July 19 :
The great-aunt of Usha Chilukuri Vance, who is married to Donald Trump's running mate for vice president, is 96 years old and is acclaimed in local media in southern India for being the oldest active professor in the country. The U.S.-born Vance family is known for their academic prowess; one member, Shanthamma Chilukuri, continues to commute forty miles (60 km) on weekdays to teach physics at a university. "Education has always been a top priority and the majority of our family is academically strong," Chilukuri told Reuters over the phone from Visakhapatnam.
At the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee on July 17, 38-year-old Usha Vance introduced her husband, Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, marking her entrance onto the U.S. national political arena.
From her home in Visakhapatnam, Chilukuri called Reuters to share the news that her husband, Usha, had been nominated for vice president. "We are happy as a family," she replied.
The "supersmart daughter of Indian immigrants" who Vance met at Yale Law School is referred to by him as "Hillbilly Elegy" in his memory.
The Vance family immigrated to the United States in the late 1970s; Usha's dad is an engineering professor and mom teaches molecular biology in San Diego. Usha Vance's family has a long history of excellence in engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT), where her grandpa and father were faculty or students. Usha herself attended Yale and Cambridge. Her aunt practises medicine in Chennai, a city in southern India, and her younger sister works as a mechanical engineer for a semiconductor firm in San Diego.
According to family relatives, Usha Vance's paternal grandpa, Ramasastry Chilukuri, moved the family to Chennai from the town of Vadduru in the Andhra Pradesh state so that he could teach at the newly established IIT in 1959. In honour of the late Ramasastry, a physics professor at the IIT, a student prize is presently administered by the institution.
The Hindu family is very devout as well.
Shanthamma Chilukuri mentioned that a number of relatives possessed extensive knowledge of the Vedas and Upanishads. One of Hinduism's most sacred texts, the Bhagavad Gita, is the subject of her book. When asked about his wife's role in helping him "re-engage" with his Christian religion, Senator Vance told Fox News in June.
He was accompanied by Usha Vance, who stated, "I did grow up in a religious household." at one point during the conversation. Being devout Hindus is just one of the many qualities that have contributed to my parents' exceptional parenting and overall goodness. Therefore, I can attest to its efficacy.
Former U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts' law clerk Usha Vance is now an attorney at the Munger, Tolles & Olson LLP company in the United States. J.D. Vance's nomination as the Republican nominee for vice president caused her to resign.
A close relative in India who was there at their 2014 wedding in Kentucky said that "the mindset that one must accomplish something, have degrees from top institutes" was the key to Usha Vance's success.
"Our family WhatsApp group is flooded with messages ever since J.D. Vance's name was announced," claimed the anonymous family member, who wished to remain anonymous to escape public scrutiny due to the increased media attention around the Vance family. I wanted to offer my congratulations and best wishes, so I wrote her a message. She was just as thrilled.
Requests for response were not responded to by Usha Vance's parents or sister in the US. The Indian media has praised her as the most recent Indian-American celebrity to emerge from India, following in the footsteps of other prominent figures such as Kamala Harris, Sundar Pichai, former Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella, and J.D. and Usha Vance's Yale Law classmate Vivek Ramaswamy.
The role played by Usha Vance in the 2020 Netflix film adaptation of J.D. Vance's memoir narrates the story of her father's immigrant experience, in which he begins anew in the United States. Actress Freida Pinto of India, who became famous for her role as the lead female in the Oscar-winning film "Slumdog Millionaire," stated, "He came here with nothing.". Simply finding his route was his task.
