Over two dozen Ohio lawmakers are pushing a bill that designates the weeks between Mother’s Day and Father’s Day as “Natural Family Month,” sparking backlash from some LGBTQ families, according to reports.
State Reps. Beth Lear and Josh Williams, both Republicans, said they introduced House Bill 262 to celebrate families and emphasize their critical role in society, at a time when marriages and birth rates are declining.
“At a time when marriage is trending downward and young couples are often choosing to remain childless, it’s important for the State of Ohio to make a statement that marriage and families are the cornerstone of civil society, and absolutely imperative if we want to maintain a healthy and stable Republic,” Rep. Lear said in a press release.
“With America facing declining birth rates and a shrinking population, we can no longer afford to ignore the foundational role that strong families play in sustaining our future,” Rep. Williams also said in a statement.
“H.B. 262 is about more than policy—it’s about promoting the economic and social stability that comes from raising children in healthy, two-parent households. We must use every tool at our disposal to support the families that are building the next generation of Americans,” he added.
The bill does not define what makes a “natural” family, but Williams told NBC News the bill is intended to “promote natural families—meaning a man, a woman, and their children—as a way to encourage higher birth rates.”
Birth rates in the U.S. fell to a historic low in 2023, according to a report by the CDC published last year.
The CDC recently reported that birth rates increased by 1% in 2023, which “drove a less than 1% increase in the general fertility rate.”
Some marriage rates have also experienced a downward shift over the past few decades. The Pew Research Center reported that the number of 40-year-olds in the U.S. who have never been married reached a record high in 2021.
But the bill was criticized by the LGBTQ community, according to reports by WLWT5 and NBC News.
Ohio resident Vanessa Melendez, who identifies as lesbian, is a married mother of two who lives with her wife, adopted daughter, and stepson from a previous marriage, in College Hill.
Melendez hit the Ohio lawmakers for using the word “natural” in their pro-family bill, saying it excludes families like hers, and others who have adopted, conceived through IVF, or are raising children without a partner.
“The elephant in the room on how they’ve positioned it is on the word ‘natural,’” Melendez told WLWT5. “And I think that what they’re saying is if there’s only one way to be a natural family, and that’s entirely not true.”
“They’re really coming after it at a very narrow, exclusionary way, and they’re only giving a description of one type of family,” Melendez added. “We don’t want to take away from that one type of family, but there are so many other kinds of families.”
Williams defended the bill to NBC News, saying the bill is not meant to be discriminatory but is intended to support the family structure that’s “most directly tied to the creation and raising of children.”
“By that same logic that all families should be celebrated,” Williams also told WLWT5. “You could go then to June and say we shouldn’t have Pride Month because all sexual orientation should be celebrated, not just those that are alternative to the mainstream.”
Williams, who is Black, was raised by a single mother, grew up in poverty, and experienced homelessness, and argued that fatherlessness has had negative effects on the Black community.
“And we know the statistics that show that that results in a higher rate of poverty, a higher rate of dropping out of school, a higher rate, a higher rate of being on public assistance, a higher rate of engaging in criminal conduct,” he told WLWT5.
Williams and Lear did not immediately return Fox News Digital’s request for comment.