From Appalachia to Trump's running mate: Who is JD Vance?

JD Vance has been on the spotlight, ever since Donald Trump chose him to be his running mate. From media gaffes that have gone viral to untrue allegations involving living room furniture, it seems it's an uphill battle for him to get into the White House.

Back in July, Donald Trump announced during the Republican convention in Milwaukee who’s going to be his running mate, after lots of speculation about the person who could become Vice President in November.

And who’s Trump VP? James David Vance, a 39-year-old businessman, veteran, and author, known for writing his memoir ‘Hillbilly Elegy’, and who is serving since 2023 as Senator for Ohio.

JD Vance is an atypical choice to say the least. He’s a Millennial whose foray into politics seems secondary to his work as a venture capitalist, author, and media personality. Maybe Trump sees himself in him?

However, since the announcement, there has been rumors that Trump regrets picking Vance as his running mate.

According to Newsweek, Donald Trump's co-campaign manager Chris LaCivita denied the allegations, arguing that JD Vance has been a fantastic addiction.

If elected, Vance would be the youngest Vice President of the United States since Richard Nixon’s time as VP of Dwight Eisenhower. He’s 20 years younger than Kamala Harris and 38 younger than Donald Trump.

According to Reuters, Vance was once openly critical of Trump, calling him an “i d i o t” and privately comparing him to Hitler back in 2016. “I think that he’s noxious and is leading the white working class to a very dark place”, he declared that year on NPR.

Now, eight years later, Vance is just a few months shy of probably becoming the next Vice President of the United States. But who is he, and where does he come from?

Politico writes that Vance was born in Middletown, Ohio. His maternal grandparents were originally from Kentucky, part of the Appalachia. The Senator has prided himself in the past about being “hillbilly royalty”.

According to the BBC, Vance’s father abandoned the family when he was a toddler, while his mother struggled with addiction for years. He was raised for the most part by his maternal grandparents.

Vance’s early years are chronicled in his 2016 best-selling memoir ‘Hillbilly Elegy’, which was adapted in 2020 into a movie directed by Ron Howard and starring Amy Adams and Glenn Close and released by Netflix.

AP writes that ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ also helped Vance to get in touch with the Trump family. Don Jr. loved the book and met the author when he was launching his political career. The two have remained friends ever since.

The BBC describes the book as painting the hardships of his family and friends in a decisively conservative perspective, condemning them as chronic welfare-dependent spendthrifts failing to pull themselves up by their bootstraps.

Image: marynanick / Unsplash

Politico writes that after finishing high school, he joined the US Marine Corps in Iraq. “I saw when I went to Iraq that I had been lied to. That the promises of the foreign policy establishment were a complete joke”, he declared at the Senate floor, while opposing a bill to send financial aid to Ukraine.

After serving in Iraq, Vance went to Ohio State University and later graduated from the Yale Law School. At Yale, he attended a talk by PayPal founder Peter Thiel which, per Politico, Vance describes as the most significant moment of his college years.

Image: huichaoji / Unsplash

Vance would move to San Francisco and work as a venture capitalist for the tech industry, working for Peter Thiel’s Mithril Capital for two years. His former boss would donate 10 million US dollars for his senate campaign in Ohio.

At Yale, Vance also met Usha Chilukuri, his wife and mother of their three children. Chilukuri is an Indian American lawyer who, at the time, was working as a clerk for Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

The question remains what sort of Vice President will JD Vance be, if he gets into the White House. Will he be the adult in the room, a spineless Trump yes-man, or bidding his time for bigger, better things?

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