Usha Vance is defending controversial comments made by her husband, Republican vice-presidential candidate JD Vance, about “childless cat ladies”, telling Fox News that she thought critics had taken the remarks too seriously.

Mr Vance initially made the controversial remarks in a 2021 interview. He argued those without children shouldn’t be leading the country and that women who don’t have kids are “miserable”.

The comments resurfaced after former President Donald Trump chose Mr Vance as his running mate. The backlash – from critics including the actress Jennifer Aniston – was swift, and so was Mr Vance’s defence of his words.

Now, Ms Vance has weighed in, telling Fox News that the remarks were a “quip” and she wished people would look at the larger context of what her husband said.

Addressing criticism that his comments were insulting to those who struggle with fertility problems, she said Mr Vance would “never, ever, ever want to say something to hurt someone who was trying to have a family, who really, was struggling with that”.

She said she understands there “are a lot of other reasons why people may choose not to have families and many of those reasons are very good”.

Mr Vance was a candidate for Senate at the time of the 2021 interview, which also happened on Fox News.

He told former channel host Tucker Carlson that the US is run by “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are miserable at their own lives and the choices that they’ve made and so they want to make the rest of the country miserable, too”.

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He went on to question why a number of high-profile Democrats do not have children, including Kamala Harris who is now running to replace Joe Biden as president. Ms Harris is a step-mother to her husband Doug Emhoff’s two children.

JD Vance argued leaders without children were making choices for the future even though they “don’t really have a direct stake in it”.

He also said those without children live in small apartments, chase wealth, careers and “status” and then end up “hating” those who have families and homes, whom he said are happier and better equipped to lead the country.

Mr Vance, who has three children with Ms Vance, has since defended the remarks – particularly “childless cat ladies” – as a “sarcastic comment” in service of making his larger point.

“People are focusing so much on the sarcasm and not on the substance of what I actually said,” Mr Vance told the conservative media personality Megyn Kelly.

He said his remarks were not aimed at belittling people who do not have children, rather, they aimed to criticise the “Democratic Party for becoming anti-family and anti-children,” he told the host.