Past vice-presidents and vice-presidential candidates are often among their party’s top contenders for future presidential nominations.

Just two years after winning his first run for political office, Ohio Sen. JD Vance is set to become vice president — ushering a new generation into power and offering a potential glimpse at the Republican Party’s future after President-elect Donald Trump’s second term ends.

JD Vance is now just a heartbeat from the presidency—and that’s the heart of the oldest man ever elected to the White House. Just eight years ago, Vance was criticizing Donald Trump as a “fraud” and a “moral disaster” and reportedly told a friend he couldn’t decide whether the MAGA mogul was a “cynical a–hole like Nixon” or “America’s Hitler.

JD Vance, a 40-year-old senator who transformed himself from a biting critic of Donald J. Trump to one of his fiercest defenders, was elected the next vice president of the United States on Wednesday, becoming the third youngest and among the least experienced and most polarizing politicians ever to hold the office.

Critics pointed out the absolute absurdity of GOP vice presidential candidate JD Vance’s latest claim about what Republican nominee Donald Trump will “never do” if he wins back the White House in Tuesday’s election.

When former President Donald Trump was shot in the ear at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, JD Vance, his soon-to-be running mate, was mini-golfing with his family in Cincinnati. Vance, who lives in Cincinnati’s East Walnut Hills neighborhood, told the story on Joe Rogan’s podcast, “The Joe Rogan Experience,” on Thursday.