Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. JD Vance has a track record of making derogatory remarks about individuals without children. This includes using his controversial “childless cat lady” comments in fundraising emails.
According to him, women without children are “childless sociopaths” with no “direct stake in this country.”
In November 2020, Sen. Vance claimed on a conservative podcast that childless Americans, particularly in leadership roles, were “more sociopathic” and made the country “less mentally stable.“
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He also labeled the most extreme Twitter commentators as typically childless. In August 2021, after announcing his Senate candidacy, Vance’s campaign used similar rhetoric in fundraising emails, criticizing “radical childless leaders.”
This sparked significant backlash when the comments resurfaced following his nomination to the Republican presidential ticket, according to CNN.
Sen. Vance attempted to clarify his controversial remarks on Megyn Kelly’s podcast, claiming they were sarcastic and not meant to criticize people without children, but rather to highlight his view that the Democratic Party is “anti-family” and “anti-child.”
However, a CNN KFile analysis reveals that Vance has consistently made disparaging comments about childless individuals, often targeting Democratic officials.
“You know, I worry that it makes people more sociopathic and ultimately our whole country a little bit less, less mentally stable,” he said. “And of course, you talk about going on Twitter – final point I’ll make is you go on Twitter and almost always the people who are most deranged and most psychotic are people who don’t have kids at home.”
In September 2021, Vance tweeted that “cat ladies…must be stopped” in response to a report that a higher percentage of Americans fear having children because of climate change. In another tweet a month later, Vance wrote, “Our country’s low birth rates have made many elites sociopaths.”
In a statement to CNN, Vance spokesperson Taylor Van Kirk said, “As [Senator Vance] has clearly stated, he was talking about politicians on the left who support policies that are explicitly anti-child and anti-family. The media can obsess over it all they want, but he’s not going to back down when it comes to advocating for policies that protect parental rights and encourage people to have more kids.”
Sen. JD Vance’s “childless cat ladies” comment to Tucker Carlson is part of a broader pattern of using cultural issues to criticize Democratic leaders, particularly targeting those without children.
Vance later used these remarks to fundraise, as evidenced by a series of emails obtained by CNN.
“Did you see me on FOX Primetime recently? I needed to speak DIRECTLY to patriots like you about the serious issue of radical childless leaders in this country,” reads one Vance fundraising email from August 2021. “We can’t have people who don’t have a direct stake in this country making our most important decisions.
“We’ve allowed ourselves to be dominated by childless sociopaths – they’re invested in NOTHING because they’re not invested in this country’s children. Fighting back won’t be easy – our childless opponents have a lot of free time. That’s why I need YOU to stand with me.”
Another fundraising email reads, “Our country is basically run by childless Democrats who are miserable in their own lives and want to make the rest of the country miserable too… What I want to know is: why have we turned our country over to people who don’t have a direct stake in it?”
