Donald Trump has chosen Senator JD Vance of Ohio as his running mate, selecting a rising star in the party and previously outspoken Trump critic who in recent years has closely aligned himself with the former president. 

Trump announced his pick Monday on Truth Social. 

If elected in November, Vance, 39, would be one of the youngest vice presidents in history. He is a relative political newcomer, winning his Senate seat in 2022 after rising to prominence as an author who wrote a best-selling memoir. His selection adds a staunch defender of Trump’s movement to the ticket and, some Republican observers said, it could help Trump solidify his base of White working-class voters, particularly in the Upper Midwest. 

Senator JD Vance of Ohio speaks at the Capitol in May. Photo / Ricky Carioti / The Washington Post 

Trump’s choice for a running mate was among the most closely watched decisions of his campaign and has taken on new significance in the wake of what law enforcement has called an attempted assassination against Trump at a campaign rally on Saturday in Butler, Pa. Even before the shooting, the decision was expected to arrive at a moment of upheaval in the presidential race.

Trump was found guilty on 34 felony counts in a New York hush money case in May, becoming the first former President ever convicted of a crime. On the Democratic side, President Biden’s future has been thrown into uncertainty after a disastrous debate performance where he appeared to repeatedly lose his train of thought, leading to calls from some in his party for him to step aside and let another Democrat challenge Trump.

The Washington Post’s polling average has Trump leading in six of the seven battleground states that are most likely to determine the outcome of the election.

Trump broke with his first-term vice president, Mike Pence, over Pence’s unwillingness to try to overturn Joe Biden’s 2020 election victory. The ex-president, who would be limited to one term if he wins in November, weighed a variety of candidates for his running mate this cycle, requesting documents from at least eight hopefuls and holding unofficial auditions for many of them at campaign events. 

Vance has been one of the former president’s most vocal champions, showing his support outside the New York City courthouse during Trump’s criminal trial this year, as well as boosting him in frequent appearances on cable TV. Vance also has grown close with Trump’s eldest son, Donald Trump Jr. 

He sought to emphasise his upbringing in a fundraising email he released Monday, ahead of an official announcement of his pick. 

“I think so many politicians are lost in the establishment,” he wrote. “They fail their constituents, their country, and ultimately – they fail themselves. It’s an industry of broken promises and corrupt practices. But I will never stoop to that level. My roots – my family – my hometown – are what got me here. The good and the bad.” 

Donald Trump and JD Vance greet supporters during a rally in November, 2022. Trump has named Vance as his running mate for this year's US presidential election. Photo / Getty

Vance grew up in a steel mill community in Ohio in a family beset by drug addiction and poverty, which he chronicled in his book, Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis. 

He served in Iraq as a US Marine from 2003 to 2007 before studying political science and philosophy at Ohio State University and attending Yale Law School. He went on to work at a large corporate law firm and then as a principal at billionaire Peter Thiel’s investment firm in San Francisco. 

The Ohio Republican has embraced a more populist direction for the GOP under Trump, embracing his “America First” policies and offshoots the former president and his followers have championed. Vance has vehemently criticised US aid to Ukraine. He has taken on culture war issues, introducing a ban on gender-affirming care for minors. He has also praised authoritarian Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban for “some smart decisions,” echoing Trump’s appreciation for strongmen. 

On abortion, another focal point of this year’s election, Vance had previously argued against exceptions to abortion restrictions for rape and incest. But he has since moderated his pitch after losing an Ohio abortion ballot measure, acknowledging that Republicans are mistrusted on the issue and need to find middle ground, putting him in alignment with Trump. 

Vance has echoed Trump’s false claims about widespread fraud in the 2020 election, and he has indicated that he would have taken a different path on January 6, 2021, than Pence. 

“If I had been vice president, I would have told the states, like Pennsylvania, Georgia and so many others, that we needed to have multiple slates of electors, and I think the US Congress should have fought over it from there,” Vance said in a February interview with ABC News. “That is the legitimate way to deal with an election that a lot of folks, including me, think had a lot of problems in 2020.” 

Like Trump, he has stopped short of saying he would definitely accept the results of this year’s election, saying he would do so if it is “free and fair”. 

While Vance is now one of Trump’s most steadfast allies, he was previously critical. He wrote in an Atlantic opinion piece in July 2016 that Trump was “cultural heroin” for the masses. 

“He makes some feel better for a bit,” he wrote. “But he cannot fix what ails them, and one day they’ll realise it.” 

He declared Trump “unfit for our nation’s highest office” in an August 2016 New York Times op-ed headlined Why Trump’s Antiwar Message Resonates with White America. Vance also sent a message that year to his law school roommate, Josh McLaurin, saying that he went “back and forth between thinking Trump is a cynical asshole like Nixon who wouldn’t be that bad (and might even prove useful) or that he’s America’s Hitler.” McLaurin had reached out to Vance about writing an opinion piece together at the time. 

“I never could have dreamed during those exchanges in 2016 that he would end up being one of the principal reinforcers of Trumpism only a few years later,” said McLaurin, who is now a Democratic state senator in Georgia. 

Vance wrote in a now-deleted tweet that he had voted for a third-party candidate in 2016. But when he ran for Senate in 2020, Vance said he regretted criticizing Trump, and Trump eventually endorsed him, putting him on the path to victory in his primary. Vance said he voted for Trump in 2020. 

Vance’s former attacks on Trump could be a liability as Democrats aim to portray Trump’s vice-presidential pick as a loyal lackey to the top of the ticket who will bend over backward to meet Trump’s commands. Some also saw Vance’s campaign for his Senate seat to be lethargic and frustrating to donors. 

Now, his vehement defenses of Trump have earned praise from the former president and others who have seen Vance as an intellectual force for Trump. In May, Donald Trump Jr. shared and celebrated a CNN appearance when Vance argued that Trump’s conviction in the hush money case was politically motivated. 

“You cannot say that this trial was anything more than politics masquerading as justice,” Vance told Wolf Blitzer in a clip the younger Trump posted. “I will help Donald Trump however I think that I can because if we allow this to happen it’s so much bigger and more troubling than Donald Trump.” 

Vance also contributes deep-pocketed connections in Silicon Valley, where he worked after his book’s success. He worked with David Sacks to organise a San Francisco fundraiser for Trump in June, and Thiel has financially supported his campaign. 

Marianne LeVine contributed to this report.