During J.D. Vance’s arrival at the Republican National Convention on Monday as Donald Trump’s choice for vice president, a moment came when he and his wife, Usha, looked at each other amidst the cheering delegates.
And as their eyes met, it was clear that although J.D. Vance has sold his soul by sucking up to Trump, his heart still belongs to her.
It was equally clear that Usha’s heart was his. She looked completely happy to be there because he had arrived where he so desperately wanted to be.
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But then the smile faded and at other moments she appeared fatigued and had a “What am I doing here?” look. She was a lone slender woman in a simple dress, hair its actual color with no attempt to conceal strands of gray at 38. But that only made her stand out all the more in the MAGA sea of “Bleach-Blonde, Bad-Built, Butch-Bodies.” She seemed to be exactly her own person, and that invites a list of things we should know about her.
J.D. Vance's kiss for his wife in front of the cameras shows how their relationship will now become public fodder, something she has so far resisted.
Jeenah Moon/ReutersShe started life as Usha Chilukuri, raised by Indian immigrants in a suburb of San Diego, her mother a biologist (now a college provost), her father an engineer. She was an avid trivia competitor in high school and played flute in the marching band.
In 2013, she went off to Yale Law School, where she met J.D. Vance. He later wrote in his memoir Hillbilly Elegy that she was “bright, hardworking, tall, and beautiful.” They both became mentees of Professor Amy Chua of “Tiger Mom” fame. Chua is said to have encouraged their union.
Usha was a registered Democrat until 2014. She is said to have retained liberal leanings as she went on to clerk for Brett Kavanaugh when he was in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit and then for U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts. She proved to be a brilliant attorney as she went on to work for two law firms considered progressive, one of them nearly woke.
Usha Vance has been at her husband's side as he campaigns before but never on the scale she experienced on the Republican National Convention floor.
Anna Moneymaker/ReutersShe married Vance in 2014. They had three children–one a month before her Supreme Court clerkship began–and in interviews her work colleagues have marveled at how she manages to juggle hands-on motherhood with an intense legal career. At least until Monday; she quit her firm as her husband’s new place at Trump’s side was announced.
She was a smiling presence at J.D. Vance’s side when he successfully ran for U.S. Senate in Ohio in 2022, even as he shamed himself in a successful effort to secure an endorsement from a mendacious former president he once compared to Hitler.
Before and after she became a senator’s wife, she was said to seldom talk politics. She maintained public silence when the man she met at Yale Law School condemned universities—perhaps Sixth College, University of California which her mother runs—as ”the enemy,” saying, “They do not pursue knowledge and truth. They pursue deceit and lies.”
The same applied when he professed to be “astonished when I learned that people listened to classical music for pleasure…” Usha is currently a board member of the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra and is an honorary trustee of the Washington National Opera.
And she appeared to just let it pass when he supported Ohio’s abortion ban, even for victims and rape and incest. That includes such cases as a pregnant 10- year-old forced to travel to Indiana for an abortion.
She sounded resigned when asked about J.D.’s hopes to become Donald Trump’s choice for vice president.
Usha Vance has supported her husband in public but seems more ambivalent about his prospects when asked directly about them.
Jeenah Moon/Reuters“I’m not raring to change anything about our lives right now, but I believe in J.D., and I really love him, and so we’ll just sort of see what happens with our life,” she told The New York Times.
On Monday, she climbed with her husband into a black Secret Service SUV outside their Cincinnati, Ohio, home (they share 5,000 square feet in the city’s toniest section) and rode off in a motorcade.
J.D made his triumphant arrival at the GOP convention in Milwaukee in the afternoon. And when he and Usha gazed at each other there was a spark of what appeared to be true love, even in MAGAland.
Then she had a look that made you hope that the heart will prove to be enough when your husband has sold his soul.
