JD Vance blasts Democrats for throwing Biden 'overboard' at hometown rally

Three years ago, JD Vance launched his political career at a steel tubing manufacturer in his southwest Ohio hometown.

He returned to Middletown again Monday, 18 months into his first Senate term, to mark a new milestone: Becoming Donald Trump's running mate.

Vance's first solo appearance came days after he secured the vice-presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention, vaulting the junior Ohio senator into the national spotlight. He joined the former president in Michigan over the weekend for Trump's first rally since he survived an assassination attempt in Pennsylvania.

More: Ohio Sen. George Lang apologizes for 'divisive' civil war comment made at JD Vance rally

The Middletown event also came less than 24 hours after President Joe Biden dropped out of the presidential race and endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris − a process Vance decried as "an insult to voters."

"The idea of selecting the Democrat Party’s nominee because George Soros and Barack Obama and a couple of elite Democrats got in a smoke-filled room and decided to throw Joe Biden overboard, that is not how it works," Vance said. "That is a threat to democracy, not the Republican Party, which is fighting for democracy every single day."

Harris’ campaign criticized Vance and Trump after a Republican state senator who spoke Monday said there could be a civil war to “save the country” if Republicans lose in November. The senator, George Lang of West Chester, apologized after the event.

“Donald Trump and JD Vance are running a campaign openly sowing hatred and promising revenge against their political opponent,” Harris spokesperson Ammar Moussa said. “It’s a feature, not a bug, of their campaign and message to the American people.”

Speaking to supporters at Middletown High School, Vance credited people there for guiding him from a poor home uprooted by addiction to the vice-presidential nomination. He joked about half the audience being distant cousins and said he would ask Secret Service to take him to a local pastry shop. His sister and mother, who has been sober for 10 years, were among those in attendance .

The senator's childhood was the subject of his best-selling memoir, "Hillbilly Elegy," and Trump campaign officials hope his backstory will speak to voters in key Rust Belt states.

"When I got to know JD and I read his book, it resonated with a lot of people like me," U.S. Rep. Warren Davidson, R-Troy, said. "My dad's dad was a coal miner and he died of black lung when he was in high school. They came up in the 50s much like JD's family did for jobs on the west side of Ohio. It resonates with a lot of people."

But Vance's book frustrated many Appalachians. While he blamed some of Middletown's troubles on shuttered factories and drugs, he also accused his neighbors of failing to take responsibility for their lives and careers. Critics believe he misrepresented the region and offered shallow answers to pundits trying to understand Trump's rise in 2016.

Plus, Middletown is not part of Appalachia. Vance visited family in Jackson, Kentucky, as a child but largely grew up in Ohio.

"The nerve that he has to call the people of Kentucky, of Eastern Kentucky, 'lazy,'" said Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear, who's been floated as a possible running mate for Harris. "Listen, these are the hardworking coal miners that powered the Industrial Revolution, that created the strongest middle class the world has ever seen, that powered us through two world wars. We should be thanking them."

Vance hammers populist message in hometown

A Vance spokesperson said the senator earned all of his accomplishments and panned Beshear as someone who "grew up with a silver spoon in his mouth." And Vance's roots were a central theme of Monday's rally.

"We really have been forgotten in Middletown, Ohio," Vance said. "They think that we're backwards. They think that we're bad people. They think that we don't know how to do anything and we do, ladies and gentlemen. This is where things are made. This is the source of America's greatness."

Echoing his RNC speech last week, Vance emphasized a populist message that Republicans hope will drive out voters in Pennsylvania, Michigan and other battleground states. He advocated for domestic energy production and said U.S. trade policy eroded manufacturing jobs to the detriment of communities like Middletown.

Vance also touted other GOP campaign priorities, including voter ID requirements and reforming − or potentially eliminating − the U.S. Department of Education.

"We're going fight for every single worker in this country," Vance said. "If you work hard and play by the rules, you ought to be able to put a good dinner on the table and send your kids to whatever vacation and whatever school you want to. Work hard and play by the rules, you get a good life, it's that simple."

While Vance's primary mission is to win over Rust Belt voters, he also showcased his ability to serve as attack dog for the Trump campaign − often with a heavy dose of snark. He suggested Democrats would call him racist for drinking Diet Mountain Dew and questioned who's "calling the shots" in the White House. He said he's "kind of pissed off" that Trump may be the one debating Harris instead of him.

But Vance also used his speech Monday to leverage the uncertainty about Democrats' nominee for president.

"My message to Democrats who are disgusted by this process, disgusted by how anti-Democratic it is, you are welcome in the Republican Party," he said.

Cincinnati Enquirer reporter Victoria Moorwood contributed.

Haley BeMiller is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

This article originally appeared on Cincinnati Enquirer: JD Vance blasts Democrats for throwing Biden 'overboard' at hometown rally