Bizarre Controversy Worries GOP Insiders
Author: Greg Valliere
July 26, 2024
RULE NO. ONE IF YOU’RE RUNNING FOR PRESIDENT: Do NOT pick a fight with Taylor Swift, the most popular performer in the universe. Her millions of fanatic followers are angry as GOP vice presidential candidate JD Vance steps into one of the most bizarre political controversies in recent decades.
VANCE HAS BECOME A VOCAL CRITIC of childless women who own cats, blasting “cat women” who don’t have children. This has infuriated the legions of Swift fans, who have been mocked by Vance — digging the hole deeper. People without children don’t have a “direct stake” in America’s future, he says.
WE THOUGHT THIS WAS A WEIRD JOKE until we heard from a loyal reader who has been sifting through an astonishing collection of quotes from Vance, some made on Fox TV with Tucker Carlson, that appear to be well out of the mainstream on issues like social engineering.
THE “CAT LADY” controversy will not subside. Vance can say it was a joke or he can apologize — but the first impression he made with voters is that he’s more than just eccentric. Vance has made an effort to mock Kamala Harris for not having children (she’s the stepmother of two children).
“We are run in this country … by a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made, and so they wanna make the rest of the country miserable, too,” Vance says. “It’s just a basic fact. You look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC (Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez), the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children.”
REPUBLICANS WE HAVE TALKED WITH are dismayed to see Vance embroiled in this kind of controversy, and many are whispering that Marco Rubio would have been a more palatable VP candidate. But it’s too late — the GOP is tied to a candidate who has made Taylor Swift — and her millions of followers — enemies in still another culture war in America.
PARTY LEADERS, who are alarmed by a polling blip this week by the Democrats, were hoping to label Harris as a San Francisco radical, but Vance is looking like a lightning rod. Donald Trump Jr. insisted on putting Vance on the ticket; now we’ll find out if both of them are ready for prime time.
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