Pence, Harris face off in VP debate with diverging views of America

PENCE'S CLAIM: "Before there were more than five cases in the United States, all people who had returned from China, President Donald Trump did what no other American president had ever done. And that was, he suspended all travel from China, the second-largest economy in the world."

FACT CHECK: At the end of January, President Donald Trump issued a proclamation to restrict travelers who had visited China in the previous 14 days from entering the United States, but it was more narrow than Pence described. The orders did not apply to U.S. citizens, green card holders and their close family members. Health care workers were also exempt. 

Nearly 760,000 people entered the U.S. from China between December of last year and February, according to an ABC News review of traveler data. 

Restrictions on travelers from Europe started in March. An April study from researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai found the first coronavirus cases in New York originated from Europe, not China.

--ABC News' Quinn Owen

Harris said that she does not not believe justice was done in the case of Breonna Taylor and she called for policing and justice reform, touting her history as a prosecutor.

"And that's why Joe Biden and I have said on this subject, look -- and I'm a former career prosecutor, I know what I'm talking about -- bad cops are bad for good cops," Harris said. "We need reform of our policing in America and our criminal justice system, which is why Joe and I will immediately ban chokeholds and carotid holds. George Floyd would be alive today if we did that."

Pence said that his "heart breaks" for the loss of innocent life and the family of Breonna Taylor, but he said that he trusts the justice system and the findings of the Grand Jury in the Breonna Taylor case. Pence criticized protestors and rioters who caused damage in the wake of the death of George Floyd while in police custody.

"With regard to George Floyd -- there's no excuse what happened to George Floyd -- and justice will be served," Pence said. "But there's no excuse for the rioting and looting that followed. I mean, it really is astonishing."

Pence pivoted from a question on pre-existing conditions to press Harris for an answer on whether or not she and Biden supported adding additional seats to the Supreme Court.

"I think the American people would really like to know, if Judge Amy Coney Barrett is confirmed to the Supreme Court of the United States, are you and Joe Biden, if somehow you win this election, going to pack the Supreme Court to get your way?" the vice president asked. 

Harris used her first answer to attack the Trump administration for rushing a vote on Barrett's nomination by bringing up a Republican the president often compares himself to -- Abraham Lincoln. 

"It was 27 days before the election, and a seat became open on the United States court. Abraham Lincoln's party was in charge of not only the White House but the Senate," she said, referring to the 1864 election.

"But Honest Abe said it's not the right thing to do," Harris added. "The American people deserve to make the decision about who will be the next president of the United States, and then that person can select who will serve for a lifetime on the highest court of our land. And so, Joe and I are very clear: the American people are voting right now, and it should be their decision about who will serve on this most important body for a lifetime."

MORE: Most say wait on Ginsburg seat, while opposing packing the court: Poll 

Pence used her non-answer to say that Biden and Harris would pack the Supreme Court and that he and Trump would protect the current number of justices on the court. 
"The American people deserve a straight answer," he said. "And if you have not figured it out yet, the straight answer is they are going to pack the Supreme Court, if they somehow win this election.

Harris responded that Republican efforts to get more conservatives confirmed as federal judges amounted to packing the court, noting that of the 50 people the president nominated to the Court of Appeals none were Black. She did not state her position on adding seats to the U.S. Supreme Court.

PENCE'S CLAIM: "We actually do know what failure looks like in a pandemic: it was 2009, the swine flu arrived in the United States. ... When Joe Biden was vice president of the United States, not 7.5 million people contracted the swine flu, 60 million Americans contracted the swine flu."

FACT CHECK: While Pence is correct that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates the 2009 swine flu pandemic infected an estimated 60.8 million Americans in its first year, it is misleading to compare the two outbreaks given H1N1's far lower fatality rate, and similarly misleading to call the Obama administration's response a "failure."

The CDC estimates up to 575,000 lives were lost to the swine flu worldwide. Of those, fewer than 13,000 were American, due in part to the Obama administration's "complex, multi-faceted and long-term response," the CDC later wrote. Thus far, COVID-19 has taken the lives of over 210,000 Americans, a little over eight months since the first known case of the virus was discovered in the United States.

"The team, in my opinion, in 2009, really demonstrated that the planning was worth it. Nothing is ever perfect. But I felt just so impressed and so proud of the job CDC did in 2009," Dr. Julie Gerberding, a CDC director during the George W. Bush administration, told ABC News.

-ABC News' John Verhovek and Lucien Bruggeman