JD Vance called out for sharing hopes his Hindu wife will ‘join Christianity’ at Charlie Kirk event
Topics: Religion, JD Vance, Politics, Charlie Kirk
Britt Jones
Featured Image Credit: Jonathan Ernst-Pool/Getty Images
Topics: Religion, JD Vance, Politics, Charlie Kirk
Vice President JD Vance is facing backlash over recent comments he made about his wife’s religion.
It’s no secret that Vance is Catholic and passionate about Christianity, but what you might not know is that his wife, Usha Vance, was born and raised Hindu.
Having been on family trips together to India, and even named one of their children Vivek, meaning Wisdom in Sanskrit, the Vances have previously spoken of their approach to faith.
However, people online have bashed Vance for seemingly U-turning his position as he spoke to a group of college students in Mississippi for Turning Point USA’s sponsored event.
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Turning Point USA, which has been taken over by Erika Kirk after her husband and founder of the organization, Charlie Kirk, was assassinated, has picked back up and is joined by many politicians to talk to American youth.
The vice president was at the University of Mississippi when a person asked him about his wife’s religious background.
Vance replied that his wife grew up in ‘not a particularly religious’ Hindu family and shared how their children are raised Christian.
He went on to say that Usha often attends church with him, and he hopes she will someday be ‘moved’ by Catholicism.
“I honestly do wish that because I believe in the Christian gospel, and I hope eventually, my wife comes to see it the same way,” he said to the crowd.
He added: “If she doesn’t, then God says, everybody has free will, so that doesn’t cause a problem for me. That’s something you work out.”
However, his response has sparked backlash on X, particularly by Indian-American commentator Deep Barot.
“Usha Vance is Hindu, not agnostic. This is not very hard for you to follow. They even had a Vedic Hindu wedding and one of his kids name [sic] is Vivek,” he said.
Barot then called Vance ‘the biggest hypocrite’ for downplaying her Hinduism and shared that this may go against him if he runs for president in 2028.
Nirmalya Dutta called Vance ‘a class A hypocrite’, while transgender activist Ari Drennen said this could spell trouble for his marriage.
She wrote: “He’s going to be the first Vice President to get Divorced while in office.”
Earlier this year, Usha spoke with Meghan McCain, where she disclosed she had ‘a lot of conversations’ about faith with her husband as he was considering converting to Catholicism.
She explained he took the leap, in part, due to 'several important obligations, like to raise your child in the faith and all that'.
However, she said she was 'not intending to convert or anything like that' and have given their children a choice in the matter of how they want to live.
“The kids know that I’m not Catholic, and they have plenty of access to the Hindu tradition from books that we give them, to things that we show them, to the recent trip to India, and some of the religious elements of that visit,” she said.
UNILAD reached out to the White House for comment.