All eyes are on Ohio Sen. JD Vance, former President Donald Trump’s pick for his running mate. His wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance — and her Indian heritage — has also sparked intrigue.
Chilukuri Vance introduced her husband at the Republican National Convention Wednesday night, putting herself in a rarely sought spotlight.
JD and Usha have been married for roughly 10 years and share three children. Vance’s wife reportedly played an influential role in his political career.
She hasn’t made many public appearances but has provided support for Vance. Meanwhile, her resume is as impressive as her politician husband’s.
Here’s everything you should know about Usha Chilukuri Vance.
What is Usha Chilukuri Vance’s background?
Apart from clerking for Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh, Chilukuri Vance worked as a litigator for Munger, Tolles and Olson law firm based in San Francisco and Washington, D.C., from 2015 until her husband became Trump’s vice presidential candidate pick.
“Usha has been an excellent lawyer and colleague, and we thank her for her years of work and wish her the best in her future career,” the law firm told Bloomberg Law. The firm is described as “radically progressive,” a contrast from her husband’s conservative politics.
Born to Indian immigrant parents, Chilukuri Vance grew up in the San Diego suburbs. Her father is a retired aerospace engineer and university lecturer and her mother is a professor of molecular biology.
She told Fox News in June that she grew up in a religious household. “My parents are Hindu. That was one of the things that made them good parents, made them good people,” she said.
How did JD Vance meet his wife, Usha Chilukuri Vance?
Their love story began at Yale. According to Vance’s 2016 memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy,” they got to know each other during a class assignment and fell in love.
During their time in college, the pair were on The Yale Law Journal’s masthead in 2012; Vance was an editor and his wife was the executive development editor. They also organized discussion groups revolving around the decline in rural America that became the basis of his memoir.
“In a place that always seemed a little foreign, Usha’s presence made me feel at home,” he wrote in his memoir. Vance withdrew his clerkship application to not lose Chilukuri Vance. Later, they decided to go through the process together.
Vance had a tough childhood; his mother struggled with drug addiction. In his book, he wrote about struggling to deal with relationship problems, and thought getting away from the intense emotions would help, “but Usha wouldn’t let me,” he wrote.
“I tried to break everything off multiple times, but she told me that was stupid unless I didn’t care about her.”
Vance detailed the experience of visiting her family for Thanksgiving in his memoir, saying, “I was amazed at the lack of drama.”
“Usha’s mother didn’t complain about her father behind his back. There were no suggestions that good family friends were liars or backstabbers, no angry exchanges between a man’s wife and the same man’s sister,” Vance said. “Usha’s parents seemed to genuinely like her grandmother and spoke of their siblings with love.”
They tied the knot a year after graduating in an interfaith marriage ceremony in Kentucky. Canadian conservative Member of Parliament Jamil Jivani, who is close to Vance and called him a brother in a social media post, performed the Bible reading at the wedding.
Usha Chilukuri Vance credited with JD Vance’s success
According to The New York Times, Chilukuri Vance was a registered Democrat until at least 2014, moving in liberal circles. She voted in the 2022 Republican primary in Ohio, when Vance made his political debut and ran for Senate.
Vance has, time and again, credited his wife for his success.
“Usha definitely brings me back to earth a little bit, and if I maybe get a little bit too cocky or a little too proud, I just remind myself that she is way more accomplished than I am,” he said on the Megyn Kelly Show podcast in 2020.
“I’m one of those guys who really benefits from having, like, a sort of powerful female voice on his left shoulder saying: ‘Don’t do that, do do that’ — it just is important.”
In an interview last month, Chilukuri Vance indicated she and her family will cross the bridge of Vance becoming Trump’s running mate when the time comes.
“I don’t know that anyone is ever ready for that kind of scrutiny. I think we found the first campaign that he embarked on to be a shock. It was so different from anything we’d ever done before. But it was an adventure,” she said.
“And so I guess the way that I put it is, I’m not raring to change anything about our lives right now. But I really, you know, believe in JD, and I really love him. And so we’ll just sort of see what happens with our lives.”
Indian Americans are making waves in American politics
Chilukuri Vance enters a circle of high-level Indian Americans drawing attention in political circles.
“Indian Americans have come of age and are active in public life in America,” Meera Shankar, a former ambassador of India to the U.S., told DW News.
“There have been two governors of Indian origin, and the number of congressmen and senators of Indian origin has increased in recent elections. All this has an exemplary effect encouraging others to follow in their footsteps,” added Shankar.
In the 2024 presidential race alone, there’s Vice President Kamala Harris, whose mother is an Indian biologist, as well as former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley and businessman Vivek Ramaswamy, who are also of Indian descent.