The New War on Childfree Women: J.D. Vance and the Politics of Procreation
How Control Masquerades as Care in the New Administration
Having grown up outside of Washington D.C., and attending Catholic school, the March for Life, an annual rally and march against abortion, is all-too-familiar for me. This year’s march occurred during the same news week where Trump signed a slew of executive orders, dismantling decades of civil rights progress.
One that wasn’t signed, that lingers in the back of my mind, is related to abortion. Within 24 hours of Trump taking office, we saw ReproductiveRights.gov, a government website offering information about reproductive care and rights, removed.
Despite Trump’s promise to “leave abortion to the states,” reproductive rights face increasing threats in the U.S. From Meta’s restrictions on abortion content to Trump reinstating the Global Gag Rule, none of these seem encouraging.
While Trump was not present at the March for Life last week, he did issue a video statement, “As you know, this annual march started 52 years ago, on the first anniversary of the disastrous ruling known as Roe v. Wade. That unconstitutional decision took power away from the states and the voters, kicking off 50 years of division and anger. But thanks to your tireless work and devotion across five decades, that historic wrong was set right three years ago.”
J.D. Vance was present at the march. I was stunned that a Vice President was at the March for Life to begin with. So much so that I Googled it. America has seen this tale before, the first sitting vice president to attend and speak at the March for Life was Mike Pence. Shadows of a familiar past but more impending doom for the future.
Vance gave a speech at the rally, addressing marchers and labeling Trump as “…the most pro-family, most pro-life American president of our lifetimes.” But that wasn’t the most incriminating part of his speech.
Vance continued, “Our society has failed to recognize the obligation that one generation has to another, is a core part of living in a society to begin with. So let me say very simply: I want more babies in the United States of America. I want more happy children in our country, and I want beautiful young men and women who are eager to welcome them into the world and eager to raise them.”
Surface level, a general audience might think this is just a nicely wrapped speech about abortion and pro-life promises. Vance is a Yale graduate, he’s educated and speaks well—especially in comparison to Trump’s meltdowns (on social media and in real life). But I want you to read between the lines of what this man is really saying. He’s not talking to those who just stand for reproductive rights and abortion access—he’s talking about the obligation to procreate.
Vance has made his position on childfree women very clear to the public, even beyond the “childless cat ladies” rhetoric. In attempts made to clean up his image, he expanded stating that he worries that a life without kids “makes people more sociopathic.” He specifically called out childless teachers, stating teachers without children “disorients” and “really disturbs him.”
In a fundraising email revealed in a CNN article, Vance stated, “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?”
Vance’s position on childfree women is clear and aligned with much of the feedback we receive in response to our decision not to parent. People can’t picture that we feel fulfilled in our lives without children and are somehow defiant in our obligation as birthing women. People wonder, “Who will take care of you when you get older?” and portray us as selfish. (I wrote more about this in my essay, “The Case for Being a Bad Woman.”) The reality is that many people didn’t know this was even an option—and Vance would like to keep it that way.
While Vance speaks on his soapbox about obligations of each generation, he neglects to talk about the very efforts that would contribute to sustaining and supporting familial growth in this country. I’ve spoken extensively about the former Attorney General’s declaration of parenting as a public health crisis—with 41% of parents reporting their stress is so severe they can’t function on most days, and 74% citing fear of school shootings as a significant source of stress.
When asked about school shootings, Vance dismissed them as “a fact of life.” Instead of offering more strict policies on gun control, he advocated for more security in school, noting that would be hard for children to grow up with but it’s “increasingly the reality we live in.”
He doesn’t talk about how risky it is for those who want to experience pregnancy and childbirth; in fact no one really does. This country normalizes pregnancy as a life milestone for women. Last week I dedicated an entire article to the realities of childbirth in America, because the hard truth is this country doesn’t care if women survive, especially women of color—whether they claim to be pro-life or not. Their actions show otherwise.
Vance talks in broad promises of familial support with no plans to back it up. This administration’s first week of executive orders tells the real story, with DEI initiatives and protections stripped away, and increased deportations tearing families apart. It’s abundantly clear that when J.D. Vance says he wants more babies in America, he’s speaking to a very specific audience.
What I worry about most in Vance is that unlike Trump, he is smart, presents himself professionally to the public, and can speak well. And by “speak well” I mean he knows how to talk his way around what he really wants to say. In previous TikTok’s, I’ve compared him to every straight woman’s manipulative ex-boyfriend—the one who knew exactly how to package his controlling and deceitful behavior in a web of reasonable sounding lies. Many of us have had a J.D. Vance in our lives. What’s scarier to me is not in what he says, but what he doesn’t say.
All of his comments are things he’s comfortable with the public knowing. It’s clear this man is eager to run for President one day, so he has the long game of politics in sight. What are the beliefs he’s not sharing?
Many people comment about Vance’s views on women who can’t have children. Vance claims to support fertility treatments and pro-family policies while describing babies as a “profound moral good.” However, his voting record on IVF legislation has drawn criticism.
Vance opposed a bill to establish a nationwide right to IVF and abstained from voting on a similar measure. He did co-sponsor the IVF Protection Act, which claimed to support access to IVF. However, this bill was blocked by Democrats who pointed out that it would still allow states to regulate IVF out of existence and failed to address fetal personhood laws—the biggest threat to IVF access. As Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.) explained, “The cold, hard reality is this Republican bill does nothing to meaningfully protect IVF from the biggest threats from lawmakers and anti-abortion extremists.'"
Similar to Vance’s other statements and claims, the answer lies in his actions. He’s a politician, of course he’s going to appeal to the public. But his voting record reveals his true priorities.
In my TikToks this week, I’ve encouraged followers to look to Russia’s views of childfree people for what might be to come in America. In response to a declining birth rate, Russia voted unanimously to ban “childfree propaganda.” Russia’s ban shows us exactly how reproductive control can be legislated under the guise of “family values.”
While I think a national abortion ban may be their first priority, childfree women need to be prepared for what comes next. Vance's carefully chosen words mask an agenda that goes far beyond encouraging traditional family values.
What makes Vance particularly effective is how he packages control as care and concern. We're watching reproductive rights transform from a personal choice into a matter of national duty—and Vance, with executive power, is helping write the playbook.
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