JD Vance is the least popular vice-presidential candidate in modern American history. In fact, his net favorability rating is now significantly lower than Sarah Palin’s was at the end of the 2008 campaign.
There are several plausible reasons why the junior senator from Ohio is so deeply disliked. But one likely factor here is that his controversial positions on marriage, divorce, and children are entirely out of step with public opinion.
Vance, for example, attracted great public scrutiny for his long history of disparaging people without children. Pundits also took issue with Vance’s push to end no-fault divorces, and his repeated attacks against divorce as a satisfactory solution to unhappy marriages. Vance even suggested that people should stay in violent marriages for the sake of their kids.
Americans show little support for Vance’s views
Those positions are unsurprisingly unpopular, as you can see in the figure below.
Unfortunately, polls haven’t consistently asked these same questions about marriage and children over a prolonged period. But in the past decade, Pew has repeatedly asked a related item about whether society is better off if people make marriage and having children a priority, or if society is just as well off if people have priorities other than marriage and children.
Public opinion is shifting away from Vance’s views
The figure shows that the American public was pretty evenly divided on the question back in 2014. Half of the respondents that year said that society is just as well off if people have priorities other than marriage and children. You can see, however, that public opinion has clearly moved away from Vance’s position. At least 60% have said it’s fine to have priorities other than marriage and children in every Pew poll since 2019.
It’s good politics, then, for Democrats to continue attacking Vance’s views. Not only are his positions on marriage, divorce, and children deeply unpopular, but they’re increasingly anachronistic in an era when Americans’ views about the structure of traditional families are rapidly changing.
