The Republican National Convention kicked off in Milwaukee on Monday, formally nominating Donald Trump as the GOP nominee ahead of November's elections. As state delegates elevated the former president to the party's ticket, he announced his pick for Vice President: Ohio Sen. JD Vance.
The announcement is the culmination of weeks of speculation on who would accompany Trump on the ticket. Sources close to the candidate had hinted for weeks now that Vance was the official pick, but Trump, ever the showman, milked the drama until hours before the convention.
Vance is a new member of Congress, serving the 18th month of his first time in the Senate. Why was he the ultimate pick? Here's what you should know about the young Senator.
Who is JD Vance?
Vance grew up in Jackson, Kentucky and Middletown, Ohio. He first came into the public eye with his best-selling memoir in 2016 "hillbilly elegy," where he described childhood as consumed by poverty and abuse. His mother struggled with addiction, leading him to spend many of his formative years with his grandmother.
After high school, Vance joined the Marines and served as a public affairs marine in Iraq. He would eventually go to Yale Law School, where he met his future wife, Usha Vance, a litigator for a law firm based in San Francisco and Washington D.C.
After graduation, he moved to California for a job in venture capitalism until 2022, when Ohio's Republican senator Rob Portman decided not to run for re-election, pushing him to campaign for the job.
Vance and Trump: a rocky but loyal relationship
When Trump first rose to the political mainstream, Vance was an avid critic of him, publicly affirming he would never be a Trump supporter, calling him an "idiot", saying he was "reprehensible" and even comparing him to Hitler.
But since then, he has changed his rhetoric, becoming a loyal Trumper. He defended Trump's actions in the events leading up to and during the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol and was even critical of then-Vice President Mike Pence's handling of the 2020 election results certification, questioning whether the vice president's life was actually endangered during the riots.
He apologized about his Trump criticism in a July 2021 Fox News interview and asked people not to judge him based on what he had said.
"I've been very open that I did say those critical things and I regret them, and I regret being wrong about the guy," he said. "I think he was a good president, I think he made a lot of good decisions for people, and I think he took a lot of flak."
Now, as Vance becomes Trump's VP nominee, at 39-years-old, the Senator would become the youngest Vice President if they are elected.
What are JD Vance's stances on key issues?
Immigration
Vance's views on immigration largely echo those of Trump, particularly amplifying the "great replacement" rhetoric, which claims there is a plot to replace white Americans as the majority group in the U.S.
He wants to finish construction of the border wall and proclaimed that he would "oppose every attempt to grant amnesty" to immigrants who arrived in the U.S. unauthorized. He favors what he called a merit-based system for immigrants seeking to settle in the U.S.
Vance also argues that undocumented immigrants are a source of cheap labor that undercuts wages for American-born workers in states like Ohio. "if you cannot hire illegal migrants to staff your hotels, then you have to go to one of the seven million prime-age American men who are out of the labor force and find some way to re-engage them.
The VP nominee, like Trump, also supports mass deportations and has blamed immigrants for the opioid crisis.
Abortion
The Ohio Senator firmly opposes abortion, even in the case of incest or rape, but says there should be exceptions for cases when the mother's life is in danger. Back in 2022, he praised the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, the New York Times reported.
However, like Trump, he opposes a national ban, saying the issue should now be left to the states, as SCOTUS ruled in the infamous case.
Climate
Vance is skeptical about the scientific consensus that warming of the earth's atmosphere is caused by human activity, hence, claiming that climate change is not a real threat. "It's been changing, as others pointed out, it's been changing for millennia," he told the American Leadership Forum.
He is also a strong supporter of the oil and gas industry, and has voiced opposition to wind and solar energy, and electric vehicles.
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