Has there ever been a more child-friendly administration than Donald Trump’s?
There was Elon Musk in the Oval Office Tuesday with his adorable 4-year-old son, “little X,” on his shoulders as he took questions from the media about how DOGE will cut $1 trillion from the deficit, while the president looked on benignly from the Resolute Desk, occasionally commenting on the child’s “high IQ.”
Meanwhile, the three small children, aged 7, 4 and 2, of Vice President J.D. Vance and wife Usha are accompanying their parents on dad’s first official visit to Europe.
They were spotted walking off Air Force Two sleepy-eyed in their pajamas and posing for photographs in Paris with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who made a fuss over them and gave them presents.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy brought his nine children with wife Rachel Campos-Duffy to his swearing-in, with Vance joking that their “beautiful family, all nine kids . . . are doing their best to solve the fertility crisis in the United States of America.”
Campos-Duffy shared photos on social media of their kids in the Oval Office before the swearing-in ceremony, including the youngest, Valentina, 5, who has Down syndrome, who posed happily next to a smiling President Trump at the Resolute Desk.
The most pro-life prez
“What an honor to visit the most pro-life president in US history,” the Fox News host posted.
“[Ninety] percent of children diagnosed with Down syndrome are aborted. Thank you, President Trump, for being so warm and loving with our little Valentina and for protecting all the baby humans in the womb.”
Another big family featured in the Trump Cabinet swearing-in ceremonies was Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and wife Jenny accompanied by their blended brood of seven well-behaved young children.
Trump himself is often spotted with a troop of grandchildren with whom he enjoys an easy rapport.
His daughter Tiffany is about to give birth to his 11th grandchild.
The eldest grandkid, Kai Trump, 17, spoke at the RNC convention last year to say Donald is “just a normal grandpa” who often calls her during school to ask about her golf game.
He was so proud at the news that she had made the high school honor roll, that he “printed it out to show his friends.”
The most memorable photo so far of his presidency depicts Trump in the East Room of the White House signing a historic executive order, “Keeping Men Out of Women’s Sports,” while surrounded by dozens of jostling little girls whose safety, dignity and opportunity it safeguards.
It has to be noted that, unlike his predecessor, Trump does not sniff or grope children in his vicinity.
That was just one of several executive orders Trump has signed whose central focus is the welfare of children and the family.
One of his first was “Protecting Children from Chemical and Surgical Mutilation” to stop “maiming and sterilizing a growing number of impressionable children under the radical and false claim that adults can change a child’s sex.”
In “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schooling,” Trump outlawed critical race theory in schools so as to “improve the education, well-being and future success of America’s most prized resource, her young citizens.”
And so on.
He will never be given credit for it from the Democratic media, but Trump has put children at the center of his presidency.
Musk’s little boy in the Oval Office picking his nose during a press conference is one obvious manifestation.
Despite the social media snarks saying the child’s presence trivialized the occasion, Musk performed a public service to a new generation by modeling strong parenting skills.
He and Trump don’t fuss over the boy, who was neatly dressed in a camel overcoat.
They don’t disrespect him by giving him toys or an iPad to keep him quiet.
They expect him to behave politely and absorb something of the adult world around him, which he did for more than half an hour.
Rambunctious boy
If he started to get rambunctious, his father picked him up and put him on his shoulders. “Sorry . . . gravitas can be difficult sometimes,” said Musk at one point.
When X started making barking sounds at the assembled media, Trump gently intervened, leaning over seriously and saying: “X, are you OK?” before introducing him to the media: “This is X, and he’s a great guy. High IQ. He’s a high-IQ individual.”
After that, X was on his best behavior.
He knows Trump is an important man to whom his father defers, which is probably not common in his world so he respects his command.
Little X is learning about self-control and new responsibilities as his father takes him seriously enough to trust him in his high-flying world.
Nothing is perfect with small children, of course.
X picked his nose as he stood alongside Trump exhibiting mastery of the two-handed dig.
But Trump didn’t care.
Musk, the richest man on the planet, has said his children make him happiest.
He has at least 11 children by three women, and while that’s not ideal and he is no longer with X’s mother, Grimes, at 53, he seems to have understood that just siring children is not enough.
You need to educate and help form your child’s character.
Vance, 40, does the same in a more traditional and inspirational way.
In his first speech, four days after being sworn in as vice president, he told tens of thousands of cheering pro-lifers in Washington DC: “I want more babies in the United States of America . . .
“I want more happy children in our country, and I want beautiful young men and women who are eager to welcome them into the world and eager to raise them,” he told the March for Life.
He said it had been the “single greatest blessing” of his and Usha’s lives to watch their three young children “grow, learn and become who they are today.”
“Every parent here knows that feeling, that awe of a newborn child. It is our responsibility to cherish and to protect it,” he added.
“We need a culture that celebrates life at all stages, one that recognizes and truly believes that the benchmark of national success is not a GDP number or our stock market, but whether people feel that they can raise thriving and healthy families, in our country.”
Duffy has modeled the sacrifice of fatherhood, when he left a safe seat in Congress in 2019 to help care for his children when Valentina was born and needed significant medical treatment.
“Our families come first,” he said at the time.
“Even though our politics are there first and if we don’t live what we believe, what good are we?”
Fathers are important, even in nonideal family situations.
The fathers of the Trump presidency are showing a new generation the centrality of children to a successful life.
For some people parenthood is unattainable, but a society that prizes childlessness and turns abortion into a sacred rite is on a suicidal path.
Thankfully for all of us, Trump is Making Kids Great Again.
This story originally appeared on NYPost
