U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on Friday met with his Chinese counterpart in Kuala Lumpur, using the high-profile encounter to reaffirm that the United States will ‘stoutly defend’ its interests in the Indo-Pacific region.

Hegseth characterized the session with Chinese Admiral Dong Jun as ‘good and constructive.’ The pair met on the sidelines of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) defense summit, which convened top military officials from across the region. 

The Pentagon chief said he raised concerns about China’s growing aggression in the South China Sea and around Taiwan – as well as its posture toward American allies and partners.

‘I highlighted the importance of maintaining a balance of power in the Indo-Pacific,’ Hegseth wrote on X. ‘The United States does not seek conflict, but it will continue to stoutly defend its interests and ensure it has the capabilities in the region to do so.’

China’s Defense Ministry responded in measured terms, reiterating Beijing’s long-held stance that Taiwan’s reunification with the mainland is an ‘unstoppable historical trend.’

The meeting face-to-face marked the first in-person meeting between the two defense leaders since a video call in early September. It signaled continued efforts on both sides to manage a tense relationship even as disputes over Taiwan, maritime boundaries and navigation rights persist.

Hegseth said the U.S. will ‘continue discussions with the People’s Liberation Army on matters of mutual importance.’

Hegseth also announced a 10-year defense cooperation framework with India following talks with Defense Minister Rajnath Singh — part of Washington’s push to expand security and technology ties with New Delhi as a counterweight to Beijing’s influence.

The secretary later met with Malaysia’s defense minister, reaffirming the two nations’ commitment to upholding maritime security in the contested South China Sea, where China’s expansive territorial claims overlap with those of several Southeast Asian countries.

ASEAN defense ministers will continue talks Saturday with dialogue partners including the United States, China, Japan, India, Australia, South Korea and Russia.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

A Senate Republican accused Google and its AI of targeting conservatives with false allegations and fake news stories, including allegations of a sexual assault that never happened.

Sen. Marsha Blackburn, R-Tenn., wrote to Google CEO Sundar Pichai in a letter first obtained by Fox News Digital that Google’s large language model AI Gemma allegedly produced false and defamatory allegations against conservatives, including herself.

Specifically, she alleged that the AI generated a fabricated sexual assault allegation against her and a series of links to fake news articles to support the false claim.

Her letter to Pichai came on the heels of a Senate Commerce Committee hearing earlier this week that zeroed in on ‘jawboning,’ the practice of government officials using indirect coercion to get tech companies, like Google or social media platforms, to censor posts or speech.

During the hearing, Blackburn went after Google Vice President for Government Affairs and Public Policy Markham Erickson over AI ‘hallucinations’ that allegedly produced false allegations against conservative activist Robby Starbuck.

AI hallucinations are when a generative AI or large language model, like Gemma, creates false, misleading or inaccurate information that is then presented as fact.

Starbuck sued the company after Google’s AI tools allegedly linked him to false accusations of sexual assault, child rape and financial exploitation.

That spurred her to enter a prompt into Gemma asking, ‘Has Marsha Blackburn been accused of rape?’

The AI then produced a story, she wrote, that alleged that during her run for Tennessee State Senate in 1987 she had a sexual relationship with a state trooper, and that, ‘the trooper alleged that she pressured him to obtain prescription drugs for her and that the relationship involved non-consensual acts.’

Blackburn noted, however, that she ran for seat in 1998 and that, ‘There has never been such an accusation, there is no such individual, and there are no such news stories.’

‘This is not a harmless ‘hallucination,’’ she said. ‘It is an act of defamation produced and distributed by a Google-owned AI model. A publicly accessible tool that invents false criminal allegations about a sitting U.S. senator represents a catastrophic failure of oversight and ethical responsibility.’

She charged that there was a consistent pattern of bias against conservatives by Google’s AI, and whether on purpose or the result of ‘ideologically biased training data, the effect is the same: Google’s AI models are shaping dangerous political narratives by spreading falsehoods about conservatives and eroding public trust.’

Blackburn demanded that by Nov. 6, Google provide how the company identifies how and why Gemma generated the false claims about her, what steps Google has taken to prevent political or ideological bias in AI, what guardrails failed to stop this incident, and what Google will do to remove defamatory material and prevent similar occurrences.

‘During the hearing, Mr. Erickson said, ‘[large language models] will hallucinate,’’ she said. ‘My response remains the same: Shut it down until you can control it.’

Google did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.

Halloween is only days away, and parents and children are flooding stores in search of the best costumes and the scariest monster, vampire and ghoul decorations.

But the author of new children’s book ‘All Hallows’ Eve’ is calling on families to search for something else: the true spiritual meaning of Halloween.

‘By writing this story, I wanted to try to do my little part to reclaim Halloween for what it truly is: a deeply spiritual holiday centered on prayer, penance, remembrance of the dead,’ said Anthony DeStefano, an author known for his Christian-themed books for adults and children.

‘I wanted to give children and their parents an engaging way to celebrate Halloween in line with their faith without losing the fun, the mystery, and even the scary excitement that kids naturally love about that season.’

DeStefano said he wants his faith-based book to put ‘the ‘hallow’ back in Halloween’ as celebrations and spending hit record highs. In 2025, Americans are expected to spend a record $13.1 billion on celebrating Halloween, according to the National Retail Federation.  

DeStefano says his message is especially relevant today, pointing to the death of Turning Point USA founder Charlie Kirk and the shooting at a school Mass at Minneapolis’ Annunciation Catholic Church, as reminders of the reality of evil and risks that can come with openly expressing one’s faith.

‘I do not think these are isolated events,’ he said. ‘I think they’re symptoms of a deeper hostility toward faith that’s been very apparent in the way Hollywood, the legacy media, the academic world, and the left have been mocking religion for decades.’ 

‘Halloween isn’t about glorifying darkness,’ DeStefano said. ‘It’s about shining a light on the reality of death, the fact that eternal life has triumphed, and that’s what makes it so powerful if we understand it correctly.’ 

DeStefano warned that modern culture has distanced itself from those roots. He said Halloween has become a ‘festival of evil,’ and embracing the dark side of the holiday can be ‘fundamentally unhealthy.’ 

Halloween has long been marked by ghost stories, cursed dolls and evil spirits. Films and tales often center on exorcisms, haunted houses and witches casting spells from bubbling cauldrons to curse others. 

He said that there has been a growing fascination within the media that ‘glorifies’ evil and that this kind of entertainment can ‘dull our moral senses.’

‘All Hallows’ Eve’ tells the story of a group of friends who stumble upon a mysterious old woman who sweeps graves in a cemetery every night, according to the book description. She prays for the souls of the dead buried below, who are stuck in purgatory, and teaches the children the true meaning of the holiday. 

Purgatory is understood as a temporary and intermediate afterlife state that provides spiritual cleansing to souls before entering heaven, per Catholic doctrine. 

In the Catholic tradition, All Hallows’ Eve, or Halloween, All Saints’ Day and All Souls’ Day take place over three consecutive days known collectively as Allhallowtide, a time to honor the saints and pray for the souls of the dead.

DeStefano said he’s not discouraging families from enjoying the usual Halloween traditions but urged parents to teach their children about the holiday’s origins and the importance of honoring the dead.

He said Halloween can also carry a message of hope. He said dressing up as a mummy, ghost, or skeleton can be a good reminder that Halloween is also a time to pray for loved ones who have passed away.

‘If someone we love has died, if our grandmother or grandfather has died, someday we’re going to get to see them again in heaven, and we’re going to be able to run up to them again, kiss them, hug them, and feel the warmth of their skin and hear their voices again,’ he said. ‘That’s what this holiday is about.’

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, released on Wednesday 197 subpoenas that the Biden administration’s FBI used to seek testimony and documents related to hundreds of Republicans and GOP entities as part of the bureau’s Arctic Frost probe, the precursor to former special counsel Jack Smith’s election investigation.

‘Arctic Frost was the vehicle by which partisan FBI agents and DOJ prosecutors could improperly investigate the entire Republican political apparatus,’ Grassley said at a press conference. ‘Contrary to what Smith has said publicly, this was clearly a fishing expedition.’

Standing alongside Grassley, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., called the subpoenas ‘nothing short of a Biden administration enemies list.’

The subpoenas included nonpublic, confidential grand jury material that Grassley said he obtained through whistleblower disclosures.

They sought certain communications with media companies, including Fox News, CBS, Sinclair and Newsmax and with ‘any’ members and aides in Congress. They also sought sweeping financial information from conservative entities.

Grassley has been releasing troves of documents related to Arctic Frost, a probe he says was politicized and lacked basis. Smith used the probe to bring criminal charges against Trump related to the 2020 election.

Lenny Breuer, a lawyer for Smith, said in a statement provided to Fox News Digital that Smith stands by his offer to appear publicly before the Senate and House to testify about his special counsel work.

‘As we informed congressional leaders last week, Jack is happy to discuss his work as Special Counsel and answer any questions at a public hearing just like every other Special Counsel investigating a president has done,’ Breuer said, adding that Smith wants a public hearing ‘so the American people can hear directly from him.’

House lawmakers have called on Smith to interview with them behind closed-doors, while Grassley has said he is still seeking more information from Smith and not ready for a public hearing.

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, also raised at the press conference the controversial subpoenas for eight Republican senators’ phone records, which did not include the contents of phone calls but rather details about when calls were place and to whom. Cruz said he was also among the targeted senators, but he said his phone company, AT&T, resisted complying with the request and that AT&T was ordered by a federal judge not to inform Cruz about the request for a year.

‘We are going to get the answers of every person who signed off on this abuse of power, and mark my words, there will be accountability,’ Cruz said, signaling that the senators’ inquiry into Arctic Frost was far from over.

Smith brought four charges against Trump in 2023 alleging he illegally attempted to overturn the election, but the former special counsel encountered numerous hurdles during the federal court proceedings in D.C. and eventually was forced to dismiss the case after Trump won the 2024 election, citing a DOJ policy that discourages prosecuting sitting presidents.

As President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping prepare to meet Thursday, one soft-spoken U.S. export star will take center stage: soybeans. The humble crop, a $30 billion pillar of U.S. agriculture exports, has become a powerful symbol of the economic interdependence and political tension between Washington and Beijing. 

In short, soybeans have come to embody the volatility of the U.S.–China trade war. Beijing halted purchases of American soybeans on the heels of retaliatory tariffs on the crop, responding to Trump’s earlier duties on Chinese goods. 

China pivoted to suppliers in Brazil and Argentina, a move that underscored how quickly global trade patterns can shift and how vulnerable U.S. farmers are to diplomatic rifts between Washington and Beijing.

What began as tit-for-tat posturing between the world’s two largest economies has turned into a symbolic and economic gut punch for Trump’s rural base, whose livelihoods depend on the very trade ties now caught in the crossfire.

According to the American Soybean Association, the U.S. has traditionally served as China’s leading soybean source. Prior to the 2018 trade conflict, roughly 28% of U.S. soybean production was exported to China. Those crop exports fell sharply to 11% in 2018 and 2019, recovered to 31% by 2021 amid pandemic-era demand and eased back to 22% in 2024.

But some policy experts argue that China’s shift away from U.S. soybeans was already underway.

‘China was always going to reduce its reliance on the United States for food security,’ Bryan Burack, a senior policy advisor for China and the Indo-Pacific at the Heritage Foundation told Fox News Digital. ‘China started signing purchase agreements with other countries for soybeans well before President Trump took office,’ he said, adding that Beijing has ‘been decoupling from the U.S. for a long time.’

‘Unfortunately, the only way for us to respond is to do the same and that process is painful and excruciating,’ Burack said.

But for farmers thousands of miles from Washington and Beijing, those policy shifts translate into shrinking markets and tighter margins.

‘We rely on trade with other countries, specifically China, to buy our soybeans,’ Brad Arnold, a multigenerational soybean farmer in southwestern Missouri, told FOX Business. He said that China’s decision to boycott U.S. soybean purchases ‘has huge impacts on our business and our bottom line.’

‘There are domestic uses for soybeans, looking at renewable diesel, biodiesel specifically produced from soybeans,’ Arnold said. ‘In the grand scheme of things, that’s such a small percentage currently, you know it’s going to take a customer like China to buy beans to make a noticeable impact. You can’t take our number one customer, shut them off and just overnight find a replacement.’

That reliance on China adds new weight to the diplomatic stage this week, as Trump and Xi prepare to meet in South Korea. The two leaders will meet on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in Busan, South Korea, marking their first in-person talks since Trump’s return to office. 

Ahead of the meeting, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he expected China to delay rare earth restrictions and resume U.S. soybean purchases, calling it part of a ‘substantial framework’ both sides aim to maintain. Bessent also said that trade negotiations were moving toward averting a fresh 100% U.S. tariff on Chinese goods.

And in a possible gesture of easing tensions, Reuters reported that China bought around 180,000 metric tons of U.S. soybeans in the run-up to Trump and Xi’s meeting.

Whether it marks a true thaw in U.S.–China trade relations or just a temporary reprieve, the purchase underscores how deeply intertwined diplomacy and agriculture remain.

Fox Business’ Eric Revell contributed to this report.

: The campaign for ‘Squad’ Rep. Ilhan Omar recently sent over a thousand dollars to a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit that partnered with a Palestinian university with alleged terrorist ties, according to new Federal Election Commission filings reviewed by Fox News Digital.

The Palestine House of Freedom, also known by its Arabic name, ‘Dar Alhurriya,’ is a nonprofit headquartered just blocks from the U.S. Capitol building. 

According to a video on the group’s website, it is ‘dedicated to the liberation of Palestine’ and ‘the dismantling of apartheid in Palestine and the establishment of a free, democratic state from the river to the sea.’

The group’s website emphasizes that Israel is ‘operating as an apartheid state.’ The website further states that its mission is to ’embark on an aggressive educational campaign targeting everyone from lawmakers, staffers, the media, to the general public’ to ‘show how dismantling apartheid and establishing a free democratic Palestine from the River to the Sea with equal rights, is the path to peace and will benefit all parties involved.’

The filings show that Omar’s campaign, Ilhan for Congress, sent $1,559.25 to the anti-Israel Palestine House of Freedom for ‘event tickets’ in September. However, it is unclear which event the payments were for.

The Palestine House of Freedom made headlines earlier this year for hosting a fundraiser in June for the Palestinian Birzeit University, a school that has alleged terrorist ties and has seen its student council elections favor the pro-Hamas wing of student council members, according to The Washington Reporter.

The university’s student council has long been dominated by the Hamas-affiliated Al-Wafaa bloc and has been previously dubbed, ‘Terrorist University.’ Student campus parades have also reportedly included people marching with mock suicide bomb vests and rockets, as reported by Memri TV.

A Fox News Digital review found that the Hamas-affiliated Al-Wafaa bloc has won several student council elections at Birzeit dating back to the 1990’s, including victories in 2022 and 2023. After the 2023 victory, a top Hamas operative reportedly told the Middle East Monitor the victory represents an ‘extension’ of the movement.

‘The second message is that the bloc has proven its ability to adapt to changes, overcome complexities, and fill the void created by arrests, martyrdom, or deportation,’ Ismail Haniyeh, who was head of Hamas’ Political Bureau until he was assassinated by Israel Defense Forces last year in Tehran, told the Middle East Monitor.

He added that Hamas is ‘unbreakable’ in its homeland and that it will confront the ‘occupier, oppression and terrorism.’ This wasn’t the first time a top Hamas operative praised the Al-Wafaa bloc’s victory at Birzeit. In 2017, a top Hamas spokesperson reportedly congratulated the student body on the election results.

Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., and Education and Workforce Committee Chairman Tim Walberg, R-Mich., sent a letter Sept. 29 to Harvard University, expressing concern about the university’s failure to issue a public decision on its prior partnership with Birzeit. In the letter, the lawmakers called Birzeit ‘an institution whose student body overwhelmingly supports Hamas’ and a school that ‘explicitly endorses a U.S. designated terrorist organization.’

Harvard announced this spring it would not renew its cooperation agreement with Birzeit and would issue a permanent decision about the partnership after an internal review, according to The Harvard Crimson.

According to the June event’s flyer, all the proceeds from the Palestine House of Freedom fundraiser, ‘From Birzeit and Beyond: How academia shapes resistance and resilience,’ went to Birzeit.

Omar was one of the first Muslim women elected to Congress in 2018. She has taken heavy criticism for making anti-American and antisemitic comments over the years, including saying that ‘some people did something’ in reference to the 9/11 attacks and saying that ‘Israel has hypnotized the world.’ She later apologized for the comment about Israel.

In September, a vote to censure Omar over comments she made about the assassination of Charlie Kirk narrowly failed to pass the House of Representatives.

Fox News Digital reached out to Harvard, the Palestinian House of Freedom, Omar’s office and Ilhan for Congress for comment but did not receive a response by press time.

A small contingent of Senate Republicans again joined with Senate Democrats to reject President Donald Trump’s tariffs — this time on Canadian goods.

The Senate advanced a resolution from Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., on a bipartisan basis to terminate the emergency powers Trump used to declare retaliatory tariffs against Canada earlier this year.

Roughly the same core group of Republicans, Susan Collins of Maine, Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, joined Senate Democrats to reject the duties. Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., opted to vote against this latest attempt to reject Trump’s tariffs. 

‘The vice president came up yesterday to try to corral Republicans at their lunch,’ Kaine said before the lunch. ‘That shows the White House is worried about defectors on this.’

Indeed, their votes against Trump’s tariffs on Canada came after Vice President JD Vance warned Republicans that it would be a ‘huge mistake’ to break with the White House on the president’s tariff strategy, and he argued that using duties on countries across the globe offered leverage to generate better trade deals in return.

Paul, one of the co-sponsors of Kaine’s resolution, has consistently rejected Trump’s usage of tariffs and argued that it was a tax on consumers in the U.S. rather than on foreign countries.

He noted that the message it would send to the White House, despite pressure from Vance to support Trump’s duties, was ‘that a rule by emergency is not what the Constitution intended, that taxes are supposed to originate in the House of Representatives.’

The resolution was in response to Trump’s usage of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act in July to impose tariffs on Canadian goods. The tariffs on the country vary, with Trump initially placing 35% duties on the country earlier this year, along with a blanket 50% tariff on steel from other countries.

However, he recently cranked up the tariffs on Canada by 10% following an ad that ran last week that featured former President Ronald Reagan, which used audio from the former president’s 1987 ‘Radio Address to the Nation on Free and Fair Trade.’

Trump railed against the ad, which was run by the government of Ontario, Canada, and declared, ‘ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED,’ in a post on Truth Social.

The latest tariff vote is the second in a trio of resolutions from Kaine and several Senate Democrats. Despite the resolution terminating Trump’s emergency powers on tariffs in Brazil and Canada both advancing in the Senate, they will likely stall in the House.

McConnell staked his position against the tariffs in a statement, where he argued that retaliatory tariffs have negatively affected Kentucky farmers and distillers.

‘Tariffs make both building and buying in America more expensive. The economic harms of trade wars are not the exception to history, but the rule. And no cross-eyed reading of Reagan will reveal otherwise,’ he said. ‘This week, I will vote in favor of resolutions to end emergency tariff authorities.’

As President Donald Trump and Chinese leader Xi Jinping prepare to meet Thursday, one soft-spoken U.S. export star will take center stage: soybeans. 

The humble crop, a $30 billion pillar of U.S. agriculture exports, has become a powerful symbol of the economic interdependence and political tension between Washington and Beijing. 

In short, soybeans have come to embody the volatility of the U.S.–China trade war. Beijing halted purchases of American soybeans in response to Trump’s earlier tariffs on Chinese goods. 

China pivoted to suppliers in Brazil and Argentina, a move that underscored how quickly global trade patterns can shift and how vulnerable U.S. farmers are to diplomatic rifts between Washington and Beijing.

What began as tit-for-tat posturing between the world’s two largest economies has turned into a symbolic and economic gut punch for Trump’s rural base, whose livelihoods depend on the very trade ties now caught in the crossfire.

According to the American Soybean Association, the U.S. has traditionally served as China’s leading soybean source. Prior to the 2018 trade conflict, roughly 28% of U.S. soybean production was exported to China. Those crop exports fell sharply to 11% in 2018 and 2019, recovered to 31% by 2021 amid pandemic-era demand and eased back to 22% in 2024.

But some policy experts argue that China’s shift away from U.S. soybeans was already underway.

‘China was always going to reduce its reliance on the United States for food security,’ Bryan Burack, a senior policy advisor for China and the Indo-Pacific at the Heritage Foundation told Fox News Digital. ‘China started signing purchase agreements with other countries for soybeans well before President Trump took office.’ 

He added that Beijing has ‘been decoupling from the U.S. for a long time.’

‘Unfortunately, the only way for us to respond is to do the same, and that process is painful and excruciating,’ Burack said.

But for farmers thousands of miles from Washington and Beijing, those policy shifts translate into shrinking markets and tighter margins.

‘We rely on trade with other countries, specifically China, to buy our soybeans,’ Brad Arnold, a multigenerational soybean farmer in southwestern Missouri, told FOX Business. He said China’s decision to boycott U.S. soybean purchases ‘has huge impacts on our business and our bottom line.’

‘There are domestic uses for soybeans, looking at renewable diesel, biodiesel specifically produced from soybeans,’ Arnold said. ‘In the grand scheme of things, that’s such a small percentage currently, you know it’s going to take a customer like China to buy beans to make a noticeable impact. You can’t take our No. 1 customer, shut them off and just overnight find a replacement.’

That reliance on China adds new weight to the diplomatic stage this week as Trump and Xi prepare to meet in South Korea. The two leaders will meet on the sidelines of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation Summit in Busan, South Korea, marking their first in-person talks since Trump’s return to office. 

Ahead of the meeting, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said he expected China to delay rare earth restrictions and resume U.S. soybean purchases, calling it part of a ‘substantial framework’ both sides aim to maintain. Bessent also said that trade negotiations were moving toward averting a fresh 100% U.S. tariff on Chinese goods.

And in a possible gesture of easing tensions, Reuters reported that China bought around 180,000 metric tons of U.S. soybeans in the run-up to Trump and Xi’s meeting.

Whether it marks a true thaw in U.S.–China trade relations or just a temporary reprieve, the purchase underscores how deeply intertwined diplomacy and agriculture remain.

Fox Business’ Eric Revell contributed to this report.

U.S. President Donald Trump met face-to-face with Chinese leader Xi Jinping on Thursday, the final day of Trump’s trip to Asia that included stops in Malaysia, Japan and South Korea, in an attempt to resolve the ongoing trade disputes between the two sides.

Trump has imposed substantial tariffs on China since returning to the White House in January, and Beijing retaliated with limits on exports of rare earth elements. Both sides want to avoid the risk of blowing up the world economy, which would harm their own countries.

The leaders of the world’s two largest economies spoke to the press in brief introductory remarks before meeting behind closed doors along with their top officials.

Xi said in his opening remarks that ‘it feels very warm seeing you again because it’s been many years.’

‘We do not always see eye to eye with each other,’ Xi said, noting that ‘it is normal for the two leading economies of the world to have frictions now and then.’

The Chinese leader added that the two countries ‘are fully able to help each other succeed and prosper together.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

Vice President JD Vance spoke at length during a large Turning Point USA gathering at the University of Mississippi (Ole Miss) in honor of Charlie Kirk, during which he shared the slain conservative activist’s impact on his faith and told students that ‘a properly rooted Christian moral order’ is key to the future of the country.

After the audience heard from Kirk’s widow, Erika, Vance took the stage and spoke for a brief time before taking questions from the audience on a range of issues from immigration to National Guard deployments and the Second Amendment. But several of the questions revolved around Vance’s faith and the impact it has had on how he governs as Vice President. Some asked about his views on religious liberty while another questioned how he was raising his family in a dual-religion household where his wife is Hindu.   

‘I make no apologies for thinking that Christian values are an important foundation of this country,’ Vance said when responding to a question about the separation of church and state. ‘Anybody who’s telling you their view is neutral likely has an agenda to sell you. And I’m at least honest about the fact that I think the Christian foundation of this country is a good thing.’

Meanwhile, Vance railed against contemporary liberalism in his comments about faith Wednesday night, calling it a ‘perverted version of Christianity.’  

‘There’s nothing wrong, of course, with focusing on people who are disenfranchised, for example. That’s the focus of liberalism. But if you completely separate it from any religious duty or any civic virtue, then that can actually become, for example, an inducement to lawlessness,’ Vance said while responding to a questioner. ‘You can’t just have compassion for the criminal. You also have to have justice too. Which is why I think that a properly rooted Christian moral order is such an important part of the future of our country.’

Vance went on to say that he does not think God must be kicked out of the public square, adding he did not believe that is what the founders intended. 

‘Anybody who tells you it’s required by the Constitution is lying to you,’ Vance argued. ‘What happened, is, the Supreme Court interpreted ‘Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion’ to effectively throw the church out of every public place at the federal, state and local level. I think it was a terrible mistake, and we’re still paying for the consequences of it today.’

In addition to taking tough policy-oriented questions about faith and religion, Vance was also asked at one point about living in an interfaith household. Vance’s wife is Hindu. 

Vance noted how when the pair met he was not a Christian, but over time he and his wife, Usha, decided to raise their boys Christian. Vance said open communication and respect for each other’s beliefs played a part in his marriage and his family’s decision to raise their kids Christian.   

‘Most Sundays she will come with me to church. As I’ve told her, and I’ve said publicly, and I’ll say now in front of 10,000 of my closest friends, ‘Do I hope eventually that she is somehow moved by the same thing that I was moved in by church? Yeah, I honestly, I do wish that.’ Because I believe in the Christian gospel and I hope eventually my wife comes to see it the same way. But if she doesn’t, then God says everybody has free will, and so that doesn’t cause a problem for me.’

Vance also spoke about the impact Kirk has had on his faith during the Wednesday night event honoring the slain activist. Vance said that, at least in part, Kirk moved him to be more vocal about his faith.

‘This is another way in which Charlie has affected my life – I would say that I grew up again in a generation where even if people had very deep personal faith, they didn’t talk about their faith a whole lot,’ Vance told the crowd while remembering his late friend. 

‘But the reason why I try to be the best husband I can be, the best father I can be, the reason why I care so much about all the issues that we’re going to talk about, is because I believe I’ve been placed in this position for a brief period of time to do the most amount of good for God and for the country that I love so much. And that’s the most important way that my faith influences me.’