Trump announces 39-year-old senator JD Vance as his VP pick

US Senator JD Vance addressing a conservative event in June 2024. (JEFF KOWALSKY / AFP)

• Donald Trump wants JD Vance to be the vice president if he is elected to the top job.
• Vance is 39, and has spent a single term in the US senate, making him one of the least experienced US VP picks in modern times.
• He was previously an outspoken Trump critic. 

Donald Trump on Monday named right-wing Ohio Senator JD Vance as his running mate in the US presidential election, a one-time harsh critic who became one of his most loyal supporters in Congress.

Trump, 78, announced his pick on the first day of the Republican Party convention in Milwaukee, an extravaganza turbocharged by the attempted assassination of the former president.

One of the least experienced VP picks in modern history, the one-term senator 39-year-old is further to the right than the ex-president on many issues including abortion, where he embraces calls for federal legislation.

He made his name with the 2016 memoir “Hillbilly Elegy,” a best-selling account of his Appalachian family and modest Rust Belt upbringing, which gave a voice to rural, working-class resentment in left-behind America.

Critics have pointed to numerous awkward remarks one-time “Never Trump guy” Vance has made in the past, including calling the billionaire an “idiot,” “noxious” and “reprehensible” and suggesting he was “America’s Hitler.”

Vance reinvented himself as a Trump supporter in recent years and ultimately won the ex-president’s key endorsement in the 2022 Ohio Senate race.

‘Supposed to be dead’

With the country still reeling from images of the bloodied Trump being escorted off a rally stage, some 50 000 Republicans descended on the shores of Lake Michigan for the four-day gathering, four months before the election against Democratic President Joe Biden.

The attempted assassination — in which one bystander was killed, and two more wounded — was expected to dominate proceedings, with Trump dismissing calls to postpone and vowing to be “defiant in the face of wickedness.”

“I’m not supposed to be here, I’m supposed to be dead,” he told the New York Post in an interview aboard his plane to Milwaukee, during which he reportedly had a white bandage on his ear and a large bruise on his forearm from where Secret Service agents gripped him.

The Secret Service, which is battling criticism it failed to protect Trump from the shooter, said it was “fully prepared” to ensure security at the convention.

Leading in multiple polls, despite being convicted at his hush-money criminal case in New York, Trump is exuding confidence.

Biden, 81, meanwhile is facing calls from his own side to quit the race over concerns around his age.

Trump scored another victory Monday as a judge dismissed the criminal case against him over accusations he endangered national security by holding on to top secret documents after leaving the White House.

Message of unity

He immediately took to Truth Social to call for the dismissal of all legal cases against him, insisting again that he was being targeted for political reasons.

Trump told the Post he had “prepared an extremely tough speech” about Biden’s “horrible administration” to deliver when he becomes the official Republican nominee on Thursday.

As some Republicans — including Vance — sought to blame Democrats’ anti-Trump rhetoric for the attack, Trump also said he hopes to “unite our country.”

Still, that would see him have to rein in the instinct to settle scores — demonstrated by his cry for supporters to “fight” in the seconds after Saturday’s attack.

The Milwaukee gathering is largely designed in Trump’s image, with digital banners beaming out a message in the cavernous convention arena: “Make America Great Once Again.