Rep. Chris Collins said Wednesday that vice presidential candidate Tim Kaine was “unhinged,” “rude” and “insulting” at the first vice presidential debate.
“Tim Kaine was rude. He was insulting. He was talking over Mike Pence, who had to just sit there and take it,” the New York Republican told CNN’s Alisyn Camerota on “New Day.”
“Tim Kaine looked unhinged so I think just the demeanor of Mike Pence would do a lot to calm people. I think Tim Kaine hurt Hillary’s team,” Collins added. “I thought Hillary was the most unlikable politician until I saw Tim Kaine last night. I think he lapped her.”
The Indiana governor scored a victory over the Virginia Senator, according to a CNN/ORC instant poll, with 48% of debate viewers saying Pence did the better job, compared with 42% who thought Kaine had the better night.
Trump campaign spokesman Jason Miller called the entire Democratic ticket “unhinged.”
“I think you’re seeing the Clinton-Kaine campaign completely unhinged this morning,” he told Camerota. “I think the 70-plus interruptions from Sen. Kaine went to that and Sen. Kaine had a very tough time standing up and defending their ideas.”
Collins also blamed Kaine for interrupting Pence repeatedly throughout the debate.
“When he kept yapping about Trump’s taxes and then making up things that he took Donald Trump’s words out of context, saying even at the end there that he wants to deport 16 million immigrants in the first 100 days,” Collins said.
Collins said Trump altered his “rhetoric” and he does not want a deportation force but wants to focus on deporting undocumented immigrants who break the law first. That is a specification that Trump had not originally made throughout much of the campaign.
“His rhetoric has changed,” Collins said. “We never were going to deport 11 or 12 million illegal immigrants. We can process them in a way of making them legal.”
“Donald Trump’s going to deport the criminal element that Hillary and Tim Kaine and Barack Obama has not,” he added.
Camerota pointed out that Collins’ accusation that Clinton wants open border is not true.
“When it comes to securing the borders Hillary and Tim Kaine are not going to change the fact that we have porous borders today. People surging in. They are not deporting the criminal element,” he said. “Donald Trump’s going to stand strong on it. That’s the difference.”