Since the former President Donald Trump After Trump chose “Hillbilly Elegy” author and Ohio Senator J.D. Vance as his vice-presidential running mate, Vance has had to contend with a pile of old media clips that women supporting the Trump-Vance ticket worry will hurt his chances of winning the election.
Several years ago, Vance In a media interview, he said that “a bunch of childless women who are unhappy with their lives and the choices they’ve made” should not be in a position to run the country, placing Vice President Kamala Harris in the same category. He also said that Congress should “tax the bad things, not the good things” by implementing higher tax rates for individuals without children.
Vance’s team says his launch at the Republican National Convention last month was a success, with the Harris campaign bringing out old media clips to discredit their opponent. But women supporting the Republican ticket still feel his comments and efforts to steer things in the right direction have so far fallen short and are hopeful the junior senator can “take back control” of the narrative with an “inspiring story.”
“JD’s vocabulary is very frustrating to undecided female voters. He needs to improve his language to get the message across, otherwise the Trump-Vance brand will be ruined,” Jessica Reed Cross, founder of House Inhabit Substack, told Fox News Digital.
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Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio, speaks during a campaign event in Glendale, Arizona, Wednesday, July 31, 2024. (AP Photo/J.C. Hong)
Rachel Dean Wilson, managing director of the Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) at the German Marshall Fund and a former adviser to the late Senator John McCain, said that “attempts to divide women along lines of mothers versus non-mothers are toxic” and would only “benefit” America’s adversaries.
“Taking a step back from the campaign, the attempt to divide women along mother vs. non-mother lines is toxic to our communities and political discourse,” she said.
“I would encourage women of all political persuasions to resist the tribalism that is encouraged on both sides by these attack lines. While this is undoubtedly a domestic conversation, I always want to remind people that deep domestic divisions and polarization benefit our adversaries abroad and weaken the United States on the world stage,” she said.
Vance has taken steps to put the past behind him. Last week, he visited the southern border and railed against Biden administration policies that have led to a record surge in the number of border crossings, leading to a rise in violent and drug crime. He appeared on the Full Send podcast, which is geared toward a male, Gen-Z audience.
In an interview with “Fox & Friends,” J.D. Vance’s wife Usha Vance said that the “cat women” comment he made was “a joke to illustrate a point he wanted to make, which was important.”
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JD Vance talks onstage with former US President Donald Trump during the Save America rally in Vandalia, Ohio, US, Monday, November 7, 2022. (Joshua A. Bickel/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
“And I sometimes just wish that people would talk about these things and that we would spend less time on this three-word phrase or that three-word phrase.”
They say J.D. Vance’s comments imply that public policy in this country has become “anti-family.”
“Obviously, it was a sarcastic comment. I have no grudges against cats. I have no grudges against dogs. I have a dog at home and I love him very much,” Vance said of the cat comment in an interview with Megyn Kelly.,
“But look, it’s not – people are focusing so much on the satire and not on what I actually said, and what the substance of what I said is, Megyn, I’m sorry, it’s true. It’s true that we’ve become anti-family. It’s true that the left has become anti-child. It’s absolutely true that it’s become a lot harder to raise a family,” he said.
The message hasn’t gone entirely unheard. “Timecast IRL” co-host Hannah Claire Brimelow says she agrees with Vance, that “we need leaders who have kids because our values depend on being passed on to the next generation, and having kids changes your view of your role in civil society.”
He added that the Harris campaign’s strategy of “bringing up a clip from 2021 to attack Vance is proof they have nothing else to criticize him for.”
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Republican vice presidential nominee, US Senator JD Vance (R-OH) with his wife Usha Vance steps out to speak during a rally with US Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at the Herb Brooks National Hockey Center on July 27, 2024 in St. Cloud, Minnesota. (Stephen Maturen/Getty Images))
But it’s been nearly two weeks since the incident broke, and Vance is still on the defensive. Vanessa Santos, president and CEO of public relations firm Renegade DC, says Vance “needs to take back control of the story.”
“The Harris campaign and the media are working together to make sure this ‘cat lady’ news cycle gets as much attention and does as much damage to Trump-Vance as possible,” he said. “Jedi needs to take back control of the narrative. He needs to go into the opposing media, look these dishonest media folks in the eye, defend himself, and expose their blatant hypocrisy.”
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“Since she announced her candidacy, the media has completely whitewashed Kamala Harris’s radical record, particularly her leaving her position as border czar, and has continued to blindly embrace her moderate stances,” Santos said.
“JD has an inspiring story and his family is so beautiful. His story resonates with both men and women, especially parents and young Generation Z voters who are worried that the American dream is out of their reach. Step aside from the ‘cat lady’ media storm and double down on the Democrats for their terrible and destructive policies,” he said.
“Senator Vance is focused on highlighting Kamala Harris’s weak, failed, and dangerously liberal record and he will be doing just that in key swing states in the coming days,” Vance spokeswoman Taylor Van Kirk said in a statement to Fox News Digital.
He said, “Kamala Harris’s policies have crushed inflation, created a historic crisis at our southern border, and increased crime — her agenda is to make Americans less prosperous and less safe. Democrats are spreading false rhetoric about JD because they know her policies have been a disaster for American families.”
