Vance once endorsed conservative family agenda from Project 2025 authors

JD Vance, the right-wing Ohio Senator and Donald Trump’s running mate, once called a collection of essays from conservative individuals that touted anti-abortion, pro-heterosexuality, anti-affordable housing and pro-restrictive sexual freedom ideals “admirable.”

In 2017, Vance wrote the introduction to a 106-page index published by The Heritage Foundation that advocated for conservative views that are noticeably reflected in its better-known document Project 2025.

The document called the Index of Culture and Opportunity is a collection of roughly 30 essays from people – two of whom went on to help author Project 2025 – that advocate for a two-parent household of a mother and father, more church involvement, restricting access to abortion, women getting pregnant at a younger age, getting rid of government benefits like affordable housing or welfare and more.

“This volume is admirable both for its willingness to house culture and opportunity under the same intellectual roof and for its effort to quantify and analyze both,” Vance wrote in the introduction.

At the time, Vance was rising to fame thanks to his bestselling memoir Hillbilly Elegy and praised the index for addressing issues that he mentioned in his book like living in a low-income household, witnessing drug addiction and coming from a “broken” home.

He also praised Donald Trump – who at the time had just taken office – for running a campaign that would unite the index’s suggestions with policy.

Some of those suggestions include encouraging women to have children at a younger age by putting a stop to “children born from high-tech pregnancies” and “women who are exploited for their healthy reproductive capacities” –  a roundabout way of saying IVF and surrogacy.

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