Although there is growing Catholic news in the announcement Donald Trump has named J. D. Vance – who converted to Catholicism in 2019 – his nomination also has international religious implications, due to his wife.
Usha Chilukuri Vance is the daughter of immigrants from India, and a Hindu.
Usha’s parents come from Andhra Pradesh, a southeastern state in India with a population that is 90 percent Hindu. The vice-presidential candidate’s wife was born in California.
Her father, Krish Chilukuri, is an aerospace engineer and university lecturer, and her mother, Lakshmi, is a professor of molecular biology.
“I did grow up in a religious household. My parents are Hindu. That was one of the things that made them good parents, made them good people,” Vance told Fox & Friends in June.
She has been involved in her husband’s political campaigns, including his successful Senate campaign in 2022, and registered as a Republican in 2018.
Vance’s appointment has been widely covered in India’s press, with newspapers interviewing her relatives.
“I wish to convey to Usha to support her husband as she has been doing, uphold Hindu values, support Hindus in the U.S. and help them if they encounter any problems in practicing their religion,” an aunt told The Indian Express.
There are currently around 5 million Indian Americans, one of the largest Asian American populations. Traditionally supporting the Democratic Party, the Indian American support of the Republicans has been growing quickly, especially with the rise of Republican politicians of Indian descent, including Bobby Jindal and Nikki Haley.
However, both Jindal and Haley are Christian – the appointment of the husband of a Hindu woman is fueling more interest in India’s media.
It Trump is elected, Vance’s wife could play an important part in building relations with what will soon be the world’s most populous country (it may already be so – China’s population is getting smaller, while India’s are getting larger, and the numbers are somewhat inexact.)
This is especially of interest to the country’s small Christian minority.
India is run by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), with strong links to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), a militant Hindu nationalist organization.
Hindu nationalists often accuse Christians of using forceful and surreptitious tactics in pursuing conversions. They then storm into villages and lead “reconversion” ceremonies – called Ghar Wapsi, or “back to home” – in which Christians are compelled to perform Hindu rituals.
Many of these “false conversions” involve marriage – when a Hindu marries a Christian and converts before the ceremony.
A Hindu married to a Catholic vice president – himself a convert – is a picture the Church in India will not mind being in the newspapers.
Christians currently make up less than 3 percent of India’s population, a percentage that hasn’t really changed for decades, and have faced discrimination due to their perception as a “foreign” religion – despite dating their origins to St. Thomas the Apostle.
The Church has a strange relationship with the BJP – facing increasing harassment in the north of the country, but Catholics will often join the party in the less Hindu-dominant south.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has made overtures to Christian leaders, since he is aware of the religion’s small numbers in the country. The BJP’s main targets are Muslims, who make up around 15 percent of the population and are the main religion in India’s principal rival, Pakistan.
However, the Catholic bishops in India has refused to back the BJP’s anti-Muslim views, although they are sometimes viewed sympathetically by lay members of the Church.
The BJP will probably look kindly on Vance’s anti-Muslim views – the Republican candidate recently stated Britain could become “first truly Islamist country that will gain a nuclear weapon,” after the Labour Party won the July 4 election.
Historically, the spouses of U.S. presidents and vice presidents have been viewed as the strongest unofficial advisors for their spouses, if the Republicans win this year’s election, Usha Chilukuri Vance influence could run much farther than her predecessors.
