When Donald Trump named JD Vance as his vice presidential nominee, he completed an extraordinary journey from former Marine and bestselling author with impeccable “Never Trump” rhetoric to ultimate MAGA loyalist.
It could have been very different if it weren’t for his wife and his legal training.
Vance met Usha Chilukuri, the daughter of Indian immigrants, at Yale Law School in 2013. While his career took him into venture capital before he embarked on the manuscript that would become “Hillbilly Elegy” and a cultural phenomenon, making sense of a forgotten America that baffled the country’s liberal elite, she was seeking federal clerkships.
She first worked in Kentucky, but then moved to a coveted position on the U.S. Court of Appeals for Washington, D.C., where she clerked for Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh.
Friends say it was Kavanaugh’s tumultuous Supreme Court confirmation in 2018, when he faced multiple allegations of sexual assault, that pushed Vance into politics.
JD Vance’s evolution from author to Donald Trump critic includes his wife Usha Vance and his relationship with Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh
“It was a political issue for him,” said someone who knew Vance at the time. “He was a family friend.”
Vance himself has made the same point.
“My wife worked for Kavanaugh, she loved the guy, he was kind of a dork,” he recently told the New York Times. “I never believed those stories.”
‘You start to look around and say, “If they can do this to him, can they do it to any of us?” An incredible smear campaign.’
Friends say that before then they thought he was well suited for a career as a writer and venture capitalist. The former Marine could write about politics and people for top-tier newspapers, appear on television to talk about Trump and the Midwest, and at the same time make a fortune with his financial firm.
His book had painted an evocative portrait of a hard childhood in a forgotten American. He was perfectly positioned to explain why those Rust Belt cities had turned to Trump, while warning that the man himself was like an opioid, an “easy escape from pain.”
It could have made him a fixture in the chattering classes of pundits, called upon to explain the appeal and meteoric political rise of a loudmouth New York real estate developer who had baffled the establishment on both the left and the right.
What changed, said a friend who knew the couple at Yale, was the way prestigious institutions criticized Kavanaugh during his confirmation and Trump in office.
A former Yale student said Kavanaugh assaulted her when they were students in the 1980s. A second allegation was reported shortly afterward.
Kavanaugh denied the allegations and was eventually confirmed, but not without harsh condemnation from Yale alumni and others.
Judge Brett Kavanaugh shakes hands with President Donald Trump before the State of the Union address in 2019. It was his stormy confirmation that helped propel Vance into politics
Christine Blasey Ford claimed Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh attempted to sexually assault her in high school after being appointed last year.
Kavanaugh broke down in tears during his 2018 testimony and claimed that accusations against him by Ford and other women were politically motivated.
The hearings were dramatic. They included testimony from Christine Blasey Ford, who said the future judge pinned her to a bed when they were teenagers, followed by angry outbursts from Kavanaugh as he fought back against the allegations.
‘Hillbilly Elegy’ was published in 2016
A friend who met Vance and his future wife in law school said it was one of the factors that pushed him toward Trump and politics after having previously been highly critical.
“I think there were two things that were frustrating for JD,” she said. “One was watching Yale, as our Yale community — faculty, alumni — go after Brett Kavanaugh and the overt partisanship that that demonstrated.”
The other thing, he added, was the way the mainstream media, which praised his book, criticized the movie when it came out in a way that seemed like an attack on the United States he had written about.
Vance had always been a conservative, but partisanship, the story goes, led him to embrace Trump and his Republican movement.
His second big break came in 2020, when he ran as a Republican Senate candidate in Ohio. During one of the primary debates, he rejected the idea of a NATO-imposed no-fly zone over Ukraine.
Don Jr. endorsed Vance in March 2022, paving the way for his father’s endorsement.
Vance has become close to Donald Trump Jr., who is seen here campaigning with him in 2022.
His military service, which included a stint in Iraq, had made him skeptical of foreign intervention, and he was the only one of the three Republicans on the debate stage to reject the no-fly zone idea.
At the time, she was hit with a barrage of ads criticizing her past comments against Trump, such as, “I can’t stand Trump. I think he’s harmful.”
But that didn’t matter when the president’s eldest son noticed his comments. Donald Trump Jr. had read Hillbilly Elegy and was amused by its author’s take on neocon interventionist Republicans.
He tweeted his support and weeks later his father stepped in with his endorsement, effectively ending the primary race and catapulting Vance into the Senate.
While strategists, donors and advisers have been pushing Trump to pick his man or woman as his running mate, this means Vance has a say within the family itself.
Last week, Don Jr. explained why he was supporting the Ohio senator: ‘You make a lot of friends in politics, but JD is a great, loyal guy who has become a true friend.
Former President Donald Trump campaigns with Sen. J.D. Vance in Vandalia, Ohio, in March. Trump has apparently taken note of a slimmer Vance, saying he “has the look.”
Vance married Usha Chilukuri in 2014. They have three children together.
An informal poll of attendees at Turning Point Action’s People’s convention in Detroit last month found Vance the clear favorite to be Trump’s vice president.
‘His entire life story is the embodiment of the American dream, but he never forgets where he comes from.
“He is also one of the few people I have seen in Washington who not only truly believes in my father’s agenda, but also has the courage and intelligence to effectively fight the Democrats and left-wing media in defense of our common-sense American values.”
He was also a big favorite of the MAGA base, and benefited from his frequent television appearances to take swipes at the former president.
When attendees at a Turning Point Action event in Detroit, made up of grassroots members of the Trump movement, were asked who should join the ticket, their overwhelming choice was Vance, who was 30 points ahead of second-place Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina.
This means Vance could be on the verge of becoming the first Navy veteran to assume the role of vice president, and the first bearded man.