JD Vance called Kamala Harris a childless cat lady. Where does he stand on family issues?

When JD Vance ran for the Senate, he made headlines for calling Democratic leaders, including Vice President Kamala Harris, "childless cat ladies" who don't have a stake in the country's future.

"We are effectively run in this country, via the Democrats, via our corporate oligarchs, by a bunch of 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," Vance told Tucker Carlson in 2021 when he was running for Ohio's U.S. Senate seat. "It's just a basic fact: If you look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children."

The interview resurfaced this week while Vance made his debut on the campaign trail as Donald Trump's vice-presidential running mate. His comments prompted swift criticism from Democrats and drew renewed attention to the Ohio senator's previous statements on divorce, domestic abuse and banning pornography.

Related JD Vance article: Jennifer Aniston hits back at JD Vance's viral 'childless cat ladies' comments

Harris is a stepmother to two children. Buttigieg and his husband adopted two kids and made the announcement within weeks of Vance's 2021 interview.

"The really sad thing is he said that after Chasten and I had been through a really heartbreaking setback in our adoption journey," Buttigieg told CNN this week. "He couldn't have known that. But maybe that's why you shouldn't be talking about other people's children."

Here's what else Vance has said about women and family policies.

What Vance said about abortion as a Senate candidate

Vance opposes abortion and previously said he would "like abortion to be illegal nationally." He compared abortion to slavery in a 2021 interview with the Catholic Current, saying both have a "morally distorting effect" on society.

When asked by Spectrum News 1 that year if abortion should be allowed in cases of rape or incest, Vance said "two wrongs don't make a right." The host followed up with another question: "Should a woman be forced to carry a child to term after she has been the victim of incest or rape?"

"My view on this has been very clear, and I think the question betrays a certain presumption that's wrong," Vance responded. "It's not whether a woman should be forced to bring a child to term. It's whether a child should be allowed to live even though the circumstances of that child's birth are somehow inconvenient or a problem to the society. The question really to me is about the baby. We want women to have opportunities, we want women to have choices, but above all, we want women and young boys in the womb to have the right to life."

A Democratic National Committee spokesperson panned Vance's comments this week and accused him of downplaying rape and incest. Vance's campaign has said media outlets misrepresented his comments.

"The Democrats have completely twisted my words," Vance told Fox News host Sean Hannity at the Republican National Convention. "What I did say is that we sometimes in this society see babies as inconveniences, and I absolutely want us to change that."

Vance softens stance on abortion after losses at ballot box

Like other Republicans, Vance moderated his position on abortion after Ohio and other GOP-leaning states voted to codify access to the procedure. The decisive vote in Vance's home state in 2023 came nearly 18 months after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.

In a December CNN interview, Vance said Republicans must "accept that people do not want blanket abortion bans." More recently, he told Meet the Press that he supports access to the abortion drug mifepristone.

JD Vance criticized for comments on violent marriages

During a 2022 event at Pacifica Christian High School in California, Vance credited his grandparents for never divorcing even though they had an "incredibly chaotic marriage."

"This is one of the great tricks that I think the sexual revolution pulled on the American populace, which is this idea that like, well, OK, these marriages were fundamentally, you know, they were maybe even violent, but certainly they were unhappy," Vance said. "And so, getting rid of them and making it easier for people to shift spouses like they change their underwear, that’s going to make people happier in the long term. And maybe it worked out for the moms and dads, though I’m skeptical, but it really didn’t work out for the kids of those marriages."

Critics accused Vance of encouraging people to stay in violent marriages ? something he rebuked after writing about domestic abuse during his own childhood.

"JD was raised by some of the strongest women I know and went on to marry an incredibly strong woman in Usha," Vance's sister, Lindsay Lewis, said in a statement. "JD is a testament to the women in his life, and the attacks from the media and Democrats that assume anything otherwise are vile."

Vance wants people to have more children

As a Senate candidate, Vance touted a program in Hungary that awards loans to newlyweds and forgives the debt if they have kids. He also said children should be entitled to votes controlled by their parents, giving those parents more say in the country’s future.

“We're not just worried about the lack of babies because it means our media is miserable and because it means our leaders are miserable," he said during a speech to the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. "We’re worried about babies because babies are good, and a country that has children is a healthy country that's worth living in."

In a 2021 interview with conservative commentator Charlie Kirk, Vance suggested people who don't have children should pay higher taxes: "If you are making $100,000, $400,000 a year and you've got three kids, you should pay a different, lower tax rate than if you are making the same amount of money and you don't have any kids."

His comments from the since-deleted video were flagged in opposition research published by a pro-Vance super PAC in 2022.

Vance opposes same-sex marriage

Writing under his previous legal name ? JD Hamel ? Vance in 2011 blasted conservatives who supported a proposal to define marriage as a union between one man and one woman.

Fast forward to his Senate campaign: Vance said he's against same-sex marriage and would not support federal legislation to codify marriage equality.

Haley BeMiller is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.

This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: JD Vance cat lady comments highlight views on abortion, divorce