Biden said Republicans oppose women’s rights — Katie Britt’s “tradwife” response proved him right
Politicians love to talk about their families, but in her Thursday night response to President Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech, Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala. went even further, portraying her powerful position as little more than the hobby of a housewife. While allowing that it’s an “honor” to be a senator, Britt argued, “that’s not the job that matters most.” Instead, she said her real job is to be “a proud wife and mom of two school-aged kids.”
Britt seemed to want viewers to imagine her in an apron, gazing lovingly upon her family and realizing she must sacrifice some measure of domesticity for “the future of children.” It’s all nonsense, of course. She is exactly the “permanent politician” she accused Biden of being, as any perusal of her resume will show. Britt holds a political science degree and law degree from the University of Alabama. She went straight from graduation to work on the staff of her predecessor, Sen. Richard Shelby. She worked in private practice and government, but never as a full-time stay-at-home mother.
And yet, even as her colleagues were in D.C. for the speech, Britt framed herself as a hausfrau, talking about how “my husband, Wesley, and I just watched President Biden’s State of the Union Address from our living room.” Her address was filmed from her kitchen with an aesthetic that former White House communications director Jennifer Palmieri mocked as “‘tradwife,” which is internet slang for “traditional wife.” As feminist writer Jill Filipovic wrote, Britt’s was a message of who women should be: “Afraid, valued only for being mothers, and in the kitchen.” Republicans didn’t even bother to hide the sexist nostalgia they were angling for. As the New York Times reported, talking points circulated before the speech suggested Republicans call her “America’s mom.”
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Just last week, the GOP nominated Donald Trump to be president, despite a New York judge recently finding that “Trump sexually abused — indeed, raped” journalist E. Jean Carroll. In his State of the Union speech, Biden blew off the long-standing lie that Republicans oppose abortion because of “life,” instead accusing Republicans of broadly opposing “reproductive freedom” and adding, “those bragging about overturning Roe v. Wade have no clue about the power of women in America.” The “pro-life” mask is fully off, proving feminists were right all along: Republicans just want to make women second-class citizens.
Britt’s speech contained a tacit admission of this, when she defensively insisted that Republicans “strongly support continued nationwide access to in-vitro fertilization.” It’s a lie, as was much of her speech. The Republican-controlled legislature in her own state tacitly banned in-vitro fertilization (IVF) last month. When Sen. Tammy Duckworth, D-Ill., introduced a bill to keep IVF legal in all 50 states, congressional Republicans blocked it. Republicans in Alabama recently passed a law to prevent the state court from blocking IVF, but as many feminists pointed out, they did with the understanding that, if Trump becomes president, he will likely sign a bill that bans both IVF and abortion nationwide.
But that Republicans are willing to prop up this lie does unintentionally reveal a deeper truth: They do not and have never thought that embryos are the moral equivalent of children. An abortion kills one embryo. For every successful IVF procedure, at least 2-3 embryos are typically destroyed. By embracing a surface-level support for IVF while denouncing abortion, Republicans are tacitly admitting this was never about “life.” It’s about denying women health care that helps them gain more autonomy. Both IVF and abortion allow women more options, which is why the GOP hates both. But abortion, for obvious reasons, more directly allows women to escape bad relationships, which is why banning it is such a priority for Republicans.
Britt’s tradwife cosplay was on-the-nose, but compared to some of the sexist shenanigans of Republicans on the state level, her June Cleaver act was downright quaint. In North Carolina, for instance, Republicans nominated Lt. Gov. Mark Robinson to be governor, even though he manages to best even Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., in the obnoxious trolling department. He’s racist, homophobic, anti-semitic, and frankly, it’s easier to list who he doesn’t hate: white conservative Christian men. Unsurprisingly, the vitriol Robinson fires at women is quite gross, such as calling victims of sexual harassment “whores” and demanding women be “led by men.”
Shortly after his nomination last week, a video surfaced from 2020 in which Robinson came out against women’s suffrage, arguing, “I absolutely want to go back to the America where women couldn’t vote.” He made these remarks at an event hosted by the Republican Women of Pitt County, which means his party was well aware of his stance but backed him anyway.
Robinson is the most prominent Republican leader so far to speak out against the 19th Amendment, which was ratified in 1920. But this idea of repealing women’s suffrage has been percolating in far-right circles for a while now. Prior to the Trump-endorsed Robinson, a Michigan congressional candidate endorsed by Trump in 2022, John Gibbs, supported the end of women’s right to vote. Prominent conservative commentator Erick Erickson, who has worked for both Fox News and CNN, has also called for the end of women’s suffrage.
Joel Webbon, a conservative activist tied with the group writing “Project 2025,” Trump’s blueprint for a second term, also spoke in favor of repealing the 19th Amendment.
In Christian right circles, the euphemism for ending women’s suffrage is “head of household voting,” in which the right to vote would be held only by the man of any house. (That women head households is of no consequence, as the Christian right’s goal is to make sure all women live either with fathers or husbands.) This pathway to overturning the 19th Amendment is backed by Abby Johnson, an anti-abortion activist who was invited by Trump to speak at the 2020 Republican National Convention.
But while ending women’s right to vote is still a stretch goal for MAGA, the war on birth control is rapidly escalating after Justice Clarence Thomas suggested the Supreme Court is open to repealing the right to contraception as well. In Missouri, Republicans in the state house are once again attempting to block Planned Parenthood from using Medicaid funds. The word “abortion” is thrown around a lot to justify this, but it’s obvious bad faith for two major reasons. First, Medicaid doesn’t cover abortion and hasn’t since the mid-70s. Second, abortion is banned in Missouri, which was one of the most eager states rushing to do so after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
No, this is all a transparent effort to stop women, especially low-income women, from accessing birth control and other sexual health care services, such as those that prevent sexually transmitted infections. Far from being “pro-life,” this policy is anti-baby. In no small part due to cuts to sexual health care in red states, the U.S. is facing a dramatic surge in syphilis, a disease that was once so rare as to be close to eradication. The disease kills newborns, leading to 51 baby deaths and 231 stillbirths in 2022 alone. The only reason to deprive women of birth control and other sexual health treatment is to punish them for being sexually active. Which is really to punish them for being living adult human beings, as research shows over 99% of Americans have sex at some point before middle age, making it as close as you’re going to get to a universal behavior.
The mask has been slipping for a while, as Republicans adore Trump, a man who bragged on tape about how much he loves to sexually assault women. Britt’s bizarre speech Thursday night is part of a larger effort by the Christian right to put a cheerful face on their repressive and hateful policy preferences. Thankfully, most in the press seemed to see right through her, and even the loudest MAGA voices were disappointed at Britt’s failed efforts at playing the frightened housewife. But more work needs to be done to link her strange performance to the full-scale assault Republicans are launching against women’s rights.