Her ‘I think I’ll have a beer moment’.
WASHINGTON (AP) — Kirsten Gillibrand had a flurry of pots on the stove and steak, haddock, peas, steamed vegetables and rice on the menu.
She had a cable news appearance coming up in a few hours, but for now, her 10-year-old son entertained the family goldendoodle, Maple, a few feet away.
The New York senator was game to talk about motherhood, leadership, her policies and her pursuit of the nation’s highest office, she told a reporter. But first she needed to save dinner.
“I need to focus, because I’m about to burn the fish,” she said. “I’ve reached my point of capacity.”
As she cranks up her presidential campaign, Gillibrand isn’t trying to hide her working-mom juggle — she’s running on it. More than any other contender in a field crowded with women, the mom of two is using her dual roles of mother and candidate to pitch herself to Democratic voters.
She opens her standard campaign speech vowing to “fight for your children as hard as I would fight for my own.” She’s floated the idea of making an RV trip through Iowa this summer, to be able to prepare meals for her family while she travels to meet supporters. During her first week as a candidate, she baked cookies with a voter, dismissing any complexity in the symbolism. And on a recent Tuesday evening, she even invited a reporter into her Capitol Hill home for dinner with her family.[…]
Gillibrand isn’t the only Democratic candidate whose campaign has reflected this shift in attitude. In her campaign launch speech, Elizabeth Warren talked about potty-training her now-grown daughter. Amy Klobuchar often tells the story of the text message her adult daughter sent her the night that Trump was elected, seeking reassurance. Kamala Harris wrote in her recent memoir that her step-children affectionately refer to her as ‘Momala.’