WATCH: Vance calls for limiting legal immigration during a Turning Point event at the University of Mississippi

Vice President J.D. Vance called for a slowdown in legal immigration on Wednesday, saying: “We have to get the overall numbers down dramatically.”

Watch the full event from October 29 in our video player above.

Vance took questions from students at the University of Mississippi at an event organized by Turning Point USA, playing the role of debater often played by the organization’s slain founder, Charlie Kirk.

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Vance said the optimal number of legal immigrants who should be accepted is “far less than we would have been accepting,” but he would not provide a specific number when pressed by a woman who questioned his position. He criticized former President Joe Biden’s immigration policies, which he said allowed too many people to enter the country and threatened the social fabric of the United States.

“When something like this happens, you have to allow your community to coalesce a little bit, to build a sense of common identity, so that all the newcomers — those who stay — can assimilate into American culture,” Vance said. “Until you do that, you have to be careful about any additional migration, in my view.”

Vance also spoke forcefully about avoiding the deaths of Americans in “unnecessary foreign conflicts,” praising President Donald Trump’s Middle East diplomacy and the strike on Iranian nuclear facilities, even as the United States ramps up military pressure on Venezuela and strikes boats that the Trump administration says are transporting drugs.

Asked whether Trump’s deployment of the National Guard to Democratic-led cities would lead to a future president using that governmental authority against conservatives, he said his allies should not worry about Trump exercising executive power. He justified Trump’s targeting of his political enemies by referring to his arrest during the Biden administration. He was charged with illegally keeping secret documents after his first term and trying to subvert the 2020 election, which he lost, but the charges were dropped after he was elected to a second term a year ago.

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“We can’t be afraid to do something because the left might do it in the future,” Vance said. “The left will already do it regardless of whether we do it.”

Vance was introduced by Kirk’s widow, Erica Kirk, in one of her first public appearances since taking over her husband’s role leading Turning Point.

“Being on campus now, for me, is a spiritual reclaiming of the land,” she said, reflecting Kirk’s love of visiting college campuses and his mission to move campuses to the right.

Erica Kirk, wearing a white “Freedom” T-shirt like the one her husband wore when he was shot, urged young Christian conservatives to fight bravely for their beliefs and not fear social consequences.

“If I’m worried about losing a friend, I’ve lost my friend,” she said. “I lost my best friend.”