Vice President JD Vance lashed out at political commentator Nick Fuentes over the weekend for calling his wife, Usha Vance, an ethnic slur.
“Let me be clear. Anyone who attacks my wife, whether their name is Jen Psaki or Nick Fuentes, can eat [expletive],” Vance told UnHerd. “That’s my official policy as vice president of the United States.”
Fuentes, a far-right white nationalist, called Vance a “race traitor” for marrying a woman of Indian descent during one of his livestreams, according to USA Today.
Meanwhile Psaki, the former White House Press Secretary under Joe Biden suggested in October on the “I’ve Had It” podcast that the second lady needs rescuing from her husband.
“I always wonder what’s going on in the mind of his wife,” Psaki said. “Like, are you OK? Please blink four times. Come over here, we’ll save you.”
Usha Vance is the first Indian American second lady in U.S. history. She graduated with a bachelor’s degree in history from Yale University and obtained her master’s from the University of Cambridge, where she was a Gates Cambridge Scholar.
While studying at Yale Law School in 2010, she met Vance when they joined a discussion group on “social decline in white America,” the BBC reported.
The couple married in Kentucky in 2014 and have three children, Ewan, Vivek and Mirabel.
While on the campaign trail in 2024, Usha Vance received racist online comments from far-right social media users, ABC News wrote.
JD Vance was also criticized for throwing his wife’s Hindu religion “under a bus” when speaking about his conversion to Catholicism during a Turning Point event in October.
After receiving the backlash, ABC News said that Vance wrote on X, “My Christian faith tells me the Gospel is true and is good for human beings. My wife — as I said at the TPUSA — is the most amazing blessing I have in my life. She herself encouraged me to reengage with my faith many years ago.”
He continued, “She is not a Christian and has no plans to convert, but like many people in an interfaith marriage — or any interfaith relationship — I hope she may one day see things as I do. Regardless, I’ll continue to love and support her and talk to her about faith and life and everything else, because she’s my wife.”