are ongoing and we are not giving up.  And we are going to continue to work very hard on this.  We got to get a ceasefire, and we got to get those hostages out.

Okay.

END                 6:30 P.M. EDT

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