Right-wing media are distorting a clip of Vice President Kamala Harris speaking to college students to dismiss young people’s concerns about climate change and take misogynistic digs at Harris for not having biological children. 

On September 19, 2023, Harris participated in a conversation at Reading Area Community College as part of her “Fight for Our Freedoms” college tour. 

In talking about the role young people played in the last presidential election, including turning out for issues like climate change, she acknowledged the well-documented anxiety young people feel about the climate crisis and talked about what the Biden-Harris administration is doing to address it.  

Right-wing pundits and media outlets are now falsely claiming that during the talk, she advised students not to start a family because of climate change. 

According to the White House, the goal of the tour was to mobilize young people on “key issues that disproportionately impact young people across the country — from reproductive freedom and gun safety to climate action, voting rights, LGBTQ+ equality, and book bans.”

• Harris acknowledged climate anxiety but emphasized that the Biden-Harris administration was taking steps to adapt and create resilient communities. Harris said that “young leaders” have described climate anxiety as “fear of the future and the unknown, of whether it makes sense for you to even think about having children. Whether it makes sense for you to think about aspiring to buy a home. Because what will this climate be?” She also said that to address these fears, the administration had invested “over a trillion dollars … around things like climate resilience and adaptation.” [YouTube, 9/19/23]
   
• Young people are worried about the future because of climate change. In a 2021 survey of young people between 16-25 years old from 10 countries, 75% said “the future is frightening” because of climate change and nearly 40% said that “fears about the future have made them reluctant to have children of their own.” [The Lancet Planetary Health, 12/2021; Yale Environment 360, 4/28/22]

• Rumble host Donald Trump Jr. wrote: “WATCH: Resurfaced video shows Kamala Harris suggesting that young people should not have children due to climate change. She calls climate anxiety ‘the fear of the future and the unknown of whether it makes sense for you to even think about having children.’” [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]
   
• Right-wing personality Juanita Broaddrick replied that Harris “doesn’t have kids and doesn’t want you to either.” [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]
   
• Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) wrote on X that “Kamala Harris says ‘climate anxiety’ is causing young people to be so afraid of the future they are afraid to have children. The Democrat’s climate cult creates irrational fear. In reality, young people today can’t afford rent because of Kamala Harris.” [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]
   
• Fox News Digital covered the viral video, saying that when Harris initially made the speech in 2023, “critics on social media erupted against Harris’ ‘climate anxiety’ claim, arguing Americans are more likely to consider the rising costs of energy, food and housing when making the decision to have children.” [FoxNews.com, 7/27/27]
   
• Right-wing media outlet The Post Millennial suggested that Republican vice presidential candidate JD Vance “was actually right,” seemingly referring to his statement claiming that Democrats are anti-family. “Oh, so JD Vance was actually right — Resurfaced video shows Kamala Harris suggesting not to have kids while speaking on climate change anxiety: ‘The fear of the future and the unknown of whether it makes sense for you to even think about having children.’" [Twitter/X, 7/27/24; NBC, 7/26/24]
   
• Antifeminist influencer Lori Alexander, who goes by The Transformed Wife on X, wrote that the clip was “satanic.” “Kamala Harris suggests that young people should not have children due to climate change. This is satanic. Don’t listen to this nonsense, women. As long as God is blessing your womb, He wants you having children. They’re blessings from Him.”  [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]
   
• Former Trump lawyer Jenna Ellis, who is now a radio host for the right-wing Christian platform American Family Radio: “Trump should ask Kamala at the debate (assuming she becomes the nominee) if climate change is the reason she doesn’t have children.” [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]
   
• Right-wing influencer Paul Szypula: “Kamala says people shouldn’t have kids because of climate change”. [Twitter/X, 7/27/24]

• Right-wing media have previously expressed outrage over the idea that people can make choices about the size of their family — especially if environmental concerns factor into the decision. In a 2019 Fox & Friends segment that discussed a U.K.-based movement of young people who are choosing not to have kids because of climate change, Fox host Rachel Campos-Duffy said, “This is what happens when you replace religion with ideology and politics. This is their religion. Environmentalism, abortion on demand, these things are their sacraments.” Co-host Pete Hegseth said, “These tactics come from an indoctrination through education where they’re made to believe that World War II is coming, that the end is neigh in 10 years.” [Fox News, Fox & Friends Weekend, 3/9/19]
   
• In a discussion about medically assisted dying in Canada, Newsmax host Rob Schmitt compared climate activism to a “death cult” in 2022 while also spreading misinformation about abortion. Schmitt compared the legalization of assisted suicide to permitting abortion. “These are the same people that want to allow abortion. Elective abortion until full birth even if the kid comes about alive. … You see it from the left all the time. I think they want a world with far fewer people. They’re so worried about climate change, they don’t want to have children anymore. It’s kind of like a death cult.” [Newsmax, Rob Schmitt Tonight, 11/29/22; Salon, 3/30/23]