US vice president JD Vance hit back at Michigan Democratic Senate nominee Abdul El-Sayed over comments about his wife, Usha Vance.
“Whatever you want to talk about, Abdul, keep my wife’s name the hell out of your mouth, because she’s way out of your league,” Vance said.
He said El-Sayed had a “weird habit of talking about my family” and that he would never “disrespect somebody’s family by talking about another person’s wife, a person who isn’t on the ballot.”
The exchange followed Vance’s criticism of El-Sayed over his past comments on efforts to ban the consideration of Sharia law. El-Sayed responded on X, asking, “So do we think JD is taking Usha with him back in time to meet Papaw, or no…”
The post was interpreted as referring to Usha Vance’s Indian heritage and Hindu background and implying that Vance’s Appalachian grandfather might not have approved of their interracial marriage.
Usha Vance later addressed the remark on Fox & Friends, saying she “kind of laughed.” Although she never met her husband’s late grandparents, she said his relatives have always treated her warmly.
“His mom, his aunt and uncle—they have never been anything but incredibly loving. They are my family. They treat me like their family,” she said.
Vance wrote in his 2016 memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, that one of his regrets was that his grandparents never met Usha.
The dispute comes as Michigan’s Senate race emerges as a key contest that could determine control of the US Senate. El-Sayed holds a narrow lead over Republican Mike Rogers in recent polling, with around 10 per cent of voters still undecided.
