Usha Vance, the wife of Republican vice-presidential nominee JD Vance, defended her husbandâs and downplayed his labelling of some Democratic politicians as âchildless cat ladies,â calling it a âquip.â
In a sit-down interview with Fox News that aired Monday, Usha Vance, a trial lawyer, argued her husbandâs past comments, which have received renewed scrutiny since he joined former president Donald Trumpâs presidential ticket, were in service of an argument about the challenges facing parents and the role government plays in parentsâ lives.
âThe reality is, JD made a quote â I mean, he made a quip, and he made a quip in service of making a point that he wanted to make that was substantive,â she said. âAnd I just wish sometimes that people would talk about those things and that we would spend a lot less time just sort of going through this three-word phrase or that three-word phrase.â
âWhat he was really saying is that it can be really hard to be a parent in this country, and sometimes our policies are designed in a way that make it even harder,â she continued.
The first solo interview from Usha Vance comes alongside fresh urgency for the Republican senator to around his candidacy. Trump allies have been eager to see Usha Vance defend her husband and the Republican ticket publicly as the campaign continues its defence of different resurfaced clips of JD Vance.
His past remarks have attracted ire from celebrity icons and Taylor Swift supporters but also from conservative outlets. The Wall Street Journal editorial board eviscerated Vanceâs comments as the âsort of smart-aleck crack that gets laughs in certain right-wing male precincts.â Conservative commentator Ben Shapiro wondered out loud to his sizable audience if Trump was having doubts about his pick.
In her interview with Fox, Usha Vance said she believes her husband âwould neverâ intend to offend people who are struggling to have children while acknowledging that some people choose not to start families for âvery goodâ reasons.
âJD, absolutely at the time and today, would never, ever, ever want to say something to hurt someone who was trying to have a family, who really was struggling with that,â she said. âI also understand there are a lot of other reasons why people may choose not to have families, and many of those reasons are very good.â
Usha Vance insisted that her husband, who repeatedly made disparaging comments about childless adults in interviews, campaign appearances and fundraising emails while targeting Democratic officials, was attempting to have âa real conversationâ about how government can help parents raise their children.
A CNN KFile review of multiple similar remarks from JD Vance underscores how the âchildless cat ladiesâ comment was part of a broader pattern of him pressing the culture war by, in part, singling out Democratic leaders for not having children.
In November 2020, for example, JD Vance said on a conservative podcast that childless Americans, especially those in the countryâs âleadership class,â were âmore sociopathicâ than those with children and made the country âless mentally stable.â Vance added that the âmost derangedâ and âmost psychoticâ commentators on Twitter â now known as X - were typically childless.
âLetâs try to look at the real conversation that heâs trying to have,â Usha Vance said, âand engage with it and understand for those of us who do have families, for the many of us who want to have families, and for whom itâs really hard, what can we do to make it better.â
Vance says sheâs come to âunderstandâ Trump
Usha Vance also pushed back on reports that both she and her husband privately condemned Trump before JD Vance joined Trump on the Republican ticket.
In the interview, Vance detailing her outrage towards Trump in the wake of the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, but said that she has grown to âunderstandâ Trump since then.
âWell, you know, Iâve had several years since then to kind of understand what it is that he is out to do,â Vance said of Trump. âIf I didnât feel that the ticket, you know, the Trump-Vance ticket was able to do some real good for the country, then I wouldnât be here supporting him and JD wouldnât have done this.â
Vance said that she and her husband sometimes disagree about political issues, acknowledging âweâre two different people,â but said she believes in the âintentionâ behind his political career.
âWe have lots of different backgrounds and interests and things like that. So we come to different conclusions all the time. But thatâs part of the fun of being married,â she said. âWhat I never doubt about JD, even when I disagree about this or that, is his intention, what it is that he really wants to do.â
Vance also defended her husbandâs private exchanges with a law school friend in which he disparaged Trump and said âI hate the police.â Vance denied her husband hates the police and said her husbandâs friend sharing their personal correspondence publicly was âhurtful.â
âJD certainly does not hate the police. I think that is clear through his career, and before,â she said. âMaybe he had a negative interaction once or twice and made a, you know, remark like that. I donât know. But since then, and always as long as Iâve known him, heâs had a great deal of respect for them and everything they do to keep us safe.â
âWeâve both been in a position of having people speculate about us a lot and make â draw a lot of conclusions based on sometimes information that isnât even true,â she said of the New York Times report. âAnd I donât want to do the same about other people.â