The New York Times: “What to Know About J. D. Vance, Trump’s Running Mate"

Senator J. D. Vance of Ohio, the newly-announced running mate to former President Donald Trump, has gone on a rapid journey over the past eight years from bestselling author and outspokenTrump critic to one of Trump’s staunchest defenders and, now, his would-be second-in-command.

Before running for office, Vance, forty, was known as the author of Hillbilly Elegy, a bestselling memoir recounting his upbringing in a poor family that also served as a sort of sociological examination of white working-class Americans. The book was published the summer before Trump’s election in 2016, and many readers looked to it after his victory as a sort of guide to understanding Trump’s support among white working-class communities.

Vance harshly denounced Trump during his 2016 campaign. But by 2022, he had embraced Trump, winning a crowded Republican Senate primary with his backing and becoming a reliable pro-Trump voice in Congress.

Here is more on Vance’s background and views: Personal background: He was born in Middletown, Ohio, and spent part of his childhood in Jackson, Kentucky, raised by his maternal grandparents as his mother struggled with drug addiction, before returning to Middletown. After high school, he enlisted in the Marines and was deployed to Iraq, doing public affairs work. He later attended Ohio State University and Yale Law School.

Career in finance: Vance worked for conservative venture capitalist Peter Thiel before founding his own venture capital firm. Thiel donated millions of dollars to Vance’s 2022 Senate campaign.

Hillbilly Elegy: The timing of his book, published the year that Trump was elected, helped raise his profile. He argued that a lack of personal agency was responsible for economic suffering, drug abuse and other struggles in white working-class communities like his, and wrote of “a willingness to blame everyone but yourself.” Since aligning himself with Trump, he has turned his blame toward outside sources, such as offshoring and immigration.

Criticism of Trump: During the 2016 campaign, Vance sharply criticized Trump, describing him as “cultural heroin” and as a demagogue who was “leading the white working class to a very dark place.” He described himself as “a Never Trump guy.” In a Twitter post that he has since deleted, he called Trump “reprehensible” because he “makes people I care about afraid: immigrants, Muslims, etc.”

Senate campaign: After deciding to run for Senate in 2022, he recast himself as an unflinching Trump supporter. Vance apologized for denouncing Trump, adopted his hard-line stances on immigration and other issues, and won Trump’s endorsement. He has said Trump’s term in the White House proved his opposition wrong. He also said in 2019 that “Trump’s popularity in the Vance household went up substantially” because of Brett Kavanaugh’s Supreme Court confirmation hearings, during which the judge — whom Trump had nominated and for whom Vance’s wife had clerked — was accused of sexual assault.

Election denial: He has not committed to accepting the results of this year’s election. “If we have a free and fair election, I will accept the results,” he said on CNN in May. It’s a caveat that many Republicans have used, leaving the door open to the notion of foul play and helping to sow doubt in advance. In February, he told ABC News that if he had been vice president on 6 January 2021, he would not have certified the election as Mike Pence did, but would have “told the states, like Pennsylvania, Georgia and so many others, that we needed to have multiple slates of electors, and I think the U.S. Congress should have fought over it from there.” 

Published in The New York Times on 15 July 2024. Reprinted with permission.