Bipartisan push for family-friendly policies gains momentum

JD Vance has floated the idea of more than doubling the child tax credit. Kamala Harris has repeatedly called for both that benefit and paid leave on the campaign trail — and she selected Minnesota Governor Tim Walz as her running mate partly because he enacted those policies in his home state .

It’s a striking pivot from previous election cycles: Both sides in a U.S. presidential race are playing up economic programs that would allow workers to better balance their personal and professional lives. That is evidence of growing bipartisan support for so-called care proposals as advocates spend tens of millions of dollars to drive their case home to candidates and the issues poll historically well with voters of both parties.

“Both Harris-Walz and Trump-Vance — all four of these sides — have some history of doing work on paid leave and pro-family policy in ways that we haven't really seen in a suite of candidates, and that, in of itself, is really exciting,” said Adrienne Schweer, a fellow at the Bipartisan Policy Center. “Regardless of who wins, we're going to have a ticket that has a history of thinking about paid leave and pro-family policy.”

The new push for care comes after a robust pandemic response that briefly granted millions of Americans access to paid family and medical leave , an expanded child tax credit and subsidized child care . With those programs now lapsed, there’s growing momentum for permanent federal support. One survey found that eight in 10 voters want lawmakers to spend more on policies like paid leave and the child tax credit.

“We are moving into a different environment,” said Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee. "We'll be able to move on these bills like we haven't been able to move in the past."

The U.S. is the only wealthy nation without a federal paid leave policy. Overall, it spends just 0.6 percent of its GDP on such family benefits, according to OECD data — on par with countries like Mexico and Turkey. The U.K. spends four times as much.

“We want to have a more pro-family policy,” Vance told CBS News on Sunday when he endorsed the expanded child tax credit.

It's something that both tickets have pursued in the past. As president, Donald Trump enacted paid leave for federal workers and pandemic-era paid leave for all workers. And as members of Congress, Harris and Walz co-sponsored legislation like a bill from DeLauro and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) that would give all workers 12 weeks of paid leave.

Harris then campaigned in 2020 for six months of paid leave before becoming a vocal advocate for President Joe Biden’s pandemic-era paid leave and child tax credit proposals, lawmakers and aides said — including his unsuccessful bid to enact 12 weeks of paid leave. Harris has spoken frequently about taking paid leave to care for her mother following a cancer diagnosis.

“This fight is personal to the Vice President,” Jennifer Klein, director of the White House Gender Policy Council, said in a statement. “The President and Vice President have been fighting for families since day one of the Biden-Harris Administration.”

Indeed, Harris and Walz's track record has top Democrats more optimistic than ever about the odds of pushing through long-stalled legislation like the DeLauro and Gillibrand bill.

“I absolutely believe that when they are in office, we will get a paid leave bill done finally,” said Senate Appropriations Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.). “When you go into a negotiating room on a bill and there's people in that room who are saying, ‘No, this is our top priority,’ not the fifth priority — it makes a difference.”

The vice president is expected to release her economic plan Friday.

Her recruitment of former aides like Gene Sperling, as well as her own stump speeches, underscores the importance she places on policies like paid leave and the child tax credit.

“The fact she's raising it on the trail, in terms of her vision for the middle class, is no small thing,” said Rohini Kosoglu, a former Harris aide who now serves as an outside adviser to the campaign on debate and policy. “She's very intentional about her words.”

There may also be clues in state policies championed by Walz, who recently cited paid leave as the first thing Democrats should enact next year. Minnesota offers parents a child tax credit of $1,750 per kid, per year — and workers 12 weeks of paid leave starting in 2026. The program will cover such a wide range of workers and needs that it will be one of the most inclusive in the U.S.

Trump and Vance’s pitch, on the other hand, focuses on tax relief over Democrat-backed social spending — making it unlikely that their administration would pursue proposals that go as far as those of Harris and Walz, which would reach more workers but require a bigger investment. Paid leave is not mentioned in the GOP platform. And though a tax package enacted under Trump expanded the child tax credit, cuts elsewhere meant families’ tax burden remained mostly the same .

The Trump campaign did not respond to requests for comment.

Any pivot from Trump and Vance would likely meet pushback from the rest of their party. GOP lawmakers remain resistant to the high cost of both paid leave and the child tax credit — most recently, when Senate Finance ranking member Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) led colleagues in voting down a bipartisan package that included a much narrower expansion of the child tax credit.

Congressional Republicans “have been concerned when these tax policies kind of dip their toes too much into a safety-net-program-type thing, as opposed to just tax relief,” said John Shelton, policy director at former Vice President Mike Pence’s group Advancing American Freedom, which promotes conservative policies. He estimates Vance’s proposal could cost as much as $200 billion per year — more than six times the bipartisan package .

Crapo declined a request for comment.

An economic slowdown could also make that spending an even harder sell.

“There are significant risks that we're going to be in a recession, and that's definitely not a time that you want to impose new taxes and mandates on workers and businesses,” Heritage Foundation fellow Rachel Greszler said.

In the meantime, those on the left are moving quickly to discredit the Trump campaign’s overtures.

“If JD Vance sincerely gave a whit about working families in America, he would have shown up in the Senate a week and a half ago and voted" on the bipartisan package, Senate Finance Chair Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) said in a statement Monday .