The Atlantic

<i>Hillbilly Elegy</i> Writer Won't Seek Office

J.D. Vance, whose memoir of rural white resentment helped explain Trump’s rise, seriously considered a bid for U.S. Senate in his home state of Ohio.
Source: Lloyd Bishop / NBC

J.D. Vance, author of the bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy, strongly considered seeking the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Ohio next year, but has decided against a run, he said Thurdsay.

Vance, whose book describes his drug-addicted mother and absentee father in unsparing detail, concluded a run for office would put too much strain on his young family. His wife, Usha, a clerk to U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts, recently gave birth to their first child.

“I felt like I had to take a serious

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