Isn’t it ironic, don’t you think, that Kellyanne Conway is resigning to focus on her family at a time when the administration she helped prop up is, in part, responsible for how difficult it is to be a parent right now? Not even ironic in the Morissettian sense, but ironic ironic. It’s just funny, you know. It’s interesting.
Perhaps you’ve heard. You’ve seen it here or there for the first time or maybe the seventh. Kellyanne is getting out. She helped Donald Trump get into the presidency, remained his faithful servant, avoided getting fired like nearly every other person that Trump hired, and now she is removing herself ahead of the election for what could be his second term. She posted a statement about her resignation on Sunday. She and George Conway, her husband and main public adversary, “disagree about plenty,” she wrote, but are “united on what matters most: the kids.”
This is the party line. They’re presenting a united front. He’s resigning from his work at the Lincoln Project super PAC, a Never Trumper thorn in the president’s side. He cited “family matters” as a reason too.
The obvious reason or excuse is that Claudia Conway, the couple’s 15-year-old daughter, has been a vocal critic of both parents on Twitter and TikTok. Saturday, before Kellyanne announced her resignation, Claudia learned that her mother would speak at the Republican National Convention on Wednesday night. She tweeted, “I’m [devastated] that my mother is actually speaking at the RNC. like DEVASTATED beyond compare.” She added that she’s “officially pushing for emancipation” from her parents. (Once, she tweeted at Congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez “adopt me.”) She cited “years of childhood trauma and abuse” as the reason, which is not funny at all. Kellyanne has pledged “less drama, more mama,” suggesting that she thinks more focus on her daughter will be helpful.
The fact that this family struggle is playing out in public is particularly strange because it feels rare. The overwhelming majority of families who are laboring to manage work and childcare are doing so quietly with nowhere to turn and good options at their disposal. The problem gets named here and there, but for the most part it’s an effort unsolved with no end in sight. On the other hand, with the extremely prominent and public Conways, it’s been hard to look at and it’s been hard to look away. You wonder how things got so bad over there in one of America’s most perplexing families, and wonder if either had the power to mitigate the issue that may have led to their departure from their respective work. The family does seem to be suggesting one thing, though: You can’t advocate for a White House in disarray—or needle one—and manage the chaos at home too.
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