“Martha, do you hear yourself?”

That phrase could become JD Vance’s rallying cry in the final days of the presidential campaign, if it hasn’t already.

Especially when it comes to dealing with one-sided, left-wing media personalities hell-bent on defeating Donald Trump and Vance, his vice president.

“Martha, do you hear yourself?” Vance, 40, asked incredulously ABC’s Martha Raddatz, 71, as the network’s veteran correspondent tried to downplay the violent takeover of an Aurora, Colorado, apartment complex by a Venezuelan immigrant gang.

Reading her questions from notes that sounded like they came from a Democratic Party textbook, Raddatz called the violent power grabs “incidents” that were “vastly exaggerated” by Trump.

The Republican presidential candidate previously said the city had been “invaded and captured” by illegal immigrants from Venezuela.

Trump, campaigning in Aurora, promised that if elected he would invoke the Alien Enemies Act of 1798 – dubbed “Operation Aurora” – to arrest and deport criminal illegal immigrants. If they are caught re-entering the country, they face ten years in prison.

“I will save Aurora and every city that has been invaded and conquered,” Trump said.

In her interview, Raddatz said, “The incidents were limited to a handful of apartment complexes.” She called them “a handful of problems.”

To which Vance replied, “Just, Martha? Do you hear yourself? Only a handful of apartment complexes have been taken over by Venezuelan gangs, and Donald Trump is the problem and not Kamala Harris’ open border?

“Americans are fed up with what is going on, and they have every right to be. I find this exchange really interesting, Martha, because you seem more concerned with cherry-picking everything Donald Trump has said than acknowledging that apartment complexes across the United States are being taken over by violent gangs.”

Vance added: “If you let people in in the millions – most of whom are unvetted and most of whom you don’t know who they really are – you’re going to have problems like this.”

At least 10 people with ties to the violent Venezuelan gang Tren de Aragua were arrested in September after seizing control of an apartment complex in Aurora and engaging in extortion, child prostitution and other criminal acts.

Raddatz, who was confronted about the Venezuelan gangs, couldn’t move on to the next topic quickly enough.

And while Vance briefed Raddatz on Aurora and the Venezuelan gangs, unlike Trump, he maintained his usual cool, concise and collected demeanor.

Vance has emerged as the star of the campaign despite initial criticism of Trump by some Republicans for choosing him as his running mate, especially compared to Tim Walz, Kamala Harris’ running mate, who can’t let a day go by without making a mistake or two.

Walz is lucky he didn’t shoot himself or anyone else in the foot last week while clumsily trying to load the shotgun he was carrying to demonstrate his masculinity during a staged pheasant hunt in Minnesota.

It’s just as easy for conservatives and others to make fun of Raddatz. Their questions were more a reflection of the politics of the Washington Democratic establishment than anything else.

Raddatz, who worked in Boston for WCVB-TV as Martha Bradley from 1979 (at the time she was married to Ben Bradley Jr. of the Boston Globe) and established herself as a successful reporter.

However, things change when reporters come to Washington, where in order to be politically and socially accepted by the Democratic establishment that runs the place, they must accept and promote the party line, lies and all.

Otherwise, you will be shunned and shamed by the deep state agents who run Washington, no matter who is president.

That means you have to follow the Democratic Party playbook when interviewing Republicans like Trump and Vance. Instead of just asking questions, you have to confront them, challenge them, and try to humiliate them, just as Raddatz tried to do with Vance.