New York – Vice presidential candidate JD Vance’s comments attacking potential Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris for not having children became the focus of public debate again this week.
An audio recording from 2021 in which Donald Trump’s running mate called politicians like Harris “cat ladies without children” sparked debate after Harris accepted Joe Biden’s request to replace him as the candidate.
In the FOX interview, JD Vance alleged that America is “effectively” governed by Democrats, whom he describes as a “bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable in their own lives and the choices they’ve made, so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too.”
The statements by the current vice presidential candidate circulating on social media such as X were not only directed at Harris, but also at the Secretary of the Department of Transportation, Pete Buttigieg, and the Democratic representative of New York, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
“How does it make sense that we’ve turned our country over to people who really have no direct stake in it?” the politician said at the time when he was running for the Senate in Ohio.
Other conservative figures such as Will Chamberlain, a lawyer who worked with Florida Governor Ron DeSantis during his presidential campaign, shared on social media X that Harris should not be president because she does not have biological children.
Really simple, underdiscussed reason why Kamala Harris shouldn’t be President
No children
— Will Chamberlain (@willchamberlain) July 21, 2024
Two political candidates to choose from.
Donald Trump has 5 children and 10 grandchildren. He has a legacy to protect.
Kamala Harris has no children, little interest in religion, motivated by raw power, & no interest in anything beyond her life on this earth.
It seems significant!
— Jordan Schachtel @ dossier.today (@JordanSchachtel) July 23, 2024
Influential Democratic figures such as former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton reacted on the aforementioned network against Vance and those who support his speech.
“What a normal, relatable guy, who certainly doesn’t hate women having freedoms,” she shared alongside the video.
For its part, Harris’ campaign said that every American has a stake in the future of this country.
“Ugly, personal attacks from JD Vance and Donald Trump are in line with their dangerous Project 2025 agenda to ban abortion, decimate our democracy, and gut Social Security,” Harris campaign spokesman James Singer was quoted as saying by the Associated Press.
Harris became stepmother to her husband, attorney Douglas Emhoff’s two children in 2014.
In Buttigieg’s case, the official and his husband adopted twins in September 2021, before Vance made his comments.
Harris, who in less than two days garnered enough support to succeed Biden as the presidential candidate, has been very vocal about women’s rights.
Harris, whose mother is Indian and whose father is Jamaican, has presented herself as an advocate for women’s rights, including reproductive rights.
The still vice president has insisted, for example, on the right to abortion as a central part of her campaign.
Even before Biden announced his withdrawal from the race, Harris has been suggesting that Trump wants to return the United States to the 1800s with his anti-abortion measures.
“This election will present a clear choice between two different visions. Donald Trump wants to take our country back to a time when many of us did not have full freedoms and equal rights. I believe in a future that strengthens our democracy, protects reproductive freedom, and ensures that all people have the opportunity, not just to get ahead, but to thrive,” she said yesterday at a rally in Milwaukee.
He also called Trump a “perpetrator.”
“Before I was elected vice president, before I was elected United States senator, I was elected attorney general of California. Before that, I was a prosecutor in court. In those roles, I took on perpetrators of all kinds. Perpetrators who abused women, con artists who abused their clients, cheaters who broke the rules for their own gain. So hear me when I say, ‘I know what kind of guy Donald Trump is,’” Harris added.
For both candidates, convincing this sector of the electorate is essential to advancing their candidacies.
According to a poll this week from NPR, PBS News and Marist, Harris and Trump are virtually tied, with the Republican leading Harris by one percentage point, 45% versus 46%, respectively. However, when looking at the results by demographics, independent female voters are currently leaning toward Trump’s candidacy, 46% versus 32%.
However, Trump faces a bigger challenge when it comes to the women’s vote due to his treatment or, some say, mistreatment of members of that population.
Even before he was found guilty on all counts in New York in a case involving falsifying business records in connection with an extramarital affair with porn star Stormy Daniels, Trump had already had to deal with allegations of inappropriate conduct against women.
A month before the 2016 presidential election, a recording of Trump bragging about grabbing women by their genitals was leaked to the media. Immediately after the uproar over the leak of the remarks, several Republicans turned their backs on him. However, they soon returned their support.
Trump’s string of unfortunate incidents involving women took a new turn with the accusations made by writer E. Jean Carroll.
Carroll filed a civil suit against Trump for a rape in the 1990s inside a New York department store.
A jury found the former president guilty and ordered him to pay the writer $5 million in damages.
Carroll also sued Trump for defamation after the Republican accused her of lying when she first made her allegations public in 2019.
Part of Trump’s argument is that the American columnist’s allegations were “fiction.”
In that suit, the jury found Trump must compensate Carroll $11 million for reputational damages and $7.3 million for emotional damages. Trump was also ordered to pay $65 million in punitive damages.
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