Vice Presidential nominee Vance introduced by wife Usha, speaks of hardscrabble roots, military service in RNC address

MILWAUKEE – Donald Trump’s running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance of Ohio, recounted his hardscrabble Ohio upbringing and his post-Sept. 11 military service as he introduced himself and his young family to the nation at the Republican National Convention here Wednesday night.

Unfurling the tale of a boy who grew up in poverty in southwest Ohio with an absent father and a drug-addicted mother – a boy who is now a 39-year-old man nominated to become the next vice president – Vance offered an up-from-the-bootstraps story that the Trump-Vance ticket hopes will resonate with working-class and rural America.

Vance spoke of being raised in Middletown, Ohio, midway between Cincinnati and Dayton – “a small town where people spoke their minds, built with their hands, and loved their God, their family, their community and their country with their whole hearts” – but also a town “cast aside” by the ruling class in Washington.

There, while his own mother struggled with addiction, Vance said he was raised by “Mamaw” – “the name we hillbillies gave to our grandmothers” – who he described as “an old woman who could barely walk but she was tough as nails.” The account was familiar to readers of Vance’s 2016 best-selling memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy.”

Taking the stage to the twangy strains of Merle Haggard’s “America First,” Vance offered voters a narrative through-line about how the lessons he learned with Mamaw in greater Appalachia shaped his populist and isolationist worldview, from his and Trump’s restrictionist trade policies and skepticism of overseas entanglements to their shared hard-line immigration stance and concerns about the scourge of fentanyl in communities across America.

“President Trump represents America’s last best hope to restore what – if lost – may never be found again,” Vance said, saying he and Trump were fighting for people like “the autoworker in Michigan, wondering why out-of-touch politicians are destroying their jobs” and “the factory worker in Wisconsin who makes things with their hands and is proud of American craftsmanship.”

“And our movement is about single moms like mine, who struggled with money and addiction but never gave up,” Vance said, gesturing to his mom who raised both hands to her lips before holding them back out to her son.

“And I am proud to say that tonight my mom is here, 10 years clean and sober,” Vance said in an emotional moment that prompted a standing ovation. “I love you, Mom.”

“J.D.’s mom! J.D.’s mom! J.D.’s mom!” the crowd chanted.

Vance was introduced by his wife, Usha Vance, who was met with a polite but somewhat subdued response, including audible gasps when she described how her husband, a “meat and potatoes” guy, came to embrace her vegetarianism.