Between a stroll through nostalgic atmospheres (reminiscent of the last Primetime Emmys in January) and a series of expected victories from heavyweights such as The Bear, Shogun, Baby reindeerAnd TricksThe 76th Primetime Emmys could have been predicted down to the second. The ceremony, which aired Sunday on ABC, hit all the usual beats while paying tribute to industry titans like producer Greg Berlanti and beloved small-screen archetypes like TV moms, dads, villains, doctors and cops. One thing that wasn’t expected? The celebrity feline fixation on a notoriously sour comment from our Republican vice presidential nominee.

When video surfaced in July of a 2021 Fox News interview in which J.D. Vance told Tucker Carlson that our country is run by Democrats, “corporate oligarchs,” and “a bunch of childless cat ladies who are unhappy in their own lives and the choices they’ve made” and who “want to make the rest of the country unhappy, too,” people laughed at the sensationalist generalization. Vance’s comment, which was revived on social media after Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential nominee, goes on to cast Harris, Pete Buttigieg, and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez as symbolic of “the entire future of Democrats” that is “controlled by people who have no children.” Despite the fact that the smear is untrue—Harris is a stepmother, while Buttigieg and his husband adopted twins—it became a flashpoint in the culture war that is the 2024 election. Vance’s disparaging remarks about both cats And Childless people have faced loud opposition in the form of op-eds, statements from congresswomen and comments from a handful of celebrities, including Chelsea Handler, Jennifer Aniston and, most recently, Taylor Swift, who signed her recent statement supporting Harris “Taylor Swift, Childless Cat Lady.”

Now the Emmys have added a handful of extra stings to Vance’s unkind remark. It started with Emmy nominee Selena Gomez presenting the night’s first award, for Outstanding Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series, along with her Only murders in the building co-hosts Steve Martin and Martin Short, and is famously best friends with Swift – saying, “And let me just say what an honor it is to work with two guests who are so far removed from childless cat ladies.” Then Candice Bergen, star of Murphy Browntook the stage to present the award for Best Actress in a Comedy Series. During the presentation, Bergen reminded us that the show angered then-Vice President Dan Quayle when Bergen’s title character became pregnant and chose to raise her child as a single mother. Bergen continued her retrospective by saying, “Oh, how far we’ve come… Today, a Republican nominee for vice president would be never attacking a woman for having children. So, as they say, my work here is done. Meow!“(I dare say it was the meowing heard ’round the world.) And as a bonus, when The Bear‘s Ebon Moss-Bachrach won Best Supporting Actor in a Comedy Series for the second year in a row, and he thanked his parents for “taking such good care of my cat.” Was that a political reference or just a thank you to his parents? Not sure, but we’ll take it.

Overall, the ceremony was quite lax in terms of socio-political statements compared to awards ceremonies in recent years, although Reservation Dogs D’Pharaoh Woon-A-Tai wore a red handprint over his mouth to raise awareness for #NoMoreStolenSisters, while BridgetonNicola Coughlan wore an Artists4Ceasefire pin and Baby reindeerRichard Gadd wore a pin in support of the UK-based charity We Are Survivors. Still, the Emmys found time in their tidy three hours (a miracle!) to continually remind the audience to vote, celebrate the most diverse list of nominees ever, and validate the hardworking cat parents among us. It wasn’t just a cat party, though: dog owners were represented, too, in a simultaneously touching and non-serious acceptance speech from Last week tonightJohn Oliver, who compared himself to Sarah McLachlan as a musical cue, played him off stage while honoring his late dog.

In short: for better or worse, the Emmys have ensured that pets (a topic that has been in numerous news stories for rather inconvenient reasons this past week) remain the talk of the town. I’ll let Murphy Brown himself have the final say: Meow.