JD Vance

JD Vance (born James David Vance) is a politician, author and former venture capitalist and the 50th vice president of the United States. Vance spent his childhood in Middletown, Ohio, where he was raised in a working-class family. He detailed much of his upbringing in his memoir, Hillbilly Elegy (2016), in which he recounts his experience being raised in poverty. After graduating from Middletown High School, Vance served in the U.S. Marine Corps, including a deployment to Iraq as a military journalist. He then attended Ohio State University before earning his law degree from Yale Law School, where he met his future wife, Usha Vance.

Following law school, Vance worked as a corporate lawyer and venture capitalist, investing in technology startups. His rise to national prominence came with the publication of Hillbilly Elegy in 2016, which became a bestseller and sparked widespread discussion about working-class America. The book later inspired the 2020 film adaptation directed by Ron Howard and starring Amy Adams and Glenn Close.

Vance leveraged his public profile into a political career, winning election to the U.S. Senate from Ohio in 2022. In 2024, Donald Trump selected him as his running mate and the pair won the presidential election. Vance was sworn in as vice president in January 2025. He is also the author of Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith (2026), a memoir about his religious journey and conversion to Catholicism.

Vance married Usha Vance (née Chilukuri) in 2014 after meeting in law school. The couple share three children: Ewan Vance (born in 2017), Vivek Vance (born in 2020) and Mirabel Vance (born in 2021). In 2026, they announced they were expecting their fourth child.