JD Vance says not having kids because of climate change is 'a bizarre way of thinking about the future'

Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance slammed the idea of not having children over fears of climate change in his latest interview with the New York Times. He told the outlet that thinking this way strips many of the good things that come from family.

Reporter Lulu Garcia-Navarro was pressing Vance on his past criticisms of those who choose not to have children such as his widely covered "childless cat ladies" comment. Vance responded, saying "What I was definitely trying to illustrate ultimately in a very inarticulate way is that I do think that our country has become almost pathologically anti-child."

The GOP candidate laid out multiple ways that he has seen this take place, including with concerns over climate change, "You see it sometimes in the political conversation, people saying, well, maybe we shouldn’t have kids because of climate change. You know, when I’ve used this word sociopathic? Like, that, I think, is a very deranged idea: the idea that you shouldn’t have a family because of concerns over climate change. Doesn’t mean you can’t worry about climate change, but in the focus on childless cat ladies, we missed the substance of what I said."

Garcia-Navarro followed up, asking about the use of "sociopathic" and Vance then added, "I think that is a bizarre way of thinking about the future. Not to have kids because of concerns over climate change? I think the more bizarre thing is our leadership, who encourages young women, and frankly young men, to think about it that way."

The GOP candidate then added that bringing kids into the world has been a blessing for his life, "Bringing life into the world has totally transformed the way that I think about myself, the way that I think about my wife. I mean, watch your grandparents interact with grandchildren — it is, like, a transformatively positive and good thing for there to be children in the world."

Vance then took aim at the ideas behind not wanting kids because of climate change, saying, "If your political philosophy is saying, 'Don’t do that because of concerns over climate change?' Yeah, I think that’s a really, really crazy way to think about the world."

The campaign page for Kamala Harris, KamalaHQ, took what Vance was saying out of context, claiming, “JD Vance doubles down on calling women without children ‘sociopathic,’ ‘bizarre,’ and ‘deranged.’” 

The X account KamalaHQLies responded to fact-check the campaign account, saying, “This is a flat out lie. Vance called the idea that people are not starting a family because of climate change 'sociopathic.'"

Since the mid-1900s, the US replacement birth rate has dropped from above 3.75 births per woman to a little below 1.75 in 2023, per the Wall Street Journal, meaning that the population is likely to start to decline in upcoming years.