Trump picks Ohio Senator J.D. Vance as running mate for 2024 election
Shafaq News/ Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump announced on Monday that he has selected Ohio Senator J.D. Vance as his vice-presidential running mate during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.
“After lengthy deliberation and thought, and considering the tremendous talents of many others, I have decided that the person best suited to assume the position of Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance of the Great State of Ohio,” Trump said in a post on his social platform.
He added, " J.D. honorably served our Country in the Marine Corps, graduated from Ohio State University in two years, Summa Cum Laude, and is a Yale Law School Graduate, where he was Editor of The Yale Law Journal, and President of the Yale Law Veterans Association. J.D.’s book, “Hillbilly Elegy,” became a Major Best Seller and Movie, as it championed the hardworking men and women of our Country.”
Trump noted that “J.D. has had a very successful business career in Technology and Finance, and now, during the Campaign, will be strongly focused on the people he fought so brilliantly for, the American Workers and Farmers in Pennsylvania, Michigan, Wisconsin, Ohio, Minnesota, and far beyond.”
Vance will join Trump on the campaign trail for the presidential election scheduled for November.
Who is J.D. Vance?
J.D. Vance, born in Middletown, Connecticut, in 1984, is a Senator from Ohio. He graduated from Middletown High School in 2003 and earned a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Philosophy from Ohio State University in 2009. He received his Juris Doctor from Yale Law School in 2013.
Vance served in the US Marine Corps from 2003 to 2007, participating in Operation Iraqi Freedom. He was elected as a Republican to the US Senate in 2022 for a term ending January 3, 2029.
During the 2016 US presidential election, Vance was an outspoken critic of then-Republican candidate Donald Trump. In a February 2016 op-ed, he wrote that “Trump’s actual policy proposals, as they are, range from immoral to absurd.” Vance also described Trump as “cultural heroin” and “opium for the masses” in media interviews.
In October 2016, Vance labeled Trump “reprehensible” in a Twitter post and called himself a “never-Trump guy.” In a private Facebook message, he referred to Trump as “America’s Hitler.”
By February 2018, Vance began changing his stance, saying Trump was “one of the few political leaders in America who recognizes the frustration that exists in large parts of Ohio, Pennsylvania, and eastern Kentucky.” Vance subsequently supported Trump in 2020, and in July 2021, he apologized for calling Trump “reprehensible” and deleted his critical 2016 tweets.
Vance stated that he now believed Trump was a good president and regretted his 2016 criticisms. In October 2021, Vance echoed Trump’s claims of widespread election fraud, asserting that Trump lost the 2020 presidential election due to significant fraud. On April 15, Trump endorsed Vance for the US Senate.
