Her presence at the convention predictably elicited some racist responses, and I expected a robust defense from her husband, who instead was tepid at best: “Obviously, she’s not a white person, and we’ve been accused, attacked by some white supremacists over that … but I just, I love Usha.” It harked back to the simpering, kiss-the-ring spinelessness of Texas Sen. Ted Cruz after Donald Trump called his wife ugly.
I can’t help but wonder about Usha Vance’s reaction each time her husband’s campaign churns out a fresh wave of racism. How did she react after Trump’s grotesque comment about Kamala Harris only recently deciding she was Black? Did she think of her own three biracial children? Did it give her pause at all about who she was standing with and what she was standing by? I alternate between thinking of her as a victim and as an accomplice.
Sen. JD Vance of Ohio joined Trump at a memorial event this month, and one of the former president’s invited guests was the loathsome 9/11 conspiracy theorist Laura Loomer, who recently stated that if Harris wins, “The White House will smell like curry.” This was so blatant that even Republican Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene called it “extremely racist.” How did the senator respond when asked about it on the Sunday morning talk circuit? He hedged and meandered with a “I make a mean chicken curry” until when pressed, he finally said, “I don’t like those comments.”
As an Indian American woman, I can only imagine that Usha Vance doesn’t like those comments either.
-- Dipti S. Barot, "Opinion: How can Usha Vance stand by her husband as he fans bigotry?" (THE LOS ANGELES TIMES).
