Politics and Parenting

The rumor started circulating on political blogs just hours after Alaska Governor Sarah Palin's veep candidacy had been announced: that her four-month-old with Down Syndrome, Trig, was actually the child of her 17-year-old daughter Bristol. Partisans and gossip mavens emailed each other the "clues": a supposed “baby bump” in photographs, Bristol's holding baby Trig at her mother's first appearance with John McCain and a supposed five-month absence from Wasilla High School (her parents told school administrators that it was a case of mononucleosis). The rumor had apparently circulated among Alaskans for months but picked up speed Friday when a contributor to the Daily Kos, a heavily-trafficked liberal-leaning blog, posted an entry on the subject, asking whether the blog should be investigating the rumors of Bristol being Trig's parent.

When Sarah Palin and the McCain campaign came out with a statement Monday morning refuting the rumors, they broke some startling news of their own: that Bristol is currently five months pregnant. "Our beautiful daughter Bristol came to us with news that as parents we knew would make her grow up faster than we had ever planned. We are proud of if Bristol's decision to have her baby, and even prouder to become grandparents," wrote Palin and her husband, Todd. The McCain campaign claims to have been aware of the pregnancy when Palin was selected as a running mate. Obama declined to comment on the issue, telling reporters at a campaign stop in Michigan that "people's families are off limits and people's children are especially off limits." But the blogosphere lit up again; Kos himself (a NEWSWEEK contributor) used the news as an opportunity to inveigh against abstinence education; Washington, D.C.-based Wonkette drew comparisons to the John Edwards affair, while a handful of blogs on motherhood hashed out how much Palin's approach to parenting might have figured in her daughter's pregnancy.

"A pregnant 17-year-old daughter definitely pushes the bounds of how a candidate's life as a parent becomes public," says Barbara Kellerman, a professor at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, who studies in women and politics. "I don't think it'll play very kindly with the constituency that would seem most obvious for her to appeal to, the relatively religious, conservative voters." Kellerman says that it's too soon to judge how this will effect Palin's political positions--whether, for example, she'll still be able to advocate for abstinence-only education, as she did while running for Alaska governor in 2006. But the news does open the door to a new and challenging conversation: what do we expect of a female vice president as a parent? Shortly after the pregnancy news broke Monday morning, NEWSWEEK's Sarah Kliff spoke with Kellerman about how this will play out with voters, what questions it raises about mothers in politics and how female candidates balance politics and parenting. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: How do you think the news of Palin's pregnant teenage daughter is going to play with voters?
Kellerman: It's a double bind for Palin and how she's judged as a parent. On one hand, she's standing by her pro-life beliefs and encouraging her daughter to keep the baby. But on the other hand, there's the question of why her daughter is pregnant in the first place? It really depends on how it's handled. If she says she supports her daughter, is very open and honest, and the daughter marries the father, she could say it's a triumph. But if there's a more surreptitious, unwholesome aura about it, like the rumors about John Edwards fathering a child, then that's a different situation. It's not only the deed but also how she handles it as a mother that is going to be judged.

Palin has, in the past, been a supporter of abstinence education. Do you think her daughter's pregnancy makes it more difficult for her to support that position?
We know so little about this woman that we're certainly not prepared to say where her stance on sex education is going to go, or how McCain's policy will be affected. It's hard to make a judgment right now. But what I do think will happen is that we're going to be tested about what we're willing to say out loud as Americans about things like this. Just as Obama's candidacy challenged what we could and couldn't say about race, Palin [and this pregnancy] are going to do that for what we can and can't say about women.

How much did Hilary's campaign do that already? What's different about Palin?
For her this is going to be much more of a challenge. By the time Hillary ran, Chelsea was already all grown up. When Bill ran, it wasn't really a question. There's no comparison in terms of what Palin is doing, running in her mid-40s, with young children, at this level of visibility. This is a first, a definite mommy first.