Anyone who watched the Democratic National Convention or the recent presidential debates will have heard of Project 2025.
In light of the upcoming 2024 presidential election, the Democrats have warned voters about the document’s contents, saying that it is an extreme blueprint of what America would look like if former President Donald Trump is reelected. Meanwhile, the Trump administration has denied any connection to the proposal, leaving many voters confused as to the significance of the project.
What is Project 2025?
Project 2025 is a policy proposal of over 900 pages drafted by the Heritage Foundation, a prominent right-wing think tank, and numerous other conservative organizations. It was primarily written by former President Trump’s Chief of Staff at the Office of Personnel Management Paul Dans and Trump’s former Special Assistant Spencer Chretien.
This is not the first time that a think tank has written a policy proposal. The Heritage Foundation also wrote a Mandate for Leadership in 2015 for the incoming Trump administration. In fact, Project 2025 is modeled on Ronald Reagan’s Mandate for Leadership from 1981. All things considered, this is not unusual, but it should not be mistaken as being affiliated with the Republican Party.
The document claims that the project aims to “restore the family as the centerpiece of American life, dismantle the administrative state, defend the nation’s sovereignty and borders, and secure God-given individual rights to live freely.”
Project 2025 consists of four principal pillars: a policy guide for new members of the Trump administration, a LinkedIn-style database of conservative loyalists to fill future government positions, an outline of training for the new administration called the Presidential Administration Academy and a playbook for what the first 180 days of the Trump administration could look like.
Policy Proposals
The majority of the document is made up of policy proposals titled “Mandate for Leadership 2025: the Conservative Promise.” The main topics covered include government structure, abortion and family, climate and economy, immigration and civil rights and education.
The policies generally outline a plan for Trump’s administration to consolidate power in the executive branch, promote ultra-conservative regulatory changes and implement stricter immigration policies.
Regarding the restructuring of government, Project 2025 calls for placing the entire federal bureaucracy, including the Department of Justice, under direct presidential control, which would allow the president to enact policies directly without the help of expert decisions from independent agencies. It also calls for eliminating the Department of Education and dismantling many other agencies.
Contrary to what some Democrats claim, a nationwide abortion ban is not mentioned in the document. Instead, the document suggests the withdrawal of the abortion pill mifepristone from markets and calls for the FDA to reverse approval of the drug. It also wants to bolster data collection on abortion and regulate abortion use— for example, it suggests enforcing the Comstock Act (1873) against distributors of abortion pills.
Overall, the project calls for the Department of Health and Human Services to “maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family,” claiming that men and women are the ideal family structure in the Family Agenda section.
For climate and economy, the document proposes slashing federal money for research and investment in renewable energy while decreasing efforts for carbon reduction to drive energy production and security. It also calls to downsize the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA), the primary agency driving the climate change alarm.
Increased funding for the US-Mexican border is also referenced in the document, including assigning active military personnel and the National Guard to the border. The project proposes that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) use “expedited removal”, a process normally used near the border against immigrants anywhere in the US, allowing raids in zones like schools, hospitals and religious organizations.
As part of what they call a “crackdown on ‘woke’ ideology,” Project 2025 aims to end diversity, equity and inclusion programs in schools and government, along with a list of terms from all federal laws, including “sexual orientation,” “gender equality” and “reproductive rights.”
What should we expect?
The proposal was written by former members of Trump’s administration, and CBS calculated that 270 proposals out of 700 from the blueprint match Trump’s past policies and current promises. Although the 2015 proposal was not directly aligned with the Trump administration, by the end of his second year serving as president, Trump had fulfilled 64% of the policy recommendations. Based on this information, Harris and her campaign have widely spread the word that Project 2025 is a roadmap for Trump’s administration that voters should count on.
However, Trump and his running mate JD Vance have made it clear that they are campaigning separately from this project and that there are many proposals they disagree with. They have denied any connection to the policies outlined in Project 2025, calling some of the proposals “abysmal”. Therefore, it is hard to tell what will be put into effect and what are merely the ideals of a conservative think tank.
Overall, voters shouldn’t assume that what’s in Project 2025 is what will happen if Trump is elected president. There will likely be a more moderate version put into play if Trump returns to the White House for a second term.
