Usha Chilukuri Vance, the wife of JD Vance, at the Republican National Convention said that neither JD Vance nor she expected to find themselves in this position on Thursday. “But it’s hard to imagine a more powerful example of the American Dream,” she added, introducing her husband after Donald Trump named him his running mate for the US presidential polls.

Future Second Lady Usha Vance: “Neither J.D. nor I expected to find ourselves in this position — but it’s hard to imagine a more powerful example of the American Dream.”

FULL REMARKS: pic.twitter.com/JJgdJbem0H

— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) July 18, 2024

Usha, born to immigrant parents from Andhra Pradesh, shared their story from the stage of the RNC. Recounting their first meeting and the journey that led them to this moment, she said “There was only one thing to do, to explain, from the heart, why I love and admire JD, why I stand here beside him today, and why he will make a great Vice President of the United States.”

She shared how they met at the law school, where JD was a “working-class student” who had “overcome childhood traumas” and served in Iraq as a Marine. “A tough Marine who had served in Iraq but whose idea of a good time was playing with puppies,” she said.

Usha shed light on the Ohio senator’s curious and enthusiastic approach to their differences when they first met, including his adaptation to her vegetarian diet and learning to cook Indian food from her mother. “Although he is a meat and potato kind of guy, he adapted to my vegetarian diet and learnt to cook Indian food from my mother,” she said.

JD and Usha Vance met at Yale Law School and married in 2014. The couple has three children together – Ewan, 6, Vivek, 4, and Mirabel, 2.

JD Vance also delivered a powerful speech at the RNC, talking about his roots in small-town Ohio and the economic challenges communities across the Rust Belt faced. He spoke about the struggles of small towns in Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan and other states, where jobs have been sent overseas and children have been sent to war.

He vowed to be a champion for these forgotten communities, promising to never forget his humble beginnings. “I promise you this: I will be a vice president who never forgets where he came from,” JD said.

“To the people of Middletown, Ohio, and all the forgotten communities in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, and every corner of our nation, I will fight for you, I will stand with you, and I will never forget the struggles we face.”

JD Vance introduced himself to a national audience on July 17 after being chosen as Donald Trump’s running mate, sharing the story of his hardscrabble upbringing and making the case that his party best understands the challenges facing struggling Americans.

Speaking to a packed arena at the Republican National Convention, the Ohio senator cast himself as a fighter for a forgotten working class, making a direct appeal to the Rust Belt voters who helped drive Mr. Trump’s surprise 2016 victory and voicing their anger and frustration.

“In small towns like mine in Ohio, or next door in Pennsylvania, or in Michigan, in states all across our country, jobs were sent overseas and children were sent to war,” he said.

“To the people of Middletown, Ohio, and all the forgotten communities in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and every corner of our nation, I promise you this,” he said. “I will be a vice president who never forgets where he came from.”

The 39-year-old Ohio senator is a relative political unknown, having served in the Senate for less than two years. He rapidly morphed in recent years from a bitter critic of the former President to an aggressive defender and is now positioned to become the future leader of the party and the torch-bearer of Mr. Trump’s “Make America Great Again” political movement.

The first millennial to join the top of a major party ticket, Mr. Vance enters the race as questions about the age of the men at the top — 78-year-old Mr. Trump and 81-year-old President Joe Biden — have been high on the list of voters’ concerns. He also joins Mr. Trump after an assassination attempt against the former President — in which Mr. Trump came perhaps millimetres from death or serious injury — underscoring the importance of a potential successor.

But Mr. Trump’s decision to choose Mr. Vance wasn’t about picking a running mate or the next Vice President, said Indiana Rep. Jim Banks, who introduced the senator at a fundraiser earlier on July 17.

“Donald Trump picked a man in J.D. Vance that is the future of the country, the future of the Republican Party, the future of the America First movement,” he said.

In his speech, Mr. Vance shared his story of growing up poor in Kentucky and Ohio, his mother addicted to drugs and his father absent. He later joined the Marines, graduated from Yale Law School, and went on to the highest levels of U.S. politics — an embodiment of an American dream he said is in now in short supply.

“Never in my wildest imagination could I have believed that I’d be standing here tonight,” he said.

Mr. Vance gained prominence following the publication of his bestselling 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” which tells the story of his blue-collar roots. The book became a must-read for those seeking to understand the cultural forces that propelled Trump to the White House that year. Mr. Vance spent years as a Trump critic, assailing the former President with insults, before he changed his mind.

Mr. Vance, who had never attended, let alone spoken at a previous Republican convention, spent much of his speech talking up Mr. Trump and going after Mr. Biden, using his relative youth to draw a contrast with the 81-year-old President.

Mr. Vance says he was in fourth grade when “a career politician by the name of Joe Biden supported NAFTA, a bad trade deal that sent countless good American manufacturing jobs to Mexico.”

“Joe Biden has been a politician in Washington as long as I’ve been alive,” he added. “For half a century, he’s been a champion of every single policy initiative to make America weaker and poorer.”

The crowd inside the convention hall welcomed Vance warmly. They erupted into chants of “Mamaw!” in honour of his grandmother, and chanted “J.D.’s Mom!” after he introduced his mother, a former addict who has been sober for 10 years.

Mr. Vance was introduced on July 17 night by his wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance, who talked of the stark difference between how she and her husband grew up — she was a middle-class immigrant from San Diego, and he is from a low-income Appalachian family. She called him “a meat and potatoes kind of guy” who respected her vegetarian diet and learned to cook Indian food for her mother.

Mr. Trump, again wearing a bandage over his injured ear, watched Mr. Vance speak from his family box and was often seen smiling.

Most Americans — and Republicans — didn’t know much about Mr. Vance before July 17 night. According to a new poll from the AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, which was conducted before Trump selected the freshman senator as his choice, 6 in 10 Americans don’t know enough about him to have formed an opinion. That includes 61% of Republicans.

Democrats have attacked Mr. Vance for his past support for a national abortion ban, his criticism of U.S. involvement in Ukraine, and his eagerness to blame Democrats for Trump’s assassination attempt. But the young senator steered clear of such controversies in his remarks, which were light on the red-meat conservative attacks that convention audiences typically expect.

Mr. Biden’s campaign responded with a blistering statement calling Vance “unprepared, unqualified, and willing to do anything Donald Trump demands.”

“Tonight, J.D. Vance, the poster boy for Project 2025, took center stage. But it’s working families and the middle class who will suffer if he’s allowed to stay there,” said Michael Tyler, Biden campaign communication director.

Convention organizers had stressed a theme of unity, even before Mr. Trump survived an attempted assassination at a rally in Pennsylvania on July 13. Mr. Trump’s refusal to accept the results of the 2020 election and the subsequent attack on the U.S. Capitol, officials said, would be absent from the stage.

But that changed with former White House official Peter Navarro, who was greeted with a standing ovation hours after being released from a Miami prison where he served four months for defying a subpoena from the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by a mob of the former president’s supporter.

“If they can come for me, if they can come for Donald Trump, be careful. They will come for you,” he said in a fiery speech, comparing his legal troubles to those faced by Mr. Trump, who earlier this year was convicted on 34 felony charges in his criminal hush money trial.

Also spotted on the floor of the convention: Paul Manafort, Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign chair, and Roger Stone, who were both convicted as part of the investigation into Russia’s meddling in that election. Trump pardoned both Manafort and Stone.

Beyond Mr. Vance’s primetime speech, the Republican Party focused on July 17 on a theme of American global strength.

In a particularly powerful moment, the relatives of service members killed during Mr. Biden’s disastrous withdrawal from Afghanistan took the stage, holding photographs of their loved ones.

Christy Shamblin, whose daughter-in-law Marine Sgt. Nicole Gee died in the attack, spoke of the six hours she said Trump spent with her family in Bedminster, New Jersey and “spoke to us in a way that made us feel understood.”

“Donald Trump carried the weight for a few hours with me. And for the first time since Nicole’s death I felt I wasn’t alone in my grief,” she said.

Herman Lopez, whose son, Marine Cpl. Hunter Lopez, was among those killed, read aloud the names of all 13 U.S. service members who died in the Aug. 26, 2021, attack.

Also featured were the parents of Omer Neutra, one of eight Americans still being held hostage in Gaza after the Oct. 7 attack by Hamas.

His parents, Ronen and Orna, said Mr. Trump called them after their son, a soldier in the Israeli army, was captured, and offered support. As they spoke, the crowd chanted “Bring them home!”

New Delhi:

Usha Chilukuri Vance, wife of JD Vance, Donald Trump’s vice-presidential pick, spoke at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee where she revealed her husband’s culinary skills in Indian cuisine.

Describing him as a “meat and potatoes” kind of guy, she mentioned his newfound ability to cook Indian food.

Recalling their meeting at Yale Law School, Ms Vance portrayed their relationship as “a testament to this great country”.

“We started as friends,” she said. “He was then, as he is now, the most interesting person I knew – a working class guy who had overcome childhood traumas that I could barely fathom to end up at Yale Law School, a tough marine who had served in Iraq, but who enjoys spending his leisure time playing with puppies and watching the movie ‘Babe’.”

Ms Vance also highlighted the diverse backgrounds they come from.

JD Vance has acknowledged the influence of his Hindu wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance, on his personal and spiritual life.

In an interview with Fox News, he explained how his wife’s Hindu faith had been pivotal in guiding him through challenges and reconciling his Catholic beliefs.

Previously, JD Vance has often credited Usha for supporting his success. During a 2020 interview with The Megyn Kelly Show, Vance described his wife as a “strong female voice” that grounds him. “Usha definitely brings me back to earth. If I get a little too confident or proud, I remind myself that she’s way more accomplished than I am,” he had said.

Washington:

Usha Chilukuri Vance, the wife of JD Vance, whom Donald Trump declared as his running mate in the upcoming US presidential elections on Monday, brings a wealth of credentials and a deep connection to Indian values and culture.

A litigator at a national firm, Usha Vance is the daughter of Indian immigrants and has an impressive academic background.

She holds a bachelor’s degree in History from Yale University and a Master of Philosophy degree from the University of Cambridge, according to the New York Times.

Born Usha Chilukuri, she has carved out a distinguished career in the legal field, having clerked for Supreme Court Justices John Roberts and Brett Kavanaugh before Kavanaugh’s nomination to the Court.

Raised in a suburb of San Diego, California, with a strong emphasis on education and hard work, Usha’s academic achievements include serving as Managing Editor of the Yale Journal of Law & Technology and Executive Development Editor of The Yale Law Journal, according to a biography from Munger, Tolles & Olson law firm.

After four years of intense extracurricular activity at Yale, she continued her studies as a Gates fellow at Cambridge, where she engaged with left-wing and liberal groups. She was a registered Democrat in 2014.

Usha and JD Vance first met at Yale Law School and were married in Kentucky in 2014, with a Hindu priest presiding over a separate ceremony, according to the New York Times. The couple has three children together.

Usha Vance has played a subtle yet significant role in her husband’s success. She assisted Vance in organizing his thoughts on the social decline in rural white America, which inspired his best-selling memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, which was adapted into a film directed by Ron Howard in 2020.

In the past, she has made some rare appearances with Vance as he sought the Ohio Senate seat.

As the US presidential elections draw near, former US President Donald Trump made his pick for Vice President, selecting JD Vance as his running mate on Monday. Trump confirmed Vance’s candidature through a post on social media.

Speaking to ANI, a US-based global real estate investment advisor and a well-known entrepreneur, AI Mason said, “Usha Vance is a highly accomplished attorney and daughter of Indian immigrants — and her husband brings youth and diversity to the Trump ticket.”

“She knows the Indian culture and all about India. She can be a big help to her husband in navigating great ties between USA and India,” the entrepreneur, who is also a friend of the Trump family, said.

Meanwhile, in an interview earlier with Fox & Friends, Usha Chilukuri Vance and her Senator husband talked about the two having different faiths, and what are their views on the speculations of him becoming a pick for the Vice President of the US.

“I don’t think people understand how hard he works and how creative he is. Everything he says and does is built on a foundation of so much thought. He’s always trying to do better,” Usha Vance said.

On being asked about the reason behind her support for JD Vance, as the US Presidential elections remain around the corner, Usha told Fox, “There are a few different reasons…One is that I grew up in a religious household. My parents are Hindu, and that was one of the things that made them such good parents, that makes them really very good people. And so I think I’ve seen that…the power of that in my own life, and I knew that JD was searching for something. This just felt right for him.”

The interview was taken three weeks before the announcement of JD Vance as the running mate of Trump in the upcoming US presidential polls.

Vance was born James David Bowman in Middletown, Ohio, to a mother who struggled with addiction and a father who left the family when JD was a toddler. He was raised by his grandparents.

The Trump campaign says the former president, following his brush with death, will call for unity in the face of tragedy instead of criticising his political adversaries as he faces off with President Biden in a 2024 election rematch.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)