JD Vance, who once called Trump 'America's Hitler' & 'idiot', is his running mate

Ending months of suspense, former US President Donald Trump on Monday named JD Vance as his running mate.

Trump’s announcement of Vance’s vice presidential nomination coincided with his own formal election as the Republican Party’s presidential nominee at the ongoing Republican National Convention at Milwaukee in Wisconsin state.

Vance is a freshman senator from Ohio who has transformed from a critic of Trump into a superfan perfectly aligned with his policies.

In 2016, in the run-up to the presidential election that brought Trump to power, Vance had called Trump “America’s Hitler”, “cynical asshole”, and “cultural heroin”, according to The New York Times.

Vance had also called Trump “loathsome” and “idiot”, as per the newspaper.

In 2016, Vance had denounced Trump as a false pain reliever for the American voters.

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“During this election season, it appears that many Americans have reached for a new pain reliever…It enters minds, not through lungs or veins, but through eyes and ears, and its name is Donald Trump,” wrote Vance in an article for The Atlantic as he argued that Trump was not the solution that Americans seek.

Your next Vice President: @JDVance1 pic.twitter.com/wkNNl2ELJU

— Team Trump (Text TRUMP to 88022) (@TeamTrump) July 15, 2024

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While Vance once denounced Trump’s electoral platform as ranging from “immoral to absurd”, he is now a staunch believer of his far-right Make America Great Again (MAGA) movement and is seen as his political successor who could take the movement ahead if and when Trump retires.

Vance has long pitched himself as a voice of the White working-class Americans, who form the core of Trump’s support base. He has written about growing up poor in rural Kentucky and Ohio and, after taking a u-turn regarding Trump, believes that Trump is the only one who has grip on the frustrations of the rural working class Americans.