JD Vance grilled on Fox News about Republicans who don't have kids

GOP vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance pushed back on critics of his 'childless cat lady' comments claiming those putting him on blast lied about what he said. The 39-year-old Ohio senator appeared on the Fox News show 'Sunday Night in America with Trey Gowdy' where he doubled down on what he meant.

'If you look at what the left has done, they have radically taken this out of context and, in fact, aggressively lied about what I’ve said,' Vance claimed. 'What I do think is true, Trey, and this goes to the heart of what I was talking about three years ago in those comments, but it’s going to be something I continue to talk about, is that the left has increasingly become explicitly anti-child and anti-family,' he continued.

The appearance Sunday night was Vance' latest effort to explain his remarks in a recently resurfaced clip from 2021 that has received fierce criticism from Democrats and prominent women. Back when Vance was running for the Senate , he appeared on Fox News where he told then-host Tucker Carlson the U.S. was being run by 'a bunch of childless cat ladies .'

He claimed they were 'miserable at their own lives and the choices that they've made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable too.' He specifically name-dropped Vice President Kamala Harris, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Pete Buttigieg. 'The entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children,' Vance said. 'How does it make any sense we've turned our country over to people who don't really have a direct stake in it?'

On Sunday, Gowdy pointed out to Vance that there have been many leaders without biological children from George Washington to former Republican Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. 'So I think you will agree with me that direct offspring are not necessary to be fully invested in the future of this country,' Gowdy said. 'Of course not, Trey. I do think that being a parent actually has a profound effect on somebody’s perspective and we should honor and respect that,' Vance said.

'But there are a whole host of people who don’t have children for a whole host of reasons. And they certainly are great people who can participate fully in the life of this country.' From there, Vance went on to double-down with his attack on Democrats. 'They’ve encouraged young families not to have children at all because of concerns over climate change,' he claimed.

'They’ve suggested that people who do have children are somehow being selfish when I think being a parent is actually the most selfless thing that you can do, and again, really does transform your perspective,' he said. But his criticism of Democrats being 'anti-child and anti-family' comes as Harris and Democrats on the trail have been campaigning on a platform calling for more affordable child care and paid parental leave.

Vance has spent several days pushing back on the fallout over his 2021 remarks which have angered women across the country from actress Jennifer Aniston who took to Instagram with a brutal response to thousands of Taylor Swift fans. Last week, Vance taped an episode of The Megyn Kelly Show where he claimed his 'childless cat lady' comment was a 'sarcastic comment.'

The GOP vice presidential nominee also went after Democrats on policy in his Kelly interview. He claimed Harris' campaign is against extending the Child Tax Credit. However, that appears to be false.

Harris has called for extending the expansion of the Child Tax Credit as it was passed in the American Rescue Plan by Democrats in 2021. Vance reiterated his claim on Gowdy's show on Sunday anyway.

'How did we get to a place where Kamala Harris is calling for an end to the child tax credit? How do we get to a place where we were masking toddlers years into the pandemic? I think it’s because we radically underrepresent the perspective of parents in our public discourse,' Vance said. Trump's running mate claimed the ex-president is the 'real defender of parents and families.'

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