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Forced birth advocate believes paid maternity leave should be a choice
It's the only issue where JD Vance thinks a woman's opinion matters.
Marisa Kabas
October 02, 2024
The vice presidential debate is a thing that happened and is, mercifully, now over.
For more than 90 minutes the American people were given the opportunity to hear Republican Senator JD Vance lie about immigrants, lie about health care, lie about his running mate’s record and intentions, and perhaps most exciting, we had the opportunity to watch him refuse to say whether or not Donald Trump lost the 2020 election. As we all know, he did. And Vance knows this, too.
Minnesota Democratic Governor Tim Walz called it a “damning non-answer,” but really we got the exact answer we needed. Vance is a hired gun ready to carry out whatever Trump has planned for another term, and is willing to subvert the will of the people to do it. That’s why, as Walz pointed out, Vance was on that stage Tuesday night and Mike Pence was not.
But of all the appalling, outrageous things Vance said during the debate, one really stuck in my craw. He was asked “Senator, do you support a national paid leave program? And if so, for how long should employers be mandated to pay their employees while they are home taking care of their newborn?”
Here’s the relevant part of his response:
I speak from this very personally because I'm married to a beautiful woman who is an incredible mother to our three beautiful kids, but is also a very, very brilliant corporate litigator, and I'm so proud of her. But being a working mom, even for somebody with all of the advantages of my wife, is extraordinarily difficult. And it's not just difficult from a policy perspective. She actually had access to paid family leave because she worked for a bigger company. But the cultural pressure on young families, and especially young women, I think, makes it really hard for people to choose the family model they want. A lot of young women would like to go back to work immediately. Some would like to spend a little time home with the kids. Some would like to spend longer at home with the kids. We should have a family care model that makes choice possible.
Choice. An interesting word selection for a man who, in so many other realms of life, does not believe in it. Particularly when it comes to one of the most central issues this election–abortion.
As a quick refresher, Vance is staunchly anti-abortion and fervently pro-forced birth. When asked in a 2021 interview about abortion exceptions in cases of rape or incest, he said "Look, I think two wrongs don't make a right. At the end of day, we are talking about an unborn baby. What kind of society do we want to have? A society that looks at unborn babies as inconveniences to be discarded?"
Women and girls who’ve been the victims of rape and incest didn’t have any choice about whether or not they want to engage in forced intercourse. But if that violent crime results in a viable pregnancy, her rights don’t matter. Right?
Vance believes when it comes to how quickly a woman can return to the workforce after incubating a small human for the better part of a year, it should be up to her whether or not she’d like to stay at home for a bit and allow her body to heal while keeping the small human alive, or throw a uniform over her ravaged body and get back to work. Never mind how this could be weaponized by employers or a coercive, abusive partner.
It’s also important to recognize that Vance isn’t referring to women who make the impossible choice to return to work before they’re ready because of financial necessity. No, this is about the mythical woman who so deeply loves working that she’d sacrifice her health and her baby’s well-being in order to get a paycheck. And never mind that, as the question posited, if every parent, regardless of whether they gave birth or not, got paid leave, there wouldn’t need to be a choice between working and care.
Tim Walz: “We’re pro women”
JD Vance: “I know a woman, she’s watching, hello woman”— albertina rizzo (@albz)
1:54 AM • Oct 2, 2024
When I posted part of Vance’s quote across my [far too many at this point] social media accounts, the response was just about as unanimous as you can get on a medium where there’s an incentive to disagree. I received various versions of “hard pass”, “hell no” and “fuck no”.
Women shared stories of needing time after life-threatening births that left them incapacitated for weeks, or some who simply wanted time to rest and bond with their newborn. Much in the way no woman should have to explain why she wants an abortion, nor should she have to justify receiving paid leave.
“When does he think is too soon,” a friend asked, “when you’re still wearing a diaper? Or before your stitches have dissolved?”
I asked Liuba Gretchen Shirley, Founder and CEO of Vote Mama, what she thought of Vance’s comments. She shared that 1 in 4 American women go back to work 10 days after giving birth because they need to. And she had this to say:
Two weeks postpartum, I spiked a fever and nearly passed out at home alone with my toddler and newborn. Four weeks postpartum, I was gravely ill with an IV while nursing two babies. I was in no shape to get dressed, hand my baby to a stranger, and go to work, and yet that is what American women do every day. I’d like to know the women Vance referred to last night. Childbirth and recovery are not a joke. Paid leave is not a vacation.
Republicans like Vance and Trump clearly don’t understand this because our policies are made by men for men. As the wealthiest nation in the world without paid family leave, we are still sending women, bleeding and in agony, back to work with stitches and newborns in tow.
It’s long past time to elect more moms who understand these struggles firsthand and will prioritize truly family-friendly policies. Only then will moms have policies made by us for us.
Vance’s sentiment isn’t new, but his comments in the debate on paid maternal leave (or lack thereof) were a new frontier in his universal disrespect and loathing for women who he sees merely as vessels for childbirth. And if you’re unable to give birth or past your birthing years, forget it. In a 2020 podcast interview, the host was discussing the importance of having grandparents in a child’s life, to which Vance replied “That’s the whole purpose of the postmenopausal female.” That is, to help raise children.
After the debate, it’s still unclear whether JD Vance has ever had anything other than a transactional conversation with a woman. When asked about his stance on abortion, Vance claimed he knew many young women who needed abortions growing up.
“And, you know, one of them is actually very dear to me,” he admitted with the sincerity of fool’s gold. “And I know she's watching tonight, and I love you. And she told me something a couple years ago that she felt like if she hadn't had that abortion, that it would have destroyed her life because she was in an abusive relationship.”
He continued: “And I think that what I take from that, as a Republican who proudly wants to protect innocent life in this country, who proudly wants to protect the vulnerable is that my party, we've got to do so much better of a job at earning the American People's trust back on this issue where they frankly just don't trust us.”
What we never learned, however, was how he and his party plan on earning back trust after successfully overturning the constitutional right to an abortion. He’s worse than a wolf in sheep’s clothing; he’s a wolf who says ‘just trust me’ when every word he’s said about having and caring for a child proves that we absolutely should not.
I want to close by wishing those who observe a Happy Rosh Hashanah and a super sweet new year. I hope you celebrate in a way that feels meaningful to you, and I’m grateful to have to have you as a reader.
Tomorrow I head to Pittsburgh for another reporting trip. In the past week, Vice President Kamala Harris, Donald Trump and JD Vance have all made stops there, and both Harris and Trump have been there on other occasions in recent weeks. To call it important to whoever wins the presidential contest is an understatement: it’s essential. So I decided I want to talk to voters and organizers on the ground to understand why all roads lead to the city of bridges.
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