Families Flock to Pro-Life Red States as Pro-Abortion Blue States Lose Children
March 2, 2026
Data continues to show that red states are attracting more families with young children who move there as a result of more affordable housing and larger job growth than blue states, according to a new Institute for Family Studies (IFS) analysis.
As reported by IFS Thursday, an “increasing correlation” is developing between how family-friendly a state’s policies are and how many families are forming within that state. As Ethics and Public Policy Center Fellow Patrick T. Brown observes, blue states are seeing a significant uptick in young people and families leaving and moving to red states, particularly in the years following the COVID pandemic. He notes that even though overall fertility in the U.S. continues to fall, the states that voted for President Donald Trump in 2024 saw an increase from 43.1 million kids under 18 in 2019 to 43.7 million in 2024. But in states that voted for Kamala Harris, the total number of children under five dropped from 8.2 million to 7.6 million over the same time period. In general, IFS has found that red states have higher fertility rates than blue states.
