Oprah Winfrey shoots down JD Vance’s “childless cat lady” jibe

Oprah Winfrey has taken a swipe at Donald Trump‘s vice-presidential candidate JD Vance over his “childless cat lady” remarks.

Speaking at the Democratic convention on Wednesday night (August 21), the iconic talk show host offered her strong endorsement to Kamala Harris to become the first ever female President of the United States. She also spoke passionately about racism, sexism and income inequality.

“When a house is on fire, we don’t ask whose house it is,” Winfrey said (via BBC News), adding that “if the place happens to belong to a childless cat lady, well, we try to get that cat out too”.

Winfrey, who does not have children of her own, was referring to Vance’s remarks from a 2021 Fox News interview, in which he claimed the US was being run by “a bunch of childless cat ladies with miserable lives” who are “making the country miserable too”.

Vance also questioned Vice President Kamala Harris’ leadership capabilities because she does not have biological children.

He added: “Look at Kamala Harris, Pete Buttigieg, AOC, the entire future of the Democrats is controlled by people without children,” Vance said. “How does it make any sense we’ve turned our country over to people who don’t really have a direct stake in it?”

A clip of the interview has gone viral in the build up to the November presidential election, for which Harris is now running as the Democrat candidate after President Joe Biden stepped down.

JD Vance says women who haven’t given birth like Kamala Harris are “childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives,” and have “no direct stake” in America. pic.twitter.com/3DJY3pQTGe

— Ron Filipkowski (@RonFilipkowski) July 22, 2024

In July, Friends star Jennifer Aniston also hit out at Vance’s comments, saying: “I truly can’t believe that this is coming from a potential VP of the United States.”

The Rachel Green actress also took the opportunity to address Vance directly and criticise his stance on IVF.

“All I can say is… Mr Vance, I pray that your daughter is fortunate enough to bear children of her own one day. I hope she will not need to turn to IVF as a second option,” she wrote. “Because you are trying to take that away from her, too.”

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