CLEVELAND — U.S. Sen. JD Vance, the 39-year-old former author and venture capitalist from Middletown, Ohio, was selected Monday by Donald Trump to run as the vice presidential candidate in the 2024 election.
Vance has not been in politics for long. He announced his candidacy for the U.S. Senate in Ohio in 2021 after incumbent Republican Sen. Rob Portman announced his retirement. With the backing of Trump, Vance went on to win a crowded GOP primary before defeating Rep. Tim Ryan in the 2022 election.
Now, Vance has the chance to become Ohio's first-ever vice president.
Yes, that's correct. In a state that has been known as the "Mother of Presidents" with eight men serving as the nation's chief executive, Ohio amazingly has never had a vice president.
There have been three Ohio vice presidential candidates from major parties in the past, but none managed to come out victorious.
The last VP candidate from Ohio
Meet Gov. John W. Bricker, the GOP vice presidential nominee who joined New York Gov. Thomas Dewey in trying to unseat Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1944 amid World War II.
Bricker, a Madison County native who graduated from Ohio State University, served in the U.S. Army in World War I and was Ohio Attorney General before being elected as governor in 1939. Despite his loss with Dewey to FDR and Harry S. Truman in 1944, Bricker went on to serve two terms as U.S. Senator.
Before that...
In 1888, incumbent President Grover Cleveland needed a running mate after the death of Vice President Thomas A. Hendricks. It just made sense for a man named "Cleveland" to choose an Ohioan, right? Cleveland tapped 75-year-old U.S. Sen. Allen G. Thurman of Chillicothe to join him on the ticket.
Thurman had an extensive political resume, including a term in U.S. House of Representatives and 12 years in the U.S. Senate. He was also elected to serve a four-year term as associate justice of the Ohio Supreme Court, spending the final year as chief justice.
He failed to get the Democratic presidential nomination in 1880 and 1884 before being tapped by Cleveland as VP on the 1888 ticket. They were beaten by GOP nominee Benjamin Harrison and his running mate, former U.S. Ambassador to France Levi Morton. When Cleveland ran again in 1892, he chose a different running mate.
The other vice presidential nominee from Ohio was Rep. George Pendleton from Cincinnati who ran alongside Gen. George McClellan in 1864 against incumbent President Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson. Like Brickley, Pendleton had the challenge of trying to unseat a sitting president in the middle of a war. In this case, the American Civil War.
During the Civil War, Pendleton was known to be a member of the "Copperheads," an anti-war faction of the Democratic party that opposed Lincoln and called for an end to hostilities with the Confederacy. He also voted against the 13th Amendment that abolished slavery permanently. (You can see the Pendleton character engaged in debate with Tommy Lee Jones' Rep. Thaddeus Stephens in the 2012 Steven Spielberg film Lincoln below)
For most of 1864, it seemed that the Democrats would succeed in defeating Lincoln as the Civil War dragged on. However, Union victories at Atlanta and Cedar Creek that fall helped turn the tide. On Nov. 8, 1864, Lincoln was reelected overwhelmingly, capturing all but three states.
Fourteen years after losing his bid to be vice president, Pendleton returned to politics when he was elected to the United States Senate. He also served in the Cleveland administration as U.S. Ambassador to Germany.
And in case you're wondering, the last Ohioan to be the presidential nominee was in 1920. In fact, there were two Ohioans as Republican U.S. Sen. Warren G. Harding, along with running mate Calvin Coolidge, beat Democratic Ohio Gov. James Cox and his vice presidential nominee Franklin Delano Roosevelt.