Usha Vance is a lawyer, a graduate of Yale, the Hindu daughter of Indian immigrants – and she just became the “second lady” of the United States.

She was thrust into the limelight after her husband, JD Vanceit was chosen as Donald Trump’s running mate in the 2024 presidential election.

Almost immediately, she quit her job as a lawyer and appeared on stage to introduce him at the Republican Convention.

There, she gave a flavor of her husband; a “working class guy” who had overcome childhood trauma to attend Yale Law School.

Read more:
Donald Trump declares victory
Republicans win control of the Senate for the first time in four years

A “meat and potatoes” man who adapted to her vegetarian diet and learned to cook Indian food for her mother.

A “tough Marine” who served in Iraq but loved nothing more than “playing with puppies and watching the movie Babe.”

This duality was also present in the way the pair positioned themselves as devoted Republicans but parents first.

Mrs Vance spoke of her husband’s “ultimate ambition” to have a family, while he called her “an incredible lawyer and a better mother”.

Early life and family environment

Ms Vance, 38, was raised in San Diego by parents who moved to the US from India in the 1970s.

Her mother is a biologist and chancellor at the University of California, San Diego; her father is an engineer, according to Mr. Vance’s campaign.

In her introductory speech at the Republican Convention, she said her middle-class upbringing was very different from her husband’s experience growing up poor in Ohio.

“That JD and I could even meet, let alone fall in love and marry is a testament to this great country,” Ms Vance said. “It’s also a testament to JD.”

In a June interview with Fox News alongside her husband, Ms. Vance spoke about being raised in a religious household.

“My parents are Hindu, and that’s one of the things that made them such good parents, that made them really good people. And that’s how I saw this power.”

Mr Vance told the TV station that his wife had helped him “re-engage” with his Christian faith.

Ms. Vance received an undergraduate degree from Yale University and a master’s degree in philosophy from the University of Cambridge on a Gates Cambridge scholarship.

She then returned to Yale for law school, where she met her now husband.

How the couple met

In his 2016 memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, Mr. Vance said the two met through a class assignment, where he soon “fell in love” with his writing partner.

“In a place that always seemed a little foreign, Usha’s presence made me feel at home,” he wrote.

In a 2017 NBC interview, Ms. Vance described how she liked that Mr. Vance — then just a friend — was “very diligent” when they were assigned to work together on a law school brief.

“He would turn up at these 9am meetings that we set up to work on the brief together,” she said.

The pair graduated in 2013 and married the following year.

They live in Cincinnati, Ohio, and have three children together: Ewan, Vivek and Mirabel.

Lawyer career

After law school, Ms. Vance spent a year clerking for Justice Brett Kavanaugh — who is now on the Supreme Court — when he served as a Washington appeals court judge, followed by a year as a law clerk to Chief Justice John Roberts.

During that time, Justice Roberts authored a 5-4 ruling upholding Mr. Trump’s travel ban targeting several Muslim-majority countries.

In another ruling, he was in the 7-2 majority that upheld a Christian baker who refused to make a wedding cake for a gay couple.

Follow Sky News on WhatsApp

Keep up to date with all the latest news from the UK and around the world by watching Sky News

Tap here

Until recently, Ms. Vance was an associate at the 200-lawyer firm of Munger Tolles & Olson, where she focused on civil litigation and appeals.

The firm has counted among its clients Berkshire Hathaway, Bank of America and PG&E.

Her clients included a division of the Walt Disney Company and the Regents of the University of California, court records show.

A spokesman for Munger said he was an “excellent lawyer and colleague.”

What JD Vance said about his wife

Speaking about meeting them as law students in a 2017 interview, Mr Vance said: “The thing I remember about Usha is how completely confident and confident she was.”

In his memoirs, he attributed some of his success and happiness to his wife.

“Even at their best, they are a delayed burst – they can be defused, but only with skill and precision,” he wrote.

“Not only have I learned to control myself, but Usha has learned to manage me.”

He also told the Megyn Kelly Show podcast in 2020 that he benefits from having a “strong female voice” on his shoulder.

“Usha definitely brings me back down to earth a little bit, and if maybe I get a little too cocky or a little too proud, I just remind myself that she’s a lot more accomplished than I am,” he said.