For many members of Congress, the fight for paid leave is personal.
Rep. Joe Cunningham (D-S.C. 1st District) went right back to work after his son Boone was born. Rep. Colin Allred (D-Texas 32nd District) was up from 1 a.m. to 3 a.m. Thursday morning with his infant son, Jordan.
Both lawmakers joined Republican senators and representatives at the White House on Thursday to share their commitments to paid leave and child care reform.
In a series of panels, governors, lawmakers, and business leaders from across the country came together to talk about solutions for paid leave and child care.
Led by Advisor to the President, Ivanka Trump, the White House Summit on Child Care and Paid Leave is the first major meeting on the issue by the Trump Administration. It came at an opportune time.
Earlier this week, Congress passed the National Defense Authorization Act, a must-pass bill to fund the Department of Defense. In that legislation, lawmakers came to a compromise on paid leave for federal workers.
"After three years of relentless advocacy," Ivanka said, "Congress agreed to finally offer Paid Parental Leave for all federal employees."
"The United States Government is now leading by example."
Trump has made this work a cornerstone of her policy push from the West Wing. And she has support in the halls of Congress.
Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and Mitt Romney (R-Utah) have introduced the New Parents Act. Sen. Joni Ernst is the leading co-sponsor of the CRADLE Act. Both plans would use Social Security funds to allow paid time off when adding a new family member. They have proposed varying ways of reimbursing the Social Security system.
And Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) is the author of the bipartisan Cassidy-Sinema Act on paid leave. That plan allows families to preemptively take an advance on future child tax credits.
All four Senators were in attendance along with Sen. Martha McSally (R-Ariz.) and Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W. Va.).
Notably, no Democratic Senators were in attendance though Arizona Republican Sen. Martha McSally mentioned that her fellow Arizonan Sen. Kyrsten Sinema, a Democrat, was invited and had a scheduling conflict.
And the panel with Representatives was bipartisan, where Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas), Rep. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.) and Rep. Jackie Walorski (R-Ind.) joined Cunningham and Allred. Crenshaw and Wagner are the House sponsors of the New Parents Act. Allred introduced the House version of the Cassidy-Sinema plan with New York Republican Elise Stefanik.
The 116th Congress is the youngest Congress in history and it shows in a push toward more robust parental leave policies.
Senator Rubio acknowledged that rapid evolution within the Republican party on the issue of providing paid leave.
"If you did this two years ago, there wouldn't be one Republican sitting up here. Today, there's six," Rubio remarked. "I think it's a great development for our country that it's become a bipartisan issue."
Democrats have long advocated for better paid-leave policies, with one of the loudest voices in the Senate, Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, sponsoring the FAMILY Act, which would provide 12 weeks of paid leave for new parents and to people needing time off to care for family members.
Gillibrand was not in attendance at Thursday's summit and shared concerns about the White House's approach to paid leave.
"The United States needs paid family and medical leave, but unfortunately, the proposals backed by the White House fall short of this goal and would do little to meet the needs of American families," Sen. Gillibrand said in a statement to Cheddar.
"This administration has done nothing more than pay lip-service to paid family leave."
Gillibrand also highlighted the need for a bipartisan approach to paid leave and she believes her FAMILY Act is the right way forward.
"I'm hopeful that with bipartisan support in the House, we can move forward on implementing a real paid leave plan that helps all workers for all of life's events," explained Sen. Gillibrand.
"My legislation, the FAMILY Act, is the most comprehensive proposal to provide paid leave."
Whether it's the FAMILY Act, the New Parents Act or another piece of legislation, in a divided Congress, bipartisanship is key to getting a paid leave plan passed through the Democratic House and the Republican Senate.
But one signature lawmakers presumably won't have the worry about? The president's.
"In everything we do, we're putting the American families first," said President Trump to close out the White House summit. "We now have a historic opportunity to enact long-overdue reforms. It's time to pass paid family leave."
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