Freshman Ohio Senator J.D. Vance has been named by former President Donald Trump as his vice presidential running mate during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee on Monday, July 15. Here’s what to know about Vance.

Vance is 39 years old and began serving as Senator of Ohio in Jan. 2023. He has served in the U.S. Marine Corps. and later earned a bachelor’s degree from the Ohio State University and a law degree from Yale University.

After law school, Vance worked as a venture capitalist in San Francisco and was a principal at Mithril Capital, a firm founded by conservative libertarian Peter Thiel.

In 2016 Vance authored “Hillbilly Elegy: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis”, which was later made into a Netflix film in 2020. Critics have said the book stereotypes residents of Appalachia.

He founded venture capital firm Narya Capital with backing from Thiel, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, and Marc Andreessen where he raised $93 million. He is also an investor in Rumble, an online video platform favored by the right wing pundits.

In 2016 Vance was staunchly against Trump winning the election. He said Trump was “dangerous” and “unfit” for office. Vance’s wife, lawyer Usha Chilukuri Vance, is Indian-American and she also criticized Trump saying he could be “America’s Hitler,” the AP reports.

His views changed in 2021, after meeting Trump, and became a fierce ally, defending Trump’s actions. Vance has openly questioned the results of the 2020 election. He has said that if he were vice president, he wouldn’t have immediately certified the 2020 election results, and would have asked states to have multiple slates of electors.

As a senator he has worked with Democrats to pass a railway safety bill following a train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio. He has also sponsored legislation increasing funding for Great Lakes restoration and has supported bipartisan legislation that would help workers and families. He has signaled support for a national 15-week ban on abortion, the AP reports, but later softened the stance when Ohio voters backed an abortion rights amendment in 2023.