Convention speeches are over. Balloons have dropped. Red, white and blue for the Harris/Walz campaign. Gold, along with red, white and blue for Trump/Vance.
At the Republican National Convention (RNC) the Republicans nominated Donald Trump to be the presidential candidate for the November 2025 elections. Despite a criminal conviction, four indictments, an impeachment and the deadly riot he incited on the US Capitol on January 6, 2021, Republicans embraced Trump as their candidate. Overall, RNC speakers painted a picture of a United States in crisis, in decline, and a terrible place, with only Trump capable of improving the alleged conditions of our country.
In the weeks since President Joe Biden declared he would not run in 2024 and endorsed his vice president Kamala Harris as the Democratic candidate; party members have coalesced in their support for Harris and her running mate, Minnesota governor Tim Walcz.
The Democratic National Convention was much more upbeat than the RNC. Speaker after speaker cited the accomplishments of the Biden Administration. They also referenced the country’s troubles (chief of those being Trump or caused by him.) The Democrats positioned themselves as the party of family, patriotism and unity for the American people. Of special note were several Republican speakers endorsing Kamala Harris. From many, we heard about the existential threat that Trump poses to democracy and to the United States of America. What does that mean?
It means that if Trump wins the election this November, the United States we have known will cease to exist. The playbook is already written, in the form of Project 2025, an over 900-page document prepared by the Heritage Foundation, with plans ready for the next conservative president to implement.
What is the Heritage Foundation?
The Heritage Foundation (Heritage) is a conservative think tank. It is based in Washington DC and was founded in 1973, by a group of men unhappy with then President Nixon’s policies.
In January 1981, Heritage published a report targeted to reducing the size of the federal government, to guide the new Reagan administration. Heritage proposed about 2,000 actions, about 60% of which were implemented or started by the end of Reagan’s first year in office.
By the mid-eighties, the Heritage Foundation was a key player in what was considered a national conservative movement. Throughout presidential administrations up through 2016, Heritage continued to develop conservative policy and attempt to influence administrations, both Republican and Democrat.
Starting in 2014, during the second Obama administration, the Heritage Foundation began to develop a database of potential conservatives they deemed suitable for a hypothetical Republican administration.
When Trump initially ran in 2016, Heritage opposed his candidacy; however, the organization ultimately supported Trump. They had their personnel and their database ready to jump in to help staff the Trump administration the moment he won the election. Heritage officials managed to move into Trump’s transition team. Sixty-six Heritage employees and alums landed positions in the Trump administration.
Several hundred names from the Heritage database eventually landed in government agency positions, including Betsy DeVos, Mick Mulvaney, Rick Perry, Scott Pruitt, and Jeff Sessions.
Heritage claims that after Trump’s 2016 election, he had implemented roughly two-thirds of its recommendations by the end of his first year of office.
What is Project 2025?
Project 2025 was developed under the leadership of Paul Dans, a former Trump administration official, working for the Heritage Foundation. Basically, this subtitled Presidential Transition Project calls for dismantling parts of the federal government (the departments of Education and Homeland Security) and consolidating the the federal bureaucracy under the authority of the president. Civil service employees would be replaced with Trump loyalists.
Trump has been claiming he knows nothing about Project 2025. He continued this contention during his “debate” with Democratic nominee VP Kamala Harris.
Given the connections between former Trump administration officials (and probable future administration officials, if he were to be elected), it is impossible to believe that Trump knows nothing about Project 2025. Numbers range from 140 to 200 in estimates as to how many people in Trump’s administration contributed to the document.
A few former Trump officials who contributed to Project 2025:
Roger Severino
Civil Rights Director of the Office of Civil Rights in the US Department of Health and Human Services 2017 to 2021, Severino wrote Chapter 14 of Project 2025, Department of Health and Human Services.
Ken Cuccinelli
Appointed as senior official and performed the duties of the Deputy Secretary of Homeland Security from 2019 to 2021, Cuccinelli wrote Chapter 5, Department of Homeland Security.
Tom Homan
Trump’s acting ICE director, January 30, 2017, to June 29, 2018, also spoke at RNC. Trump has already mentioned he is open to bringing Homan back in a new administration.
Gene Hamilton
Served in the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security during the Trump presidency, Hamilton wrote the Department of Justice Chapter of Project 2025.
Paul Dans
Former Project 2025 Director served as chief of staff of Trump’s Trump Office of Personnel Management. He helped place approximately 4,000 presidential appointees across the federal government.
In 2023, in the Daily Beast, Dans stated that Project 2025 had a “great” relationship with former President Donald Trump.
Dans has since resigned from Heritage, allegedly to focus on the effort to get Trump elected in November 2024.
Dans’ resignation leaves Kevin Roberts, President of Heritage, leading the Project 2025 team. Roberts has written a book called Dawn’s Early Light, Taking Back Washington to Save America, in which he proposes nothing less than a “second American revolution.” The book was originally set for publication on September 24, 2024, but due to the controversy surrounding the book and Project 2025, publication has been moved until after the November elections.
In another blatant connection between Trump and Project 2025, Trump’s VP pick, JD Vance wrote the foreword to Dawn’s Early Light, which contains a call to “circle the wagons and load the muskets.”
In the incredibly large and complex job of staffing a new administration, Heritage stands ready again to provide policy and personnel to a possible Trump presidency. Their playbook will be Project 2025.
Sources:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/20/magazine/trump-government-heritage-foundation-think-tank.html
https://www.project2025.org/policy/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Heritage_Foundation
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cpe3kx3vgd1o
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/trump-project-2025-author/
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