Executive Order Reforms Child-Welfare System, Raising Concerns about Religious Gatekeeping By Manny Moreno
WASHINGTON – On November 13, 2025, the White House released an executive order from President Donald Trump titled “Fostering the Future for American Children and Families.” First Lady Melania Trump described the order as a national effort to strengthen the transition to adulthood for young people who have spent time in the foster care system. At the signing ceremony, she emphasized the dire conditions faced by many youth leaving care, stating that “too many people from the foster care community end up homeless, in danger on American streets.” She described the new policy as “both empathetic and strategic” and predicted it would spark a “lasting nationwide movement.”
The executive order begins with a focus on “empowering mothers and fathers to raise their children in safe and loving homes” while easing the burden on caseworkers. Critics note that the language relies on a binary framing of parents and family life, and they warn that some of the policy’s components could have unintended consequences, particularly for minority faiths and families seeking to foster or adopt.
At its center, the order calls for a comprehensive modernization of the nation’s child-welfare system. It highlights longstanding challenges, including inconsistent placements, long stays in foster care, poor support for youth aging out, and outdated data systems that hinder effective case management. The “Fostering the Future” initiative seeks to address these problems by upgrading state information systems, expanding tools for caregiver recruitment, and using advanced technologies, including predictive analytics and artificial intelligence, to improve caregiver and child matching.
The Administration for Children and Families introduced the implementation initiative “A Home for Every Child,” which emphasizes streamlining foster family licensing, supporting kinship caregivers, and removing bureaucratic barriers that prevent families from participating. The initiative also includes the creation of an online platform to help youth identify needs, locate services, and access resources such as housing, education, mentoring, and employment support.
The Secretary of Health and Human Services is instructed to update regulations, improve data transparency, and publish annual state-level scorecards tracking outcomes related to child safety, permanency, faster investigations, and the recruitment and retention of caregivers. The order also encourages states to increase access to educational vouchers, redirect unused federal funds to support self-sufficiency, and develop partnerships with community organizations, nonprofits, and private-sector entities.
While much of the order focuses on modernization, efficiency, and improved outcomes for children, it also introduces language that has raised concern among civil rights and religious-freedom advocates. The order asserts that “some jurisdictions bar qualified foster or adoptive parents because of their religious beliefs” and directs HHS to address and remove such restrictions. It further instructs the agency to expand partnerships with faith-based organizations and houses of worship.
The order does not state that Christian or heterosexual parents are preferred, nor does it define what constitutes “proper parenting.” Rather, it positions religious freedom as a central value to be protected within child-welfare programs. Yet because Christian organizations make up the majority of faith-based foster-care providers in the United States, prioritizing these partnerships may, in practice, advantage Christian groups over minority faiths or secular families. This dynamic is a policy implication rather than an explicit intent of the order.
Still, the language has drawn scrutiny. In Sections 1 and 4, the order references jurisdictions that exclude families based on “sincerely held religious beliefs or adherence to basic biological truths,” phrasing frequently used in political and legal contexts opposing LGBTQ+ inclusion. By directing HHS to remove state or local policies that restrict agencies from acting on such beliefs, the order could enable some organizations to continue practices that exclude LGBTQ+ individuals or families whose structures do not align with specific theological definitions of gender or sexuality.
This emphasis aligns with themes associated with Project 2025, a conservative policy blueprint that advocates broad religious exemptions in social-service settings and the rollback of LGBTQ+ nondiscrimination requirements. Like Project 2025, the executive order expands faith-based participation, promotes technologically driven performance measures, and places a strong emphasis on individual responsibility and self-sufficiency. However, it does not incorporate the more sweeping structural proposals found in Project 2025, such as redefinitions of sex and gender across federal agencies or major reorganizations of executive power.
Reactions to the order have been mixed. The National Foster Parent Association offered a cautious welcome, stating that it “applauds any action that brings attention to the needs of youth in foster care” and stands ready to collaborate with partners across the community. The Family Focused Treatment Association also expressed measured optimism, saying it would review the order closely and gather feedback from its members on potential impacts and opportunities.
Americans United for Separation of Church and State responded more critically, warning that aspects of the order may open the door to religiously motivated discrimination in foster-care programs. AU notes that while the order does not reference sexual orientation, Christian identity, or definitions of proper parenting, several elements reasonably fuel concern. The order’s protections for agencies acting on particular religious or moral beliefs, combined with terminology such as “basic biological truths,” mirror language used to justify excluding LGBTQ+ families or restricting who may serve as caregivers.
AU points out that the concern is not theoretical. The organization highlights real-world examples, including the case of Liz and Gabe Rutan Ram, a Jewish couple in Tennessee who sought to foster and eventually adopt a child. They were turned away by a taxpayer-funded evangelical foster-care agency solely because of their Jewish faith, a case that AU subsequently brought to court.
For minority religions, including contemporary Pagan traditions and other communities outside the nation’s religious majority, the order’s language may appear protective at first glance. Yet as AU warns, without careful implementation and strong oversight, it could ultimately become a “blueprint for religious discrimination.” ChristopherBlackwell
Yep, it WILL be used to discriminate. Look who signed it.
These are not laws. They are temporary band aids. Felon thinks we're in a national emergency. We are, because of him. He isn't the cure. He's the cause.
Poor Wisconsin, overrun by Somalian gangs. Where are the Packers supposed to play? Felon sed Aurora was overrun by Venezuelan gangs when he rallied here. I was there.
Funniest moment was in the middle of a thought, he turned around to leave the stage and didn't koow where the gap was in the curtain. He wrapped himself in curtain, angrily fighting and yelling noises. Two handlers helped him turn around, and they led him back to the podium.
We used to call children like that EBD. Emotionally and behaviorally disturbed. They are often the most difficult children to teach.
Did the felon ever bite one of his teachers? I bet in his ed history, he did. You can look away from a painting, but you can't listen away from a symphony
on December 1, 2025, 7:49 pm
