After being the victim of an assassination attempt last Saturday, former President Donald Trump announced Monday who his running mate will be for the presidential campaign. It will be best-selling author and junior senator from Ohio, JD Vance, he revealed during the first day of the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
“I have determined that the best person to serve as Vice President of the United States is Senator J.D. Vance of the great State of Ohio,” Trump posted on his Truth Social network. His running mate is set to deliver a speech Wednesday night at a convention that is expected to be historic, coming just days after former President Trump was shot at a political rally in Pennsylvania.
Mr. Vance, 39, is a former military man and venture capitalist. Now a vocal advocate for Make America Great Again Donald Trump, he first became known to the public in 2016 with the publication of his book Hillbilly Elegywhich tells the story of his family, white working-class Americans living in rural Ohio. He is close to Donald Trump Jr..the son of the former president.
This choice of running mate is surprising, insofar as JD Vance is not complementary to Mr. Trump, which is what one might have expected, points out Christophe Cloutier-Roy, deputy director of the Observatory on the United States of the Raoul-Dandurand Chair at UQAM. “It shows us that perhaps the biggest criterion we were ultimately looking for in the vice-presidential candidate was loyalty, J.D. Vance has really demonstrated that a lot for several years now.”
He hasn’t always been a fan of the 78-year-old former businessman, however. In 2016, he called him a “total fraud,” a “moral disaster” and “America’s Hitler.” He’s since changed his tune. “You might wonder which side of Vance is more ideological and which is more opportunistic. It’s clear that he’s someone who’s adapted a lot to please Trump,” Cloutier-Roy said.
In Defense of Trump
J. . Vance is known for having ardently defended Donald Trump on several occasions, notably on television sets. In the American Congress, he carries the causes that the former Republican president has at heart, such as the fight against immigration and economic protectionism.
“On issues like firearms, there is a constant in JD Vance’s discourse. He has always been very, very aligned with the traditional positions of the Republican Party,” notes Christophe Cloutier-Roy. On certain issues, however, he positions himself further to the right than Donald Trump: on the issue of banning abortion, in particular, he opposes any exception, including in cases of rape or incest.
A leading figure in political events on the American radical right, he may have been chosen by Donald Trump to take over, Cloutier-Roy suggests. “He is relatively young and very aligned with his policies. So it may be a way of preparing the future of the Republican Party when Trump is no longer here.”
The author’s choice of Hillbilly Elegy as a running mate is not insignificant, he continues. “In his book, he denounced a lot precisely the decline of industrial America in the northeastern region of the United States, which is called the Rust Belt. Selecting JD Vance as his running mate shows some continuity in Trump’s vision of ‘making America great again.'”
J. . Vance is scheduled to deliver a speech Wednesday night at a convention in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, that is expected to be historic, coming just days after former President Trump was targeted by a gunman at a political rally in Pennsylvania.
With Fabien Deglise and Agence France-Presse
