Washington DC - Vice presidential candidate JD Vance recently got into a heated semantics debate regarding Donald Trump's repeated false claims about the city of Aurora, Colorado.

On Sunday, Vance did an interview with ABC News anchor Martha Raddatz, who pressed him on his boss' claims that the city has been "invaded and conquered by Venezuelan gangs."

Raddatz noted that the city's Republican mayor, Mike Coffman, said Trump's claims "have been grossly exaggerated and have unfairly hurt the city's identity and sense of safety" and asked if Vance supports the former president's rhetoric.

"Well, Martha, you just said the mayor said they were 'exaggerated,'" Vance responded. "So that means there's gotta be some element of truth here."

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Vance claimed their campaign has been speaking with "people on the ground" who say they are "terrified" of Venezuelan gangs, but Raddatz explained that local police have only reported a "handful" of such problems that have been handled.

The Ohio senator chuckled at Raddatz in response, stating, "Do you hear yourself?" and then went on to argue that she is paying far too much attention to Trump's words and their influence.

"You seem to be more focused with nit-picking everything that Donald Trump has said rather than acknowledging that apartment complexes in the United States of America are being taken over by violent gangs," he argued.

Trump's claims about Aurora come as the Republican nominee and his running mate have made their extreme immigration agenda the focus of their campaign, vowing to deport millions of undocumented migrants on day one if they are elected.

Their campaign faced similar backlash for spreading misinformation after they pushed conspiracy theories about Haitian migrants in the city of Springfield, Ohio, eating their neighbors' pets.

In defense of the disproven claims, Vance told CNN that he was willing to "create stories so that the American media actually pays attention" to the issues he wants them to.