The Heritage Foundation Proposes Federal "Marriage Bootcamp" in New Policy Blueprint

[Celerity]

Heritage published its blueprint for federally subsidized "marriage bootcamps" run by churches.

https://globalextremism.org/post/project-2025-january-14th-update/

After the success of Project 2025, the authors at the Heritage Foundation have intensified their focus on imposing a Christian nationalist view of the ideal American family in 2026, urging the Trump administration to fund “marriage bootcamp” classes for unmarried couples living together. This is part of a 168-page policy document, released on January 8, 2026, that seeks to reshape how Americans form families. The report, titled “Saving America by Saving the Family,” builds on the policy framework Heritage established in Project 2025, the 920-page transition blueprint that has already guided the Trump administration’s overhaul of federal agencies. Where Project 2025 focused on restructuring government, it acted as a springboard for this new document which extends Heritage’s reach into private life, proposing cash incentives for marriage, discouragement of dating apps, and expanded Sunday closing laws.

Heritage describes the effort as a “culture-wide Manhattan Project” to reverse declining marriage and birth rates. “Our country will not survive if families continue to crumble at this rate,” Heritage President Kevin Roberts wrote. He warned that the United States is “dangerously close to being unable to reverse the decline” in family formation. The Heritage report defines marriage as “the committed union of one man and one woman” and calls it “the cornerstone” of civilization. Children, the authors write, are “divine gifts” arriving through “God’s grace.” The report cites Aristotle and Cicero in arguing that family serves as the foundation of political order. Heritage argues that federal policy should favor heterosexual married couples over same-sex couples, unmarried partners living together, polyamorous relationships, and people who choose to parent alone. “Fathers and mothers are not generic and interchangeable parents,” Heritage writes. The report acknowledges that IVF has helped people build families but recommends against the practice outside of marriage.

Churches would apply for federal grants to run the bootcamps. Heritage cites a $35 million HHS program called Helping Every Area of Relationships Thrive (HEART), an evolution of healthy marriage grants that date back to George W. Bush’s Healthy Marriage Initiative in 2002, as the funding model. Participants would learn communication, money management, fidelity, and conflict resolution. Nonprofits, radio spots, transit ads, and social media would drive recruitment. At the end, a communal wedding. Couples walk down the aisle together and receive a $5,000 wedding bonus from private foundations. Mentor couples would guide them afterward. Grantees get paid based on marriage success rates. The report doesn’t define what counts as success or how long marriages must last. Heritage proposes HHS-funded ad campaigns. One suggested slogan: “Give her a ring before she gives you a baby.” The report holds up then-Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s 2013 teen pregnancy public service announcement ads as a model.

These ads blatantly shamed young mothers and featured photos of toddlers asking, “Honestly, Mom, chances are he won’t stay with you. What happens to me?” Beyond marriage bootcamp, Heritage’s report proposes $2,500 deposits into investment accounts for couples who marry by age 30. Married biological parents would receive a new tax credit equal to the $17,670 adoption tax credit, with a 25 percent bonus for families with three or more children. The report encourages couples to have an average of two children to maintain the population. U.S. fertility dropped to a record low of 1.59 children per woman in 2024. The Heritage report also discourages online dating and calls for expanding blue laws, which restrict Sunday alcohol sales in some states, into a “universal day of rest.” The report asks President Trump to sign executive orders requiring every federal grant, contract, and regulation to be assessed for its effect on marriage and family formation.

snip

[kwolf68]

1. I read half of that...,

Then I had to go induce vomiting.

[Volaris]

17. Oh, the end of this nonsense is a blurb about restricting alcohol sales on Sundays.

You know, WHEN MAGAS ARE AT THE BAR CAUSE FOOTBALL IS ON.

[Wednesdays]

48. Even Oklahoma, the most notorious dry state in history

...dumped most of their blue laws in 2018.

[mountain grammy]

2. LEAVE US ALONE!

[Solly Mack]

3. ...

[Blues Heron]

4. Sounds romantic

[Coventina]

5. GET YOUR FUCKING CHURCH OUT OF MY GOVERNMENT!!!!!

I hate these people so much.

I have no words to express how much I hate them.

[Trueblue1968]

38. Un-Constutional

[JHB]

6. The Sedition Foundation says what?

[kwolf68]

7. Gift from God bullshit annoys me

Birth is a miracle. Bla Bla Bla

For the record I have 3 kids I love them so much. No doubt.

But they were a byproduct of sexual intercourse, no metaphysical deity had anything to do with it. We coulda kept on popping them out, but wife was maxed at 3 because her last pregnancy was hard so that was it.

Miracles should be rarely seen. I am sorry if we can pop out billions upon billions of babies in this world, I call bullshit on it being a miracle. Also, can God please explain why women have "natural abortions", better known as a miscarriage. Is he just fucking with the women? Here is a child you so desperately want...PSYCH!!

These people want to take us back to the freaking stone age.

[Turbineguy]

8. Sounds positively Hitlerian.

[Arazi]

9. Besides being creepy as fuck, none of this will work

The Scandinavian countries have the most generous pro-family benefits on earth and their birth rate is falling. Other countries with similar enticements face the same falling birth rate.

Women especially have discovered the joy of single, and child free, lives. They aren’t going back to the 1950s

[biophile]

15. Not willingly- the plan is to force it on them

Not going to really have any choices at all other than the way the government wants it.

[Arazi]

16. Nah. Like South Korea the women will just drop out of dating altogether

And stay single until this shit blows over

[Diamond_Dog]

34. Having children, even marriage, is not for everyone. Full stop.

[Ars Longa]

10. How about a MYOFB Bootcamp for Trumpy

Republicans and the Heritage Foundation?????

[flvegan]

11. "Children, the authors write, are 'divine gifts'..." That's what Trump thinks too. n/t

[Wednesdays]

49. So too, Elon Musk

He's left oodles of gifts with oodles of women.

[walkingman]

12. This reminds me my experience in 1974 when I was transferred to Houston.

My now DW (we were not married at the time) went to look at a house for rent and when we were in the process of putting down our deposit the lady asked us if we were married? We told her no just dating. She said that she would not be able to rent to us because were not married. We couldn't believe it. We left, laughed a little and said to ourselves "I hope this is a common thing in this State" 😁 It wasn't.

I can't imagine this being accepted these days, but there are a lot of things I'm seeing that I never thought would happen.

The Bible Belt is a strange place even today - very weird and very real.

[PXR-5]

13. What's next...

When do the Handmaids become available... 🤔

[electric_blue68]

23. I know. Shades of Gilead.

[eppur_se_muova]

14. The Heritage Foundation are the real insurrectionists. They want to replace our Constitutional democracy with their ...

vision of an authoritarian, misogynist, white-supremacist kleptocracy.

Maybe a future Dem POTUS should try out the Insurrection Act on them.

[lonely bird]

44. I call them

A terrorist organization.

[DJ Synikus Makisimus]

18. Obviously it's God's will and you must obey.

That's what you get when you allow freedom of religion without a guarantee of freedom FROM religion.

But we can't do that. Wouldn't be bipartisan.

[Norrrm]

29. God's will... five kids by three wives, two of them immigrants. And all the adultery you can brag about.

Including lusting after your own daughter.

[DJ Synikus Makisimus]

33. Yup, Biblical. (n/t)

[gulliver]

19. Marriage training is an extremely good idea

I don't think it needs to be religious, and I assume that any funding would not require religious affiliation.

Home economics and parenting skills training are also super important. Without them, kids whose parents didn't simply inherit those skills through generations of successful role modeling are at an extreme disadvantage.

[valleyrogue]

32. Marriage is gradually dying out, and there is no going back to the fifties.

Home economics was absolute BULLSHIT when I was in school. it was forced upon girls to prepare them for marriage and kids. Eff that shit for those of us not interested in either. Title IX banned the teaching of home economics solely to girls. It is now radically different and both boys and girls enroll in it. It is not called "home economics" anymore and hasn't been called that for decades. It is not about "marriage" preparation as it was pre-1972, training girls to be wives.

Nope, no going back. Marriage isn't necessary for anything anymore. Its purpose is obsolete and has been for centuries. Thank god for that.

[gulliver]

46. By whatever name it goes, it's extremely effective

Nothing is perfect. Also, no blithe rejection of imperfect systems is perfect.

We're playing old tapes. Home economics is unisex and necessary even for singles. Same for learning how to parent. "I'm never going to use this," is the common objection anyone makes to being "forced" to learn something. But it goes against principles of social equality not to ensure all people have access to fundamental life skills and vital guidance concerning their importance.

It's really in the interest of a country's future workers that they know not just how to get a living but how to maximize the "life" side of work/life balance (a thoroughly progressive priority).

[Baitball Blogger]

20. .

[Ping Tung]

21. Belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man. Thomas Paine

[localroger]

22. Ah, good ol' blue laws

I remember there was an all out political knock-down drag-out in NOLA when I was a kid over blue laws. Louisiana had them, and they prohibited all kinds of work related stuff from being sold on Sunday, as well as alcohol. Except in NOLA, where alcohol was OK, because it was NOLA and the hospitality industry is that big here. But the city wasn't exempt from the hardware laws, which were driven largely by hardware stores that didn't want to compete with up-and-coming big boxes that could afford Sunday staffing. So drugstores like Katz & Besthoff and Walgreens, which were the shiznit before the big boxes like K-mart came, had to rope off some aisles and refuse to sell parts and tools on Sunday. Which meant that if your toilet exploded Sunday morning, you couldn't get the stuff to fix it, but you could get shitfaced drunk as you contemplated the stupidity of the situation. Even with that stupidity it took several years to get the hardware blue laws overturned, so now Louisiana is a mix of wet and dry parishes on Sunday but you can get the parts to fix your toilet all 7 days, everywhere in the state.

[Celerity]

25. Dodgy crawfish etouffee on a Saturday night often leads to the shitter exploding on Sunday morning.

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

[3catwoman3]

42. I was stationed in San Antonio TX in 1976-77 in the Air Force nurse corps...

…and the Sunday blue laws were ineffective then. I’d grown up in Rochester NY, where there were no blue laws, so it seemed very strange and ridiculous. I remember the roped off aisles in the grocery stores, and there didn’t seem to be much logic about what items were forbidden.

I don’t remember the specifics anymore, but it was stuff like you could buy dish soap to wash your dishes, but not a cooking pot to make food in, or a dish towel to dry the pot after washing it.

This was only one of many reasons that Texas seemed like a foreign country to this Yankee girl.

[WestMichRad]

24. In the fine print...

They also probably want to ban divorce, birth control and the reporting of spousal and child abuse.

[RedWhiteBlueIsRacist]

26. Call it what it is, The Donald John Trump Marriage Bootlicker Camp For Adulterous Republicans.

[JBTaurus83]

27. And this policy is to be delivered

By a 34 time felon and adjudicated rapist, multiple time divorcee who had his ex buried in a golf course for a tax break.

[keep_left]

54. Oh, snap!!

[MorbidButterflyTat]

28. Sounds like it has real potential for a massive grift.

Piggy and the Mrs. should sign up ASAP!

[Johonny]

30. Incels wonder why no one wants them

[bucolic_frolic]

31. Perverts don't belong in our bedrooms! /nt

[Norbert]

35. We should procreate but not have fun doing it. I get it.

[artemisia1]

36. "A rat in a maze is free to go anywhere, as long as it stays inside the maze." Blessed be. /nt

[Celerity]

39. rat in a maze

Social Unrest - Rat In A Maze (Full EP) 1982

Social Unrest formed in Hayward, CA, near San Francisco, in 1980. They soon established themselves as one of the leading forces of the Bay Area early hardcore punk scene. The band released their 1st 7'' in 1981, on Infra Red Records. 'Making Room for Youth' was produced by the Dead Kennedys guitar player, East Bay Ray. SU teamed up again with Ray a year later to produce their classic 'Rat in a Maze' 12", released in the summer of 1982 on their own Libertine Records label. They also appeared on Maximum Rock'n'Roll masterpiece 47 band compilation, 'Not so Quiet on the Western Front'.

Label: Libertine Records – LSU1
Format: Vinyl, 12", 45 RPM, Red Translucent
Country: US
Released: 1982
Genre: Rock
Style: Punk, Hardcore

[Norbert]

37. Remember their mantra. There won't be any trouble of the liberals let them do this.

[NoMoreRepugs]

40. Unbelievable.

[Hugin]

41. Aren't these clowns the same "do as I say, not as I do" group who wants a government small enough to drown in a bathtub?

What they are proposing here would cost billions.

[flashman13]

43. There are a lot of things the planet needs - sanity would be good. The last thing it needs is more people.

[paleotn]

45. More religious bullshit.

Why can't these people face the fact that their mythology is dying. People can do and live however the hell they want. It ain't up to the religious bigots anymore.

[littlemissmartypants]

47. That the HFound wants to get their hands on our money is no surprise at all.

[Bread and Circuses]

50. pardon me, wasn't this the party of SMALL Government ?

Except when it comes to women’s bodies

[Laffy Kat]

51. At this point, all women should refuse to marry. nt

[vapor2]

52. they need to STOP shoving their religious views on others

[valleyrogue]

53. What "success" of Project 2025? There isn't any. n/t

[travelingthrulife]

55. Heritage Foundation should be declared a terrorist organization.

Tax the churches back into political silence.

Fucking evangelicals have the worst marriages in the world.High divorce rate.