While discussing Donald Trump’s child care proposals on CNN Wednesday morning, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) said that he wants to encourage the “natural family.”
“I want to respect all people, but I want to promote the natural family,” King said. “And I think that’s the most wholesome thing that we can do.”
King then defined the term “natural family” as “a man and a woman joined together hopefully in holy matrimony, blessed by God with children.”
CNN’s Chris Cuomo noted that research shows that kids raised by LGBT families “are doing just as well if not better” than those raised by a man and woman, which King dismissed.
“I think I’d need to look a little further into some of that research,” King said in response. “We got down the global warming argument and found out there’s another side to that equation too.”
The congressman then said the “natural family” is “the best and most wholesome way to raise a child.”
“And that’s been the case throughout thousands of years of human history. And I think we need to go with the things we know work,” King said.
Cuomo pushed back, arguing that what works is loving a child.
“Why not encourage anything that gets a child loved and provided for?” Cuomo asked.
“I just don’t think it’s true that there’s no reason to believe that a child needs a man and a woman to raise him,” King replied.
Cuomo then jumped in to say, “No, I didn’t say there’s no reason to believe it. I’m saying there’s plenty of reason to believe it’s not the only way it can be done well.”
King still insisted that the “evidence is very heavy on the other side of this thing,” arguing that children need both male and female role models.
Watch a clip via CNN:
.@SteveKingIA on whether Trump’s child care plan will protect LGBT families: “I want to promote the natural family” https://t.co/IvyUHZ0x83
— New Day (@NewDay) September 14, 2016
