United States vice presidential candidates JD Vance and Tim Walz met on Tuesday night in their first and potentially only debate ahead of the November election.Vance, an Ohio senator, is Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump’s running mate, while Walz, the governor of Minnesota, is Vice President Kamala Harris’s VP pick on the Democratic Party ticket.
The debate, hosted by CBS News, was dominated by heavy policy discussions, and was largely cordial. That was a striking change from the September 10 debate between Harris and former President Trump, a matchup that often devolved into personal attacks. Vance and Walz acknowledged occasional agreement with each other on policy points and respectfully addressed one another throughout the debate.
However, during the debate, they exchanged various accusations. Here, we fact-check the candidates’ claims.
Iran
Vance: “Iran, which launched this attack (on Israel), has received over $100bn and unfrozen assets, thanks to the Kamala Harris administration.”
False.
Under President Barack Obama, Iran did take possession of $100bn in unfrozen assets after the signing of the Iran nuclear deal, which Trump later overturned. But Harris was not involved in the Obama administration.
Something that occurred on Biden and Harris’s watch was a hostage release agreement with Iran that was supposed to free up $6bn in frozen Iranian assets. There is no evidence that any of the $6bn reached Iran.
In August 2023, the US announced an agreement with Iran to secure the freedom of five US citizens who had been detained in the country in exchange for allowing Iran to access $6bn of its own funds that had been frozen in South Korean banks.
The money consisted of Iranian oil revenu …
