Abby McCloskey, Politico Magazine, September 5, 2023
“One year ago, I wrote in these pages about how as a millennial mother of three I don’t have a home in either political party. I wrote that the Republican Party — where I’ve spent most of my political life — had been particularly disappointing given its “pro-family” and “pro-life” rhetoric and yet failing to support vulnerable mothers and children. That, unfortunately, hasn’t changed much, even in the contentious and politically challenging aftermath of the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.
But over the past year, schisms have emerged within the GOP about family policy, including a debate over problem itself. That gives me some hope that the party is — finally — grappling with this problem. Sometimes this discussion is framed in terms of economics and family affordability, other times as a cultural phenomenon of declining marriage and birthrates, or something more amorphous but arguably more on point — declining hope and generalized anxiety among parents with young children.
These debates represent progress, however incremental, that family policy has gone from something that the GOP doesn’t really focus on to something that party leaders are beginning to chew on and test out various approaches.
To get there, Republicans will have to start asking the right questions, and that will be harder to do if more people like me leave the party. But that’s not happening yet. Here’s what they’re getting wrong.”
