Popping up in the news is Project 2025. What is it, exactly?
Officially titled the 2025 Presidential Transition Project, the multi-pronged plan builds upon Heritage Foundation efforts to shape new administrations since the Reagan era. Essentially, it’s a policy blueprint, a government job placement and training program and a 180-day playbook for a new (presumably Republican) president. It’s supported by dozens of conservative think tanks and advocacy groups.
Project 2025 intends to “pave the way for an effective conservative administration.” Says its sponsors: “If we are going to rescue the country from the grip of the radical Left, we need both a governing agenda and the right people in place, ready to carry this agenda out on day one of the next conservative administration.”
Already, battle lines have been drawn. Democrats attack Project 2025 as the symbol of Republican “extremism.” Donald Trump, who mostly supports its proposals, has notably distanced himself from the project; he doesn’t want his flexibility as candidate or president to be subsumed by anything or anybody, even allies.
A Republican congressional staffer, fearful someone would overhear him, whispered to me that Project 2025 is designed “to give Trump a real conservative platform, whether he wants one or not.” A Democratic political consultant, trying out new attack messaging, told me it’s “a right-wing power grab to take over the government, dilute democracy and establish authoritarian rule.”
Ron Faucheux
Project 2025 was established by Heritage Foundation’s president Kevin Roberts, a Lafayette native and former CEO of the Texas Public Policy Foundation. Roberts recently raised eyebrows when he told an interviewer, "We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.” The project is run by two former Trump administration officials, Paul Dans and Spencer Chretien.
While conservatives enthusiastically support Trump’s candidacy, some remain unnerved by his lack of interest in policy details. They’re pushing for wide-ranging conservative reforms that will endure well beyond another Trump term.
Project 2025's guidebook is the 920-page "Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise." It advocates restoring “the family as the centerpiece of American life,” dismantling the administrative state, defending America’s “sovereignty and borders” and securing the “blessings of liberty.” It was co-authored by more than 400 subject-matter experts, including many former Trump officials such as Dr. Ben Carson and former trade director Peter Navarro.
Specific policy proposals include: ending diversity, inclusion, equity and affirmative action programs; arresting, detaining and deporting undocumented immigrants; reorganizing federal immigration and law enforcement bureaucracies; abolishing the U.S. Department of Education; giving the administration greater authority to hire and fire current civil service employees; changing tax laws; raising the retirement age for Social Security; trimming environmental and climate change regulations; removing “critical race theory” and “gender ideology” from school curricula; and enforcing the Comstock Act that could be used to prohibit the mailing and shipping of abortion drugs and instruments, effectively banning the procedure in some cases.
Democrats insist Project 2025 would, if enacted, undermine the rule of law and chip away at civil rights. They say it would entangle church and state, weaken LGBTQ legal protections and pack federal agencies with Trump partisans.
But Project 2025 also worries some Republican politicians; they fear it’s a minefield of politically risky measures. One of them is Trump himself. “I know nothing about Project 2025,” he recently posted on social media. “I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.”
It’s been reported that Trump has largely dictated the 2024 Republican Party platform, which is more political and less ideological than Project 2025’s agenda. Examples include softening the party’s official position on abortion and opposing a higher retirement age for Social Security. Four years ago, the Republican National Convention adjourned without adopting a platform.
Project 2025 — love it or hate it — is one of the few attempts in this election to offer a governing agenda. That, in itself, is noteworthy. But political campaigns, historically, have been lousy forums to discuss policy proposals — whether they’re thoughtful or reckless, radical or restrained, from the left or from the right. Let’s watch what happens to this one.
Ron Faucheux is a nonpartisan political analyst, pollster and writer based in Louisiana. He publishes LunchtimePolitics.com, a nationwide newsletter on polls and public opinion.