A more-than-a-decade-old secret has been revealed about Vice President JD Vance and his wife Usha Vance.
The two have been married for 12 years, but their story begins at Yale Law School.
They met on campus as two law students who became close friends and study partners. Then in their second semester Vance won her heart with his story about being raised by grandparents in Ohio and having a mom who was an addict. Their relationship became romantic.
Four years later, they tied the knot and now they currently have four children together.
In a Aug. 12 Vanity Fair story about Usha, their Yale classmates shared more insight to who she and her husband were back in their college days. One of those details includes their nickname.
According to the anonymous classmate, Usha and Vance were a popular couple on campus.
They were so famous that other students created a name for them.
Mixing their names together and adding the word “judicial,” students called them “Judusha.”
This was revealed two years ago in a 2024 New York Times article, which noted that they were “so accomplished” and “inseparable” then.
Usha’s parents are Indian Hindu immigrants who came to America between the late 1970s and early 1980s. But her own husband publicly slams DEI initiatives and is a major advocate for immigration restrictions.
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It leads many to wonder if Usha secretly despises his right-wing views.
Not according to her anonymous classmates.
“It’s patronizing to say that she’s been silenced. She has chosen this,” they said.
They claimed that Usha was a huge part of why Vance became who he is today.
“She built JD into this creation of the coastal Acela corridor. It’s not an immigrant story; it’s a meritocracy story,” said their classmate.
Vance shared in his 2016 memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy” that Usha taught him how to use utensils at a dinner table and introduced him to the social norms of wealthy people.
Her classmates remember her as someone who was never the type to gossip or share her opinions in class.
“It was never about anything other than achievement,” said a classmate,“She was the quintessential, ubiquitous Yale Law student whom I like to call a ‘gold star chaser.”
Usha started her judicial clerkship in 2013 while Vance went on to clerk for the U.S. District Judge David Bunning of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky.
She clerked for mainly Republican judges like US District Court judge Amul Thapar and Judge Brett Kavanaugh on the US Court of Appeals for the DC Circuit.
She had a closeness with Kavanaugh — who was elevated to the Supreme Court during Trump’s first twerm — which some would say sparked her to lean more to the right in her politics.
Others reacted to the thought that she built Vance.
One said, “I too would appreciate an Indian baddie building me up.”
Someone else wrote, “I think that even JD would admit that.”
But that doesn’t mean she is in full agreement with neither President Donald Trump or her husband.
She just doesn’t show it in public.
Vanity Fair wrote, “Like many ambitious spouses of powerful politicians, Usha has learned to operate in private.”
They continued to describe her as “a quiet architect content to let her husband stand in the light while she does the load-bearing work off camera.”
As for becoming a future first lady, it seems that is not a huge goal for Usha. She detailed her thoughts on that in a 2025 interview on “Citizen McCain with Meghan McCain.”
She said, “maybe it was four years ago at this point, I had absolutely no intention of, um, leading any sort of life in politics. It really is that rapid.”
But their lives changed in 2024 when Vance was picked by Trump to be his vice president after years of developing a close relationship with him.
Usha admitted to McCain that one day she’d like to be able to live in her home and continue pursuing her career.
However she would “understand” if Vance became president in the future.
