LA CROSSE, Wis. — Vice President Mike Pence highlighted the workforce and condemned civil unrest in his Labor Day visit to La Crosse, Wis.
Pence visited Dairyland Power Cooperative and praised President Donald Trump's administration's work to secure job growth across the country as well as in Wisconsin.
According to the White House, Trump's administration led to an unemployment rate of 3.1% in March and 59,600 Wisconsin jobs, including 15,000 manufacturing jobs since Trump took office. Since the pandemic, over 200,000 Wisconsin jobs have been recovered and more than 92% of Wisconsin small businesses have safely reopened.
"We've already seen more than 10.6 [million] Americans go back to work," Pence said. "In the last four months alone, we've literally seen half the Americans that lost their jobs, go back to work. And that includes 200,000 Americans right here, in the state of Wisconsin."
"[President Trump] is the best friend American workers have ever had," he said.
Pence also discussed the president's response to the recent unrest following the police shooting of Jacob Blake in Kenosha.
"There is no excuse for the rioting and looting that we have seen in Kenosha, and in citries around the country," Pence said. "This violence [...] must stop now. Rioting and looting is not peaceful protest. Burning buildings is not free speech."
He reiterated the claim that the Trump administration will continue to advocate for "law and order."
"Under President Donald Trump, I promise you, we will always stand with those who serve on the big blue line of law enforcement," Pence said. "We are not going to defund the police, not now, not ever."
Pence arrived in La Crosse just before 11 a.m. on Monday. Candidate for Vice President Kamala Harris also took to the Badger state on Labor Day, stopping in Milwaukee to tour an International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Training Facility and speak with IBEW members and Wisconsin labor leadership. She also spoke with Blake's family members.
This was Pence's second time visiting Wisconsin in the last three weeks.