JD Vance tried to backtrack on the weird stuff he’s said about ‘childless cat ladies’

When Kamala Harris became the consensus Democratic presidential nominee, something wonderful happened with the now-Harris campaign’s communications. They instantly pivoted to a much clearer comms strategy when it comes to clapping back on the Trump-Vance campaign. For several days now, the Harris campaign has been sending out press releases every time Donald Trump or JD Vance open their mouths, and in nearly every press release, there’s something about “these guys are just incredibly weird.” Why give a long-winded response about why Trump and Vance are crazy men who want to control women when you can just drive home the point, day after day, that these are just really gross creeps and their whole political viewpoint is WEIRD.

Speaking of, JD Vance’s comments mocking “childless cat ladies” have really hit a nerve and changed the whole dynamic of the election. Even conservative women are not cool with Vance’s lack of empathy for people’s fertility struggles. Normal, everyday voters are turned off by Vance’s increasingly convoluted culture war against people who are not parents (or people who are stepparents). Even Jennifer Aniston – who rarely says much about politics – clapped back on Vance. So… the Trump campaign sent this couch f–ker to Megyn Kelly’s podcast to do some damage control. He made it worse.

Vance is trying to backtrack: The main argument Vance made during his Friday interview with Kelly is that the Democratic Party is “anti-family” and that his criticism was not directed at those who don’t have kids. “The simple point that I made is that having children, becoming a father, becoming a mother, I really do think it changes your perspective in a pretty profound way,” Vance told Kelly. “I explicitly said in my remarks, despite the fact that the media has lied about this, that this is not about criticizing people who, for various reasons, didn’t have kids. This is about criticizing the Democratic Party for becoming anti-family and anti-child.”

He doesn’t have anything against pets: “Obviously, it was a sarcastic comment. I’ve got nothing against cats. I’ve got nothing against dogs. … People are focusing so much on the sarcasm and not the substance of what I actually said.”

He’s just standing up for parents: “I’m proud to stand up for parents, and I hope the parents out there recognize that I’m a guy who wants to fight for you. I want to fight for your interests. I want to fight for your stake in the country. And that is what this is fundamentally about.”

On Jennifer Aniston’s comments: Aniston wrote on Instagram, “Mr. Vance, I pray that your daughter is fortunate enough to bear children of her own one day.” Vance said: “Hollywood celebrities say, ‘Oh, well, JD Vance, what if your daughter suffered fertility problems?’ Well, first of all, that’s disgusting because my daughter is 2 years old. And second of all, if she had fertility problems, as I said in that speech, I would try everything I could to try to help her because I believe families and babies are a good thing.”

[From ABC News & The NY Times]

He believes in IVF now? Because he voted against the IVF-protection bill – a bill which would have helped couples access IVF services – and access to IVF is on the chopping block in Trump’s Project 2025. He also has some nerve to get indignant about HIS daughter… but no one else’s daughter. All of those girls and women who need reproductive care or IVF or abortion access… all of those people are “disgusting” and subhuman because they’re not directly related to JD Vance.

Since Vance wants us to go back to what he said in 2021, here are the exact quotes: “The entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children. And how does it make any sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?” And don’t forget: “We are effectively run in this country … by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made, and so they wanna make the rest of the country miserable, too. It’s just a basic fact. You look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children.”

JD Vance also cooked up this very weird scheme where parents (fathers) should get extra votes.

Sorry what now? JD Vance thinks people who don’t have children “shouldn’t get nearly the same voice” as people who do and proposes giving parents an extra vote for each child they have. Even for an Ohio State grad this is truly some weird s*^t. pic.twitter.com/ruhiiGCcwG

— Michigan Democrats (@MichiganDems) July 24, 2024

My buddy @brianschatz and l have some thoughts about JD Vance’s really creepy idea to give less votes to people without kids.

Give a watch. pic.twitter.com/pHcAQzdvTA

— Chris Murphy ???? (@ChrisMurphyCT) July 26, 2024

Photos courtesy of Backgrid.