How Project 2025 Limits Families

“Our lives are full of interwoven, overlapping communities, and our individual and collective happiness depends upon them,” states the Project 2025 Foreword. “But the most important community in each of our lives—and the life of the nation—is the family” (p. 4). Sounds good, except its definition of family is restricted to a married heterosexual couple with children and it routinely attacks unmarried couples with and without children, single parents, and the whole LGBTQ+ community.

Fortunately, the playbook specifies that marriage is between two unrelated adults (p. 481), which needs to be stated since child marriage is still prevalent in the US. Unfortunately, there is no mention of the adults consenting to the relationship or being able to end it when needed. In fact, conservatives are making it harder to get divorced. (Ironically, the two Presidents most praised in the playbook are also the only two Presidents to be divorced.) Project 2025 opposes the “nonreligious definitions of marriage and family” included in the Respect for Marriage Act—which protects same-sex and interracial marriages—and protects “a biblically based, social science–reinforced definition of marriage and family” (p .479-481), completely ignoring the need to heal from and discontinue religious and generational trauma. It emphasizes that the purpose of marriage is to have children—with no recognition of healthy sexual practices or reasons to not procreate—and invalidly claims heterosexual homes are more stable than homosexual homes.

Instead of simply saying that each child deserves two caring and responsible parents, Project 2025 pushes gender roles by highlighting the need for “the love and nurturing of a mother and the play and protection of a father” (p. 481). Why can’t a father be nurturing and a mother be protective; can’t they both be both? Gender and the legal or religious status of a marriage don’t determine one’s ability to parent. It takes compassion, humility, critical thinking, open-mindedness, and so much more. It also takes caregivers and educators—related and unrelated—beyond the parents to raise well-rounded children into thoughtful adults, it’s not a two-person job. (See article on how Project 2025 aims to destroy public education.) 

It’s not shocking that a far-right playbook opposes LGBTQ+ equity and equality (p. 451, 258), but Project 2025 aims to remove all protections and references to the LGBTQ+ community:

“This starts with deleting the terms sexual orientation and gender identity (“SOGI”), diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”), gender, gender equality, gender equity, gender awareness, gender-sensitive, abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights, and any other term used to deprive Americans of their First Amendment rights out of every federal rule, agency regulation, contract, grant, regulation, and piece of legislation that exists” (p. 4).

It continues by claiming that transgender identity is pornography and should be outlawed, and anyone supporting it should be imprisoned. “Educators and public librarians who purvey it should be classed as registered sex offenders. And telecommunications and technology firms that facilitate its spread should be shuttered” (p. 5). This means that a picture book affirming a nonbinary character could not only be banned but also used as an excuse to arrest and potentially fire a teacher. Starting on page one there are numerous attacks on the “toxic normalization of transgenderism” by banning individuals from military service (p. 104), denying teachers the ability to refer to students by a chosen name or pronoun (p. 346), removing support for gender-affirming care (p. 491), and encouraging discrimination of transgender individuals (p. 584).

To validate its LGBTQ+ discrimination, Project 2025 constantly uses religion as an excuse and protects those with “traditional beliefs about marriage, gender, and sexuality,” such as

• Educational institutions (p. 352)
• Adoption and foster care agencies (p. 478)
• Grant recipients (p. 480-481)
• Health insurers and healthcare workers (p. 493-494)
• Employers (p. 585-586)

Project 2025’s Foreword refers to the overturning of Roe v. Wade as the “greatest pro-family win in a generation” because the decision made “a mockery of our Constitution and facilitated the deaths of tens of millions of unborn children.” (See article on how Project 2025 decimates reproductive rights.) If the far-right actually cared about children’s lives, they wouldn’t reject the single-parent, non-religious, and LGBTQ+ homes ready, willing, and able to foster and adopt children when the biological parents are unable to care for them. The playbook supports on-site childcare at work (p. 587) but doesn’t provide parental leave other than in reference to accruing time off. It also aims to limit supports like grants and aid based on its definition of family. For example, Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) provides states funding for programs aimed at helping low-income families break the cycle of poverty. The playbook emphasizes that states should use TANF funds for married male-female couples with children and might penalize states that don’t follow their definition of “healthy family formation.”

Families are formed and strengthened by shared values, commitment, empathy, and acceptance. They are not limited by blood, marriage, gender identity, or sexual orientation. Our individual and collective happiness depends on thriving families, and our families—both automatic and chosen ones—should all be respected by our government.