Just two days after a gunman targeted a Trump campaign rally in Pennsylvania, leaving the candidate grazed by a bullet and one of his supporters dead, the Republican national convention kicked off in Milwaukee in a strikingly normal fashion. Donald Trump, who made his first public appearance but did not yet address the convention, has now been officially nominated as the Republican presidential candidate. Here are key takeaways from the day: For his vice-president, Trump chose 39-year-old JD Vance, a bestselling author who swiftly transformed himself from a self-described “never Trumper” to a Trump loyalist.
Now an Ohio senator, Vance first took public office 18 months ago, when he won a race for Senate after being backed by more than from tech mogul Peter Thiel. Vance had previously worked as a venture capitalist, and lived for several years in the Bay Area before moving back to Ohio. Vance, who gained a national profile for a much-praised 2016 memoir about white family dysfunction in Appalachia and how he made it to Yale Law School, once publicly called Trump “reprehensible” and an “idiot”, and said he was a dangerous figure who was “leading the white working class to a very dark place”.
But Vance worked hard to walk back these criticisms and gain Trump’s endorsement in his 2022 Senate race. Vance has endorsed a , continued to falsely claim that Trump won the 2020 election, said that the US should conduct “ ”, and claimed the Democratic party is trying.
