NEW: JD Vance responds to media attacks: 'The Democrat party has become anti-family and anti-child'

Following heavy backlash from left-wing outlets over family-centric comments he made over the past few years, vice presidential candidate JD Vance told Megyn Kelly on Friday that the Democrat party "has become anti-family and anti-child."

"I know the media wants to attack me and wants me to back down on this, Megyn, but the simple point that I made is that having children, becoming a father, becoming a mother, I really do think it changes your perspective in a pretty profound way. This is something, of course, we recognized for hundreds of years in this country, that human civilization has always recognized," Vance said.

"It’s not a criticism of people who don't have children," Vance said. "I explicitly said in my remarks despite the fact that media has lied about this, that this is not about criticizing people who for various reasons didn't have kids. This is about criticizing the Democratic Party for becoming anti-family and anti-child."

The quote that liberal outlets have latched onto came from an Intercollegiate Studies Institute speech Vance gave, in which he asked, "Why have we let the Democrat Party become controlled by people who don't have children?" While outlets attacked Vance for the comment, they left out the rest of his statement: "There have always been people like that, who even though they would like to have kids, are unable to have them. Let's set them aside."

Vance continued in the Friday interview, "We have to ask ourselves Megyn, why do we have masking of toddlers years after the pandemic ended? Why do we have the Harris campaign coming out this very morning, Megyn, and saying that we should not have the child tax credit which lowers tax rates for parents of young children."

"It's because they have become anti-family and anti-kid and I'm proud to stand up for parents and I hope the parents out there recognize that I'm a guy who wants to fight for you. I want to fight for your interests. I want to fight for your stake in the country. And that is what this is fundamentally about. The Democrats in the past 5-10 years Megyn, they have become anti-family. It's built into their policy. It's built into the way they talk about parents and children. And it's time that we call that out. I don't think we should back down from it Megyn, I think we should be honest about the problem."

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