JD Vance says women not having children due to climate change concerns is ‘deranged’

JD Vance has once again talked about women’s reproductive autonomy, this time saying those who choose not to have children because of climate change are “deranged”.

The Republican vice-presidential nominee has faced criticism for comments he made in an interview in 2021 where he called prominent Democrats “childless cat ladies” who are “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 told right-wing pundit Tucker Carlson: “Look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children,” he 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?”

The Ohio senator has also said childless Americans have “no physical commitment to the future of this country” and floated the idea that parents should get more votes than people who don’t have children.

In a different resurfaced audio, Vance described the left as “people without kids trying to brainwash the minds of our children”.

Now, in an interview with The New York Times, published on Saturday (12 October), Vance admitted his earlier comments were “dumb” but immediately went on to claim that America is becoming “pathologically anti-child” and criticised those who do not have children because of their fears about the climate crisis.

“You see it sometimes in the political conversation, people saying maybe we shouldn’t have kids because of climate change. You know, when I’ve used this word sociopathic? That is a very deranged idea: the idea that you shouldn’t have a family because of concerns over climate change,” he said.

“That is a bizarre way of thinking about the future. Not to have kids because of concerns over climate change?… That’s a really, really crazy way to think about the world.”

Vance hasn’t exactly lit up the campaign trail for his running mate Donald Trump. He’s managed to misgender himself, seen old photographs of him in drag resurfacing, despite often voicing anti-trans views, and certainly wasn’t happy when moderators fact-checked him during a televised debate with Democratic rival Tim Walz.

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• Dec 18 2024

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