JD Vance’s longtime family friend explains how Usha went from supporting Hillary Clinton to Donald Trump

The wife of Donald Trump’s running mate once wanted to vote for Hillary Clinton, but now “fully” supports Sen. JD Vance’s candidacy for the 2024 MAGA primary.

A close family friend told DailyMail.com how Usha Vance went from being a registered Democrat to supporting Trump and her husband’s Republican agenda.

Trump’s running mate told a friend before the 2016 election that Usha planned to vote for Clinton in her race against Trump, The Daily Beast was the first to report.

But just as JD’s changing views on Trump and his policies grew, so did the MAGA agenda on Usha.

“As has been well documented, JD has become a supporter of President Trump over time,” revealed Vance, the Senate campaign strategist and close family friend.

‘Usha has undergone a similar change in her views and fully supports Donald Trump and her husband. She will do everything to ensure her victory in November.’

The Yale-educated lawyer was previously a registered Democrat and her parents, like most first-generation Indian-American immigrants, are still registered with the Democratic Party, according to recent voter registration data.

But Usha also worked for the Republican-appointed conservative Supreme Court justices Brett Kavanaugh and John Roberts.

“It wasn’t something that seemed to me to indicate her ideological leanings,” said a former classmate of Usha’s. “It seemed more like an expression of her ambition.”

Several of Usha’s friends say they were unaware of her political leanings because she never shared them openly. People close to her family also say that the Chilukuris have generally been slow to speak out about politics.

Usha’s mother, Lakshmi Chilukuri, was one of 2,300 California professors who signed an open letter to Trump, then president, in 2017 urging him not to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement.

With less than 80 days left until the 2024 presidential election, the mother of three has openly aligned herself with the MAGA agenda.

Chabri said of the couple’s view on the former president’s agenda: “There is no daylight to be found there.”

Vance also had reservations about Trump in his early years — even calling himself a “never Trumper” — but has since gone along with the former president’s agenda and was selected as his running mate last month.

One person who has known the Vances for more than a decade says they view the two as “a joint venture.”

“I don’t think they would do this if she didn’t agree to it,” they added.

The Ohio senator’s wife is the daughter of Indian immigrants, and five different family friends say the Chilukuris have never spoken out about politics.

Usha spent the first half of her years earning two separate degrees from Yale – her bachelor’s degree and her law degree. She also completed a fellowship at the University of Cambridge.

She also practiced law for nearly eight years at Munger, Tolles & Olson, a law firm known for its left-leaning attorneys and progressive values.

One of Usha’s Yale Law classmates said, “I never thought she would be someone who would run for office. I saw her more as someone who would become a partner at a law firm — absolutely very successful with an immense amount of power — but more power behind the scenes.”

“But in that way they are a perfect match, because he always loved being in the spotlight.”