The Marine chosen to bounce with JD Vance on inauguration evening revealed that the fiftieth vice chairman made a fast joke backstage to “break the ice” and ease her nerves earlier than she stepped on stage in entrance of America.
SSgt. Lexus Martinez, 27 — a local New Yorker working as a meals service specialist with the Washinton, DC-based Marine Corps Enlisted Aide Program, which hosts and caters non-public occasions for high-ranking generals — credit “luck” for being picked to bounce with the vice chairman, she instructed The Publish Wednesday.
“It felt surreal,” she mirrored on being chosen.
“It was like a lucky moment kind of thing.”
Every department of the nation’s armed forces despatched one member to bounce with President Trump, first girl Melania Trump, Vance and second girl Usha Vance on the Commander in Chief Ball on the Walter E. Washington Conference Middle Monday evening.
Martinez, who arrived in DC in April after serving three years as a recruiter in Smithtown, New York, mentioned her unit was tapped with discovering a Marine to bounce with Vance — and he or she determined to use for the once-in-a-lifetime alternative.
The Brooklyn-born Marine realized she would hit the dancefloor with the brand new veep per week later, the Friday earlier than Inauguration Day.
On Sunday, she and the opposite servicemembers chosen had a rehearsal with out Trump and Vance, so the nerves of the historic second didn’t hit her till she was ready backstage for the ceremony to start.
“President Trump and Vice President JD Vance walked by and they just wanted to shake our hands, thank us for our service and to get facial recognition of who they were dancing with,” Martinez mentioned, and that’s when the fiftieth vice chairman made a “really funny joke” that “broke the ice.”
“He said, ‘Well, I hope you don’t step on my feet.’ And I said, ‘Well, I hope you teach me how to dance up there,’” and the 2 shared a short chortle.
“It made me feel more relaxed,” Martinez mentioned. “He still has that Marine Corps humor.”
Vance served within the Marines from 2003 to 2007 as a fight correspondent, with one tour in Iraq earlier than leaving the service and utilizing the GI Invoice to attend Ohio State College.
The dad of three can also be the primary veep to serve within the Marine Corps.
Throughout their dance, the pair talked about Martinez’s time within the Marines and the place she’d been stationed throughout her nine-year profession.
Earlier than she knew it, the track ended, and he or she was strolling off extra assured than ever due to how down-to-earth Vance, 40, was throughout their encounter.
“Him acknowledging me as a Marine and just like joking with me in that way. It felt cool to just be myself because, in the Marines, we’re all family no matter what. You’re a Marine 24/7,” she defined.
“I was talking to someone in the brotherhood like we were family already. It just all felt so natural.”
Following the dance, Martinez and the opposite servicemembers briefly returned to the stage to roll out the ceremony’s cake for Trump and Vance earlier than calling it an evening.
The Marine mentioned that her mother, sister — her “biggest fan” — and two brothers again in New York had been past pleased with seeing their liked one on stage dancing with the vice chairman.
“My phone was blowing up the second I got off the stage,” she mentioned, including that her “phone is still being bombarded” days after the ceremony from family and friends.
Martinez, who mentioned she’s Puerto Rican and has “family everywhere,” was getting hit up by relations “across the globe” to precise how proud they had been of her.
“It really kind of brought my family together a lot.”
