We’ve discussed the purpose of Project 2025 – to lay out a systematic blueprint for transforming the United States government from top to bottom over the first 180 days of a new Republican administration and we’ve talked about the parties behind Project 2025 – more than 100 conservative groups headed by the Heritage Foundation and more than 400 individual contributors formerly associated with the first Trump administration (including his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, and Stephen Miller, arguably his most influential political advisor).

The next two parts will be heavy on policy. There’s so much to cover that I had to split it into two. They must be heavy on policy because policy specifics make things real to people. You can tell someone that Project 2025 wants to dismantle the administrative state, and they shrug. But tell them that Project 2025 sets the next president up to direct a government agency to write a policy that may result in gay people not being able to adopt children, and they’re not shrugging anymore.

The Four Pillars of Project 2025

Project 2025 is built around four main pillars, each representing a key area where its architects seek to reshape the federal government and American society.

• “Restoring the Family as the Centerpiece of American Life” emphasizes promoting traditional family structures and specifically conservative values as fundamental to the nation’s moral and social fabric.
• “Dismantling the Administrative State” seeks to reduce the size and influence of federal agencies, making them answer to the president and shape them to reflect conservative principles.
• “Defending Sovereignty, Borders, and Bounty” focuses on strengthening national defense, enforcing strict immigration controls, and prioritizing American interests in both domestic and foreign policies.
• “Securing Individual Rights” is a pillar framed around the conservative interpretation of liberty, which seeks to expand their ideas of religious freedoms, protect gun rights, and limit government intervention in moral or religious matters.

These four pillars are not abstract concepts—they include specific, actionable proposals that could drastically alter how the government functions and how everyday life is governed in the United States.

In the first part of our deep dive, I touched on the idea that many things sound good to people when laid out in theory but are less attractive when the practical steps for achieving them are introduced. To see whether that principle applies, let’s examine these four pillars more closely. 

We’ll talk about what each one means according to Project 2025 itself (“What it means”) and then give some concrete policy examples (“Concrete Examples”) that Project 2025 provides that would help advance each of its pillars.

Pillar #1- Restoring the Family as the Centerpiece of American Life

Project 2025’s vision for “Restoring the Family” is deeply rooted in promoting traditional family structures and conservative values; however, its specific policies could lead to significant rollbacks in rights and freedoms for many Americans.

What it means

This first pillar focuses on promoting “traditional family structures and values,” which Project 2025 defines as a married mother, father, and their children. The Project sees this definition of family and getting back to traditional family structures as essential to the moral and social fabric of the nation.

Project 2025 also regards “Restoring the Family” to mean opposing what they describe as “radical gender ideologies” and reinforcing conservative views on family and gender roles.

There are probably many conservatives, including evangelicals and other Christians, who agree with much of that, whether in principle or wholeheartedly.  Once the theory is accepted, we must consider what the execution might look like. What exactly does Project 2025 think needs to be done to transform our national policies so that “the family is restored” as they say it should be?

We don’t have to guess at this—Project 2025 spells it all out for us, including what they propose for the good of the country.

Concrete Examples: What Does Restoring The Family Look Like For Project 2025?

Project 2025’s policy backbone covers 900 pages; every section has specifics. For this pillar, Restoring the Family, Project 2025 proposes policies restricting LGBTQ rights, promoting traditional family structures, and restricting abortion nationally. The project’s authors regard these as essential elements of their goal to “restore the family as the centerpiece of American life.”

Here’s what some of that would look like.

POLICY: Banning Same-Sex Marriage

In a move that would reverse years of progress on marriage equality, Project 2025 includes proposals to redefine marriage at the federal level, recognizing only those unions between a man and a woman. This would strip away legal recognition of same-sex marriages and deny related benefits and rights.

POLICY: Promoting Traditional Family Structures by Removing References to Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity

The Project advocates for redefining the term “family” in federal policies to exclude same-sex couples and non-traditional family arrangements. A key proposal on this front is a plan to remove references to sexual orientation and gender identity from federal regulations, grants, and policies. This might include eliminating terms like “gender equity” and “reproductive rights” from federal documentation.

You might say, “So what? That doesn’t sound very consequential”. Some folks are probably a little sick of hearing about such things, so when they hear a proposal to remove references to it, they cheer a little inside.

If the federal government strips those references from regulations and federal recognition, the ripple effects could remove protections for LGBTQ people.

How might that happen? If references to gender, such as “sexual orientation” and “gender identity,” were removed from federal regulations and policies, anti-discrimination protections under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act could be interpreted more narrowly because those key terms are not specifically mentioned. This would potentially allow employers, schools, and other institutions to discriminate against LGBTQ individuals without the individuals possessing any legal recourse.

If references to “sexual orientation” and “gender identity” were removed from federal regulations and an LGBTQ individual brings a discrimination claim against their employer because they think they were fired for being gay or transgender it would be much harder for them to prove their claim because the relevant anti-discrimination statute no longer explicitly mentioned “sexual orientation.”  The employer would have the legal advantage and could argue that the law does not protect against this type of discrimination. This would weaken legal protections and make it harder for LGBTQ individuals to seek justice through existing civil rights laws.

POLICY: Denying Federal Benefits for And Changing Adoption & Child Custody Policies

If Project 2025’s “traditional family” policies become a reality, there would be a real chance that families that don’t fit Project 2025’s narrow definition will be denied federal benefits. The repercussions on federal benefits and adoption/child custody policies. 

If the term “family” were redefined in federal policies to exclude same-sex couples and non-traditional family structures, same-sex couples might lose access to the spousal benefits they now have, such as health insurance, social security, and tax benefits that are currently available to married couples. Those benefits hinge on the definition of “family.” Project 2025 takes the position that same-sex couples and LGBTQ “family units” should not be considered a “family” under the new federal definitions.

What would this mean in adoption? Since same-sex/non-traditional couples would not be included in the federal definition of family, federal policies might then limit the ability of LGBTQ couples to adopt children. At the very least, these non-traditional families would lose access to the same help protections in the adoption process that traditional families would experience because of this proposed federal shift.

They would face questions related to maintaining custody of children already in their care because they would lack the legal definition of parents, profoundly affecting both their parental rights and their access to adoption services. 

POLICY: Nationwide Abortion Restrictions

One of the most controversial proposals for Project 2025 is the push for a federal abortion ban. Following the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, Project 2025 goes further by advocating abortion access across the country, regardless of local laws or public opinion.

A nationwide abortion ban is not something that a new Republican president can simply decide to implement. It would require Congressional legislation and the president’s signature. Donald Trump has been asked repeatedly if he would sign or veto a national abortion ban if it came to his desk for signature. The likelihood of that scenario occurring decreases substantially if Republicans win only a narrow margin in both houses of Congress.

Changing Abortion Policy Without A Ban

The president doesn’t necessarily have to sign an abortion ban into law to make dramatic changes in this area. In our system of government, the legislative branch of Congress makes the laws, and the executive branch, headed by the president, oversees the implementation of those laws. While the president can’t create a ban with the stroke of their pen, the president does have the power to significantly shift the stance of the government toward an anti-abortion position.

Let’s talk about three things a president can do:

1. The president could reinstate the Mexico City Policy (also known as the “global gag rule”), which prohibits U.S. foreign aid from funding NGOs (non-governmental organizations) that provide or promote abortions. Under a new Republican president, this policy could be expanded to include more restrictions on domestic organizations that receive federal funding. That would have a dramatic functional effect on making the provision of abortions more difficult.
2. The president could issue executive orders that restrict federal funding to any organization, including Planned Parenthood, that provides abortions or advocates for abortion rights, significantly limiting resources available to abortion providers. Remember, Congress makes the laws, but the President (as the head of the Executive Branch) leads the way in enforcing/implementing those laws through all the different departments and agencies they control. The president can do a lot just by ordering those under them to interpret the rules one way or the other.
3. A Republican president who wanted to make abortions difficult to obtain without having the force of law of a national ban behind them could simply direct the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to reinterpret existing regulations, making it harder for healthcare providers to offer abortion services. They could do this by directing HHS to impose stricter requirements for these providers or even go so far as redefining what constitutes a legal abortion under federal programs like Medicaid. They could tighten the definitions of what constitutes a “life-threatening” situation or eliminate coverage for cases of rape or incest, making it more difficult for individuals to qualify for federally funded abortions through these programs. Any such changes would effectively reduce access to abortion services for those who rely on federal programs.

HHS administers federal health programs like Medicaid, which can currently cover certain abortion services under specific circumstances, such as cases of rape, incest, or when the mother’s life is at risk. In making these decisions, HHS currently follows the legal framework established by federal law, protecting access to abortion in certain circumstances.

While the president can’t ban all abortions by force of their unitary will, the president has great influence on how government policy is implemented in key areas. This means a president who agrees with the objectives of Project 2025 wouldn’t technically have to ban abortion to make it inaccessible.

POLICY: More Abortion Surveillance

Project 2025 calls for increasing “abortion surveillance” at the federal level. What does that mean?

“Abortion surveillance,” in a general sense, refers to the systematic monitoring and collection of data related to abortion procedures. That necessarily means the gathering of information both on women seeking abortion and on the providers providing it. This would require establishing a system of increased surveillance in the reproductive healthcare field, with stricter reporting requirements for healthcare providers and enhanced data collection on abortion procedures.

Of course, there would also be substantial penalties for anyone deemed non-compliant. States that do not comply with these federal reporting mandates could face penalties like the withdrawal of federal funding (a historical cudgel used by the government to “encourage” compliance with different requirements).

If any of that makes you a bit uneasy, consider the very real possibility that vaguely worded “appropriate abortion surveillance” could be deemed to include the tracking of interstate travel by people suspected of seeking abortion services. This leads us back to my earlier point about theory vs. reality.

Do we want fewer abortions to happen in this country? Many of us would emphatically say yes. Are we comfortable getting there by allowing the government to track our interstate travel to ensure we’re not doing something they don’t think we should do? When you put it like that, many more people would likely feel uneasy about it. Here, theory meets reality.

Before we move from the abortion element of Pillar 1, this travel tracking proposal is an example of something Project 2025 proposes, which would likely face big legal challenges. The right to travel between states is a well-established constitutional principle, and any attempt to monitor or restrict interstate travel could violate this right. Privacy concerns could spawn legal challenges under the Fourth Amendment, which protects against unreasonable searches and seizures. Legal challenges could also argue that such surveillance violates the right to personal autonomy and the privacy of medical decisions as established in previous Supreme Court rulings. It should be noted that the Roe. V. Wade case centered on the right to medical privacy. It’s now been overturned with the aid of three new conservative Supreme Court Justices.

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Image: Pamela Reynoso

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