Kids in America: How Motherhood Became Political Under Trump

“All of my friends who have kids are in hell,” recalled US singer Chappell Roan during a recent interview for the podcast Call Her Daddy. 

“I actually don’t know anyone who’s, like, happy and has children at this age,” she continued. Roan is currently 27, the average age of first-time mothers in the US according to the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). While Roan later clarified in the episode that her friends with kids are “in hell” because they care for and love their children, her comments did stoke online debate surrounding motherhood. 

A rising number of women online are speaking out on social media about the choice to stay childfree. A notable example of this discourse is the TikTok account “Girl with the list” which has amassed over 500k followers and regularly posts content about childbirth, pregnancy and motherhood under a list entitled Reasons to remain childfree. At the time of writing, the account’s content has received over 14.8M likes from users on the site. While some of the reasons listed  are humorous (“children are a nightmare if you are not a morning person”), the list also contains very real concerns about the ethical and health problems associated with pregnancy and childbirth.

But are fewer women having kids and, if so, why is motherhood becoming undesirable for many young women online?

The US birthrate hit a historic low in April 2024 according to the CDC, as the general fertility rate fell 3% from 2022 to present, with births recorded for mothers aged between 20 and 24 experiencing the greatest dip. Between 2014 and 2020 the fertility rate had been consistently dropping by 2% each year.

A survey conducted by non-partisan US think tank Pew Research Center (PRC) found that the most-cited reason for men and women aged between 18 and 49 for not having children was their concern about the state of the world- this includes both political and climate anxiety. Nearly 40% of participants stated that this was their top reason for remaining childfree.A further 36% also noted that they felt as though they could not afford to raise a child.

PRC’s research did show some gender discrepancy between the societal expectations of parenthood. Female participants above the age of 50 were more likely to state that having a successful career was easier due to not having children than their male counterparts. Additionally, over 40% of female participants of all ages reported feeling pressured by society or peers to have children and start a family. Only 27% of male participants recorded facing the same pressure.

The pressure to become a mother has long been a part of the female experience.

In her 2023 book Women Without Kids, author and journalist Ruby Warrington details her experience as a woman who has never felt the urge to have children, noting that she often felt alienated from other women because of this feeling.“Girl children are indoctrinated with the message that womanhood is synonymous with motherhood from the word go,” she wrote, “... (B)eing female has meant being socialised to aspire to the role of mother.”

Warrington stated that remaining childfree in contemporary times continues to feel like a “deviant, stigmatised path” despite the advances in women’s equality. “In some ways,” she reflected, “forgoing motherhood in favour of doing quite literally anything else with your life is the final frontier in women’s fight for equality.”

Warrington was born in 1976, a year she recognises as deep in the midst of a changing tide for women’s rights and their place in society. More and more women were entering the workforce and by 1974 the Equal Credit Opportunity Act had been passed in the US allowing women to gain their own credit card without the need for a male signature. Women were finally receiving access to birth control and legal, safe abortion- so why had society continued to expect women to choose motherhood when previously unthinkable opportunity was finally available.

Warrington’s feeling of isolation in her decision to remain childfree is shared by other women:

Participants of activist Laura Bates’ Everyday Sexism project, which began in 2012, also describe feeling scrutinised or misunderstood about their childfree lifestyle.“I get insulted frequently for [not having children],” wrote one anonymous participant, “Told I’m unnatural, heartless, and most commonly selfish. I often get treated like a pariah among friends and family with children, or even strangers… I get threatened, insulted, derided and told I’m not a real woman.”

Women in the US are also increasingly facing scrutiny over their childfree status from the government. The Trump Administration has criticised childfree women both before and after the 2024 US election.

Current Vice President JD Vance defended comments he made in 2021 that had resurfaced in the run up to the election in which he described Democrat voters as unhappy “childless cat ladies”.

While Vance stated that his insult was sarcastic, he explained that his comment was a jab directed at the Democratic Party’s anti-family and anti-children politics. 

“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,” he stated in an interview with US journalist Megyn Kelly, “I’m making an argument that our entire society has become sceptical and even hateful towards the idea of having kids.”

https://www.flickr.com/photos/juuuulli/14447794496/in/dateposted/

The Trump Administration is pronatalist, advocating for traditional nuclear family units and an increased birth rate. 

During the 2023 Conservative Political Action Conference Donald Trump stated that he wanted to create another baby boom in America if elected president. Since being elected into office, Donald Trump has been reviewing written proposals to encourage women to have children as reported by the New York Times. Potential ideas include a medal for motherhood awarded to women who birth over six children and reserving 30% of competitive Fulbright scholarships to those who are married or have children.

US women lost the right to abortion after Roe V Wade was overturned in 2022, and nearly 19 million women live in a contraceptive desert restricting their access to free contraceptives. This month Congress also passed the Safeguard American Voter Eligibility Act (SAVE Act) which requires US voters to provide proof of their citizenship at the polls. Under the SAVE Act voters without a valid passport or birth certificate that matches their legal name could be ineligible to vote, posing a major risk to the votes of married women who have legally changed their last name.

For many women in the US, choosing to remain childfree during the Trump Administration may feel like the safest option for their body, rights and finances.

However, there are also women who are embracing a traditional family-orientated lifestyle online. Tradwives, traditional wives, are an internet subculture of women who document their life as a stay-at-home, usually non-working, mother .For example, Hannah Neeleman, who posts under the name Ballerina Farm, creates content that many of her viewers would consider tradwife content. Neeleman runs a homestead alongside her husband and is the primary carer of their eight children.

UCLA gender studies professor Juliet Williams explained in conversation with USA Today how tradwife content online may have impacted the latest US election: 

“There's a lot to say about the effects of romanticising the past and how that has played in this election…The whole premise of a trad wife is the profound fulfillment that comes from fulfilling your duties in the private sphere,” stated Williams, “but the will to broadcast this for social media is an indication of a desire for modes of recognition that are precisely denied by this notion that a woman's place is in the home.”

In her USA Today conversation, Williams concluded that tradwife content, like all social media content, did not always reflect the reality of tradwives’ lives and duties or the past role of women in society. The choice to have children or remain childfree remains deeply politicised in the US today, with many female viewers of tradwife content simultaneously romanticising and criticising the gender roles presented. 

Motherhood continues to be politically interfered within the US, with access to contraceptives and abortion becoming sparser. The Trump’s Administration’s focus on medals and scholarships is misplaced; creating a better living standard for American women, such as affordable childcare and healthcare, would help mould the US into a country that its citizens would want to bring new life into.

Edited by Cormac Nugent