JD Vance: Can Trump's 'hillbilly' win the Senate?

Once considered a literary darling for his bestselling 2016 memoir-turned-film Hillbilly Elegy, author JD Vance had previously described President Donald Trump as "reprehensible" and his policy proposals as ranging from "immoral to absurd".

Now, with a lukewarm endorsement from Mr Trump, Mr Vance has vaulted into the lead in the race to be anointed the Republican candidate for the US Senate seat from the key state of Ohio.

But how did a child of the hardscrabble Appalachians-turned-US Marine, Yale Law graduate and venture capitalist become such a controversial political figure?

The story of James David Bowman, later Vance, began in Middletown, Ohio - the heart of the American Rust Belt - in 1984.

His mother, Bev Vance, struggled with addiction, first to alcohol, then drugs. His parents split up when he was still a toddler; his father, Don Bowman, was largely absent for the early years of the young JD's life.

But home, for Mr Vance, was elsewhere: with his maternal grandparents, known as "Mamaw" and "Papaw", in Jackson, Kentucky, in the heart of the Appalachian Mountains, the vast inland region that stretches from the Deep South to the fringes of the industrial Midwest.

His family were what he calls "hillbillies": white, working class, mostly of Scots-Irish decent and with no education beyond secondary school.

In his book, Mr Vance remembers the family as proud, clannish and occasionally violent. Aspiration was rare. On the other hand, addiction - increasingly to prescription medication - was commonplace.

Mamaw, in particular, is the star of the book: foul-mouthed, hot-tempered, but affectionate and a source of stability for her grandson.

Mr Vance credits that stability with his eventual success and ability to lift himself out of the grinding poverty of the Appalachians.

Rather than sink into a familiar pattern of sporadic employment, drugs and violence, he joined the Marines for four years and served in Iraq before going to Ohio State University. There, he gained a degree in political science and philosophy.

From Ohio State, he gained admission to Yale Law School, one of the most prestigious academic institutions in the US.

While at Yale, Mr Vance met one of his mentors, law professor Amy Chua, and author of Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. It was Ms Chua who convinced him to write his memoir, published in 2016 just as Donald Trump was making his ultimately successful pitch for the US presidency.

While the book does not mention Mr Trump, some commentators described it as a window into a conservative white working class often overlooked by Ivy League-educated coastal elites. Profoundly conservative, Mr Vance put the blame of the hillbillies' failure to thrive on culture and a lack of personal responsibility, rather than systemic issues of economics and policy.

Rod Dreher, a columnist for the American Conservative, later wrote that the book gave poor white people "voice and presence in the public square" at a time when they were key supporters of Mr Trump.

In 2020 it was turned into a film, directed by Ron Howard and starring Glenn Close as Mamaw. Despite unfavourable reviews, it was one of the most-streamed films on Netflix at the end of the year.

While Mr Vance was no Trump loyalist - and was sometimes harshly critical - he repeatedly said he understood the reasons for his popularity.

In a July 2016 interview, for example, Mr Vance explained that Mr Trump was critical of "the factories shipping jobs overseas" and defended working class white Americans from "condescenders".

In 2017, Mr Vance moved back to Ohio from California, where he had been working in biotech. He married a Yale Law classmate, Usha Chilukuri (now Vance), who had clerked at the Supreme Court. In Hillbilly Elegy, he described her as his "Yale spirit guide", who helped him navigate the socially treacherous waters of the Ivy League and the recruitment rounds of the big law firms. The couple now have a son.

Mr Vance later joined Revolution, a company established by AOL founder Steve Case to funnel venture capital to the parts of the country that otherwise went overlooked - places such as Middletown, Ohio. He considered, and then decided against, a Senate run.

In 2019, he set up his own venture capital operation, Narya Capital, with backing from PayPal founder Peter Thiel, a sometime libertarian and rare Republican in Silicon Valley.

In early 2021, Mr Thiel gave $10m (£7.98m) to a committee seeking to recruit Mr Vance as a Senate candidate to succeed Rob Portman, who had announced he would not be seeking a third term in 2022.

In July 2021, Mr Vance officially entered the race.

The announcement came with an abrupt change in tone regarding former President Trump, with Mr Vance apologising for previously calling him "reprehensible" and repeating Mr Trump's claims of voter fraud in the 2020 election.

His repudiation of his earlier views on Mr Trump quickly became a prominent feature in media coverage of Mr Vance's political views.

In July 2021, for example, The Atlantic described the abrupt about-face as being carried out with "ruthless cynicism".

"If I actually care about these people and the things I say I care about," he told Time magazine. "I need to just suck it up and support him."

In April, Mr Vance's recent history of support gained him an endorsement from Mr Trump, who described him as "the candidate most qualified and ready to win in November".

"It is all about winning," Mr Trump wrote. The former president also noted Mr Vance had previously said some "not so great things about me".

Mr Vance, for his part, seized on the opportunity, and has since appeared at a number of events with Donald Trump Jr and, in early April, with Mr Trump.

The endorsement led to Mr Vance seeing an immediate boost in the polls, with support for him in the state more than doubling from 11% in late March to 23% in late April.

His most significant challenger in the crowded Republican primary, former state treasurer Josh Mandel, trailed behind with 18%, compared to 13% for investment banker Mike Gibbons.

The winner will face the victor of the Democratic primary - most likely Representative Tim Ryan - in a general election in November.

Republican strategist Adam Gingrich told the BBC that part of Mr Vance's appeal to voters is the same "great personal story" of individual hardships and conspicuous government failures that were outlined in Hillbilly Elegy.

"His ability to dole out Clintonian 'I feel your pain' lines, without the political baggage, will be a decided advantage in Ohio," Mr Gingrich said.

However, Mr Vance's 'hand up, not hand out' economic message could fall flat, he explained, especially as stimulus checks from the government have been welcomed by struggling Ohioans.

If he does pull it off, he'd be capturing a seat that has been held by a Democrat since 1977.