Rep. Brittany Pettersen is due to give birth to her second child early next Congress. Whether she does so in her home state of Colorado or in Washington could depend on who wins the House majority this November.
Pettersen, who is seeking reelection in a safely Democratic district, announced she was 20 weeks pregnant last month. And because of a prohibition on proxy voting — the controversial pandemic-era practice that Republicans ditched at the beginning of the 118th Congress — she was staring down a difficult choice between her family and her constituents.
“When elected, I didn’t expect to have a child again,” Pettersen said last week in an interview. “But it makes it even more urgent in this moment for me. I’m trying to figure out what this is going to look like and if I’m able to be home and with my family and my support system and my doctors, or if I’m going to have to have a baby in D.C.”
