JD Vance’s ‘Hillbilly Elegy’ is ‘poornography’ – and that’s a problem

By Lennard J. Davis, University of Illinois Chicago Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance holds a rally in his hometown, Middletown, Ohio, on July 22, 2024. Luke Sharrett/The Washington Post via Getty Images JD Vance has climbed to his current position as former President Donald Trump’s running mate, in part, by selling himself as a hillbilly, calling on his Appalachian background to bolster his credentials to speak for the American working class. “I grew up as a poor kid,” Vance said on Fox News in August 2024. “I think that’s a story that a lot of normal Americans can empathize with.” Indeed, the book that brought him to public attention was his 2016 memoir, “Hillbilly Elegy.” In that book, he claims his family carried an inheritance of “abuse, alcoholism, poverty, and trauma.” “Poor people,” he proclaimed in a 2016 interview with The American Conservative, are “my people.” But there’s a bit of a shell game going on when it comes to Vance’s poverty credentials. Vance did come from a troubled family. His mother was – like so many Americans, whether they’re poor, middle class or rich – addicted to painkillers. In the book, Vance searches for an explanation for his...