Former President Donald Trump’s 2024 running mate J.D. Vance formally accepted his vice-presidential nomination at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday night and delivered a speech aimed at appealing to working class voters in Rust Belt swing states critical to the November election.
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Vance, a 39-year-old first-term Senator from Ohio, used the primetime platform to introduce himself to Republican voters across the nation and share his journey from a “forgotten” industrial Ohio town to the halls of the Capitol. “I grew up in a place that the ruling class in Washington had cast aside,” Vance told the crowd. “But in these forgotten corners of our nation, people don’t ask for much—they just want a fair shot and a government that works for them.”
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Vance’s narrative, peppered with personal anecdotes about his hometown and family, underscored his transformation from a skeptic of Trump to a steadfast ally. Just eight years ago, Vance had labeled himself a “Never Trump guy.” On Wednesday, he declared, “President Trump represents America’s last vessel to restore what, if lost, may never be found again: a country where a working class boy born far from the halls of power can stand on this stage as the next Vice President of the United States of America.”
Vance’s candidacy, as the first millennial on a major party’s presidential ticket and a self-declared representative of the “American Dream,” is seen by many Republicans as a strategic asset to winning Midwesterners and a new generation of voters across the country in Trump’s bid for re-election.
Here are some of the biggest moments and themes from Vance’s speech.
Vance nails Biden on NAFTA, Iraq, and inflation
“Joe Biden has been a politician in Washington for longer than I’ve been alive,” Vance said of the President and presumptive Democratic nominee, whose career in politics started at the local level in 1970. “For half a century, he’s been the champion of every major policy initiative to make America weaker and poorer.”
Vance sought to portray Biden as “out of touch” and having made missteps throughout his career that worsened the struggles of ordinary Americans.
“When I was in the fourth grade, a career politician by the name of Joe Biden supported NAFTA, a bad trade deal that sent countless good jobs to Mexico. When I was a sophomore in high school, that same career politician named Joe Biden gave China a sweetheart trade deal that destroyed even more good American middle class manufacturing jobs. When I was a senior in high school, that same Joe Biden supported the disastrous invasion of Iraq,” Vance said.
“At each step of the way, in small towns like mine in Ohio or next door in Pennsylvania or Michigan and states all across our country, jobs were sent overseas and our children were sent to war.”
Later on, Vance criticized “Joe Biden’s inflation crisis” and his administration’s “Green New Scam.”
Vance goes all in for Trump
Vance contrasted the “the trails inflicted by Joe Biden and the rest of the corrupt Washington insiders” with Trump, who he said “was right on all of these issues.”
“President Trump’s vision is clear and powerful—we’re putting America first, not catering to Wall Street or globalist interests,” Vance said.
Vance embraced Trump’s values throughout his speech, advocating for protectionist trade policies, limits on foreign military engagements, and bolstered support for domestic manufacturing. During his less than two years in the Senate, Vance has carved out a distinct profile by championing issues that blend economic populism with nationalist fervor, often aligning himself with Trumpism.
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Referencing immigration, he said that newcomers are welcome in the U.S. but added that “when we allow newcomers into the American family, we allow them on our terms.”
And while Vance did not specifically address his opposition to further U.S. funding for Ukraine, a position that has drawn rebuke from some Republicans, he said: “No more free rides for nations that betray the generosity of the American taxpayer.”
Also noticeably absent from Vance’s speech was any mention of his hardline anti-abortion stance, which Democrats have made a focal point of their campaign against him.
The Biden campaign released a statement after the speech calling Vance “the poster boy for Project 2025,” an ultra-conservative agenda created by the Heritage Foundation, a right-wing think tank. “Backed by Silicon Valley and the billionaires who bought his vice-presidential selection, Vance is Project 2025 in human form—an agenda that puts extremism and the ultra wealthy over our democracy,” the Biden campaign said.
Vance makes a direct appeal to four swing states
Casting himself as a fighter for the working class, Vance leaned on his rural roots to make a direct appeal to Rust Belt voters who are seen as critical to determining the outcome of the 2024 election. Throughout his speech, he claimed that he would work to elevate the interests of blue-collar voters, repeatedly naming Ohio, Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin as top of mind for him.
While Trump is currently polling ahead of Biden in every swing state, both campaigns are expected to focus their efforts on the so-called “Blue Wall” states that Biden captured in 2020.
“This moment is not about me,” Vance said. “It’s about the auto worker in Michigan, wondering why out of touch politicians are destroying their jobs.”
“It’s about the factory worker in Wisconsin, who makes things with their hands and is proud of American craftsmanship,” he continued. “It’s about the energy worker in Pennsylvania and Ohio, who doesn’t understand why Joe Biden is willing to buy energy from tinpot dictators across the world when he can buy it from his own citizens, right here in his own country.”
“In small towns across Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Michigan, we’ve seen jobs vanish and families torn apart by decisions made in the corridors of power,” Vance said. “To the people of Middletown, Ohio, and all the forgotten communities in Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, and Ohio, and every corner of our nation—I promise you this, I will be a Vice President who never forgets where he came from.”
Vance heralds his family and ‘homeland’
Vance, who first rose to prominence as the author of his bestselling 2016 memoir Hillbilly Elegy, recounted his hardscrabble upbringing in Middletown, Ohio, where his mother battled with addiction and his father was absent. He paid tribute to the woman who raised him—his “mamaw, the name we hillbillies gave to our grandmothers”—and later, in an emotional moment, celebrated his mother, who was in the audience.
“Our movement is about single moms like mine, who struggled with money and addiction but never gave up,” Vance said, adding that she’ll be 10 years sober next January. “If President Trump’s OK with it, let’s have the celebration in the White House,” he said.
“I love you, Mom,” Vance said, as the crowd erupted in chants of “J.D.’s mom!”
Vance chronicled his path from Middletown to the Marines to Ohio State University to Yale Law School, where he met his wife Usha, who introduced him on Wednesday night.
“Some people tell me I’ve lived the American Dream, and of course, they’re right and I’m so grateful,” he said. “But the American Dream that always counted most was not starting a business or becoming senator or even being here with you fine people, though it’s pretty awesome. My most important American Dream was becoming a good husband and a good dad.”
Vance ended his speech by giving a description of his family burial plot nestled on a mountainside in eastern Kentucky, where seven generations of his ancestors rest. “That is a homeland. That is our homeland,” Vance said, invoking a sense of nationalism. “People will not fight for abstractions, but they will fight for their home.”