We got a big response to our item yesterday on the troubling decline in U.S. total fertility to under 1.6 kids for every woman of childbearing age. Several readers pointed out that the birth dearth is a Blue State phenomenon. So we checked the data and it’s true!

The Institute for Family Studies documented the trend in 2024:

Where are Americans most likely to have babies? Again, the answer is red states. Republican states (those that Trump won in 2020) generally have markedly higher fertility rates than Democratic ones (those that Biden won), suggesting that more men and women feel confident about starting and raising families in red states than blue ones.

By 2025, every state declined further in total fertility, with the liberal states hitting the lowest lows. Turkish demographer B. A. Koçer produced the best map we’ve seen of the new CDC data. (But he got his colors backwards for US politics!)

South Dakota was the only state with a rate over two last year. DC had the lowest rate – barely over one.

Blue staters can’t even get sex right.