JD Vance Responds To CBS Report On on Lakshmi Chilukuri Work At University
Well, if CBS News was hoping to rattle JD Vance with a hit piece on his mother-in-law, they got a response—but probably not the one they wanted. The Vice President didn’t just shrug off the attack; he mocked it, calling it what it was: a weak attempt to undermine President Trump’s crackdown on DEI policies by dragging a family member into the fight.
The article in question, titled "She advanced DEI at her university. Her son-in-law, Vice President JD Vance, wants to end it nationwide," zeroed in on Lakshmi Chilukuri, the provost of UC San Diego’s Sixth College. The piece highlighted her involvement in DEI initiatives—such as developing courses on race and gender in biology and serving on a university diversity committee—before pivoting to a broader critique of the Trump administration’s dismantling of DEI across government, academia, and corporate America.
"I don't like DEI, and I'm proud of what our administration has done on that front," he told CBS. "But I love my mother-in-law. If she doesn’t share my views on DEI, I suppose I’ll have to do what 99 percent of Americans do when confronted with a family member who doesn’t always agree with them: get over it."
That right there is the story. Vance made it clear that personal relationships don’t dictate his policy stance, and—more importantly—he exposed CBS for what they were really trying to do: create controversy where none exists.
"This story exists because CBS has decided that harassing my mother-in-law is a reasonable price in order to attack President Trump," he added.
It’s a fair point. There’s no actual scandal here—no contradiction, no hypocrisy. Just the media fishing for something that might make headlines, even if it means dragging someone who has nothing to do with federal policy into the political arena.
Ironically, even CBS had to admit that its own parent company, Paramount, has backed away from DEI hiring quotas since Trump took office. That little detail undercuts the entire narrative. If even major corporations are shifting away from DEI, it suggests that Trump and Vance aren’t outliers—they’re in step with where the country is moving.
The broader reality is that the Trump administration’s opposition to DEI isn’t about “attacking diversity.” It’s about dismantling a system that prioritizes identity over merit. Trump has signed multiple executive orders aimed at rolling back DEI across federal agencies, arguing that these policies sow division and lower standards rather than promote fairness.
As for CBS, this isn’t their only battle with the Trump administration. The network is already facing a $20 billion lawsuit from Trump over allegations of election interference, stemming from its handling of a 60 Minutes interview with Kamala Harris. So, while they’re busy trying to manufacture a controversy around Vance’s family, they’ve got far bigger problems to deal with.