Vice President J.D. Vance is walking back a headline-grabbing remark from his preWhite House days, calling it not only foolish but a failure to live up to his own Christian standards.
In his new memoir, Communion: Finding My Way Back to Faith, released Tuesday, Vance revisits what he now labels the most regrettable line of his political career, a jab at childless cat ladies that resurfaced after Donald Trump tapped him as his running mate in 2024, according to Western Journal. The remark, made in 2021 when Vance was running for the U.S. Senate in Ohio, came during an appearance on Tucker Carlsons former Fox News program and quickly became a rallying point for critics on the left and defenders on the right. One of the dumbest things I ever said came when I argued that childless cat ladies across the Democrat Party were running our country into the ground, the vice president wrote in the book, according to NBC News, which obtained an advance copy.
At the time, Vances critique was aimed squarely at the Democratic Partys leadership class and its cultural priorities, a theme that resonated with many conservatives who see progressive elites as detached from the everyday concerns of families. On Carlsons show, he framed the issue in stark terms, saying, Were 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 theyve made, and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too, in a clip later posted to X.
Vance went on to single out thenVice President Kamala Harris, thenTransportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York as emblematic of a leadership class with no direct stake in the nations future. The argument, however blunt, reflected a broader conservative concern that those crafting policy often lack the lived experience of raising children in an increasingly hostile cultural and economic environment. When Trump announced Vance as his vice-presidential pick in July 2024, the childless cat ladies line was quickly dredged up by opponents eager to paint him as cruel or dismissive of Americans without children.
Many on the right argued at the time that the comment was being stripped of context and weaponized by a media establishment already hostile to the Trump-Vance ticket. Yet Vance now concedes that, context or not, the phrasing itself was a mistake. The comment caused two firestorms: the first when I made it, the second years later, during a political campaign, he wrote in his new book, according to NBC. It was a boneheaded comment, intentionally (and successfully) provocative rather than illuminating.
He further acknowledged that the viral quip undermined the substantive point he had hoped to make about a culture increasingly indifferent, if not antagonistic, to family life. The childless cat ladies remark, he wrote, had the added benefit of distracting from the actual point I wanted to make, which was that our society is becoming pathologically hostile to having kids, a point he said he could have made much more effectively, and with the benefit of showing a little charity to the many Americans who some for reasons beyond their control dont have children.
For Vance, who has made his Catholic faith a central part of his public identity, the episode has become a case study in falling short of his own moral commitments. When I consider the Churchs admonition to respect the dignity of every life, he concluded, this was a clear moment where I failed. That admission underscores a tension many religious conservatives face: how to speak hard truths about cultural decline without demeaning individuals who may be caught up in it or suffering from circumstances beyond their control.
The vice president revisited the controversy again during a much-publicized appearance Tuesday on ABCs The View, a venue not known for its friendliness to conservatives. Reflecting on the fallout, he asked, Did that comment actually shed light on something and start a discussion? Or did it just close people down? And when I make a comment that just closes people down instead of trying to appreciate the point that I make, thats a mistake, right? And thats on me to do better, as he said in another clip posted to X.
Vance used the segment to emphasize that Christians are called not only to speak truth but also to extend and receive forgiveness. He noted that believers must show and receive grace, a theme that dovetails with his broader effort to frame conservative politics as compatible with compassion rather than caricatured cruelty.
The vice presidents media blitz has extended well beyond daytime talk shows, reflecting the high stakes of the 2024 campaign and the scrutiny on Trumps running mate. On Tuesday, he appeared on Fox News late-night mainstay Gutfeld! where he reported that his largely cordial experience on The View had gone better than he anticipated.
Since Sunday, Vance has also been a fixture on network morning programs, using those platforms to defend and explain Trumps Iran peace deal and to articulate a foreign policy rooted in strength without endless war. His willingness to publicly repent of a past rhetorical excess, while still pressing a robust pro-family, pro-faith agenda, signals a strategic effort to broaden the appeal of conservative ideas without surrendering their core convictions.
Login