PORTAGE, Mich. (WOOD) — Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance held a campaign rally in Portage Friday, working to encourage former President Donald Trump’s supporter base to cast their ballots as Election Day nears.

“We have got just four days to go. Four days to turn Michigan red and four days to make Donald J. Trump the next president of the United States, and we’re going to do it,” Vance, a senator from Ohio, opened his remarks at RAI Jets, an aircraft management and sales business near the Kalamazoo airport.

Vance criticized Democratic opponent Vice President Kamala Harris’ record on government spending, energy policy and — a key Trump campaign platform issue — immigration. He touted what he called Trump’s successes on the economy, crime and border security during his presidency. He said a vote for Harris is a “vote for more of the same.”

“I think the state of Michigan, we’re going to vote for change, we’re going to vote for common sense, we’re going to vote for Donald J. Trump to get back in the White House,” Vance said to cheers.

Discussing Michigan’s automotive industry, Vance criticized policies from Harris and President Joe Biden aimed at encouraging the sale of electric vehicles. Vance said that he and Trump thought auto loan payments should be tax-deductible to promote the domestic production of vehicles.

“This is common-sense economics. We want to reward people who are creating jobs and working at those jobs right here in the state of Michigan, right here in the United States of America,” Vance said.

Absentee ballots went out in Michigan in late September and early in-person voting was required to start statewide by Oct. 26. State data shows that as of Friday morning, nearly 737,000 people around Michigan had voted early in person and more than 1.8 million absentee ballots had been returned.

“You’ve got an opportunity to vote early and we ought to do it. We ought to take advantage of every opportunity that we have to vote,” Vance said.

The Trump campaign had previously attacked early and absentee voting, pinning unsubstantiated allegations of voter fraud on those methods. Not this time around.

“Kamala Harris is trying to bank as many votes as physically possible so that they can have as big of a lead on Election Day. So think about it: It’s like a football game where you start the game down by three touchdowns. Well, let’s the start the game tied so that on Election Day, we get over the finish line and we win the game and make Donald J. Trump the next president of the United States,” Vance said. “I don’t like election season, I like Election Day, but it is what it is.”

By state law, early in-person voting concludes statewide Sunday. Absentee ballots may be returned up until 8 p.m. on Election Day.

The presidential race has consistently been tight in Michigan. An EPIC-MRA poll released Friday shows that 48% of respondents said they intended to vote for Harris in the election and 45% for former President Donald Trump. With a margin of error of plus or minus 4%, that’s a statistical tie.

Trump is expected to hold his last campaign rally of the cycle in Grand Rapids on Monday, a source confirmed to News 8. He also ended the 2016 and 2020 campaigns in metro Grand Rapids.

Harris is scheduled to hold a rally on Michigan State University campus in East Lansing on Sunday.

Kelly Sackett, the chairwoman of the Kalamazoo County GOP, said her team worked hard to prepare and was excited for Vance’s visit.

“This is a big deal for us. We don’t take any of this for granted. We know that Kalamazoo County is an important part of the state. We know that the White House is won through Michigan, and so I expect to see people flock to the rally … be probably on the roadside, do all of that,” she told News 8 Thursday. 

The Harris campaign held a Republicans for Harris event in Kalamazoo Friday in response to Vance’s visit. There, former state Rep. Dave Pagel, who served in the Michigan House of Representatives from 2013 to 2018, criticized Trump’s rhetoric as “hateful” and divisive.

“I know that I will have policy differences with Kamala Harris, but I also know that she brings a great of wealth of experience, having been a prosecutor, a state attorney general, a United States senator and vice president. She has demonstrated strong character throughout her career. Donald Trump is simply not an acceptable choice. We need to turn the page, end the divisiveness, the name-calling, the petty, small-minded and even hate-filled politics that Donald Trump thrives on. America is better than this,” Pagel said in a video clip released by the Harris campaign.