New Vision or Right-Wing Revolution: How 'Project 2025' Sparked Controversy in America

A recent report said that Project 2025 does not represent former US President Donald Trump's plan if he wins the November elections, although many of his closest political advisors are deeply involved in it.

A set of conservative political proposals that include a set of recommendations for the form of the next American government have become the focus of criticism from opponents of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, at a time when they are seeking to highlight what they say are the risks of his return to the White House.

These recommendations were issued by the Heritage Foundation, a Washington-based research and educational think tank whose mission is to build and strengthen conservative public policies.

Project 2025 has been around in some form since early 2023. But in the past few months, the Biden-Harris campaign has made a concerted effort to boost awareness of the project among voters, and to turn it into a symbol of the far-right political shift that the campaign says will happen in the United States if Trump becomes president.

Project 2025

The right-wing Heritage Foundation previously drafted a comprehensive 922-page plan in collaboration with more than 100 conservative organizations and 400 scholars and political experts from across the spectrum of the US conservative movement.

A CNN investigation found that 140 former Trump administration officials had a hand in crafting Project 2025. 

Among the most prominent of these officials are: former acting Secretary of Defense Christopher Miller, former Deputy Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Ken Cuccinelli, former chief trade advisor Peter Navarro, former chief of staff Mark Meadows, and longtime adviser Stephen Miller.

The project has identified a set of policies that will begin to be implemented immediately after Trump’s inauguration next January, enabling the future Republican administration to take action quickly and radically.

“The actions of liberal politicians in Washington have created a desperate need and unique opportunity for conservatives to start undoing the damage the Left has wrought and build a better country for all Americans in 2025,” the project's official website stated.

“It is not enough for conservatives to win elections. 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,” it added.

The project details comprehensive reforms to the executive branch, including criminalizing pornography and imposing a comprehensive ban on it, eliminating the Department of Education and Department of Commerce and halting sales of abortion pills.

It supports the deployment of the military to assist in arrest operations along the US-Mexico border and mass deportations of millions of illegal immigrants, according to the New York Times.

The project also calls for the repeal of large-scale environmental conservation regulations and a crackdown on programs that promote diversity in the workplace.

It calls for expanding presidential power by increasing the number of appointees to political positions and strengthening the president's authority over the Justice Department, which has alarmed many law enforcement officials who say it will undermine the department's ability to conduct investigations without political interference.

It also calls for the dismissal of thousands of government workers, comprehensive tax cuts, an end to worker protections, and the dropping of prosecutions against far-right leaders, which made Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts describe the project as a second American revolution.

Extremist Agenda

Project 2025 was unveiled in April last year by the Heritage Foundation, which has made a habit of proposing policy blueprints for future Republican administrations since the election of Ronald Reagan in 1980.

The Biden-Harris campaign has since run ads and created a website linking Trump to Project 2025.

A group of Democratic lawmakers have also linked Project 2025 to Trump, repeatedly warning that it is his shadow platform and evidence of an extremist agenda for a second term.

He said in a statement he issued last week before announcing his withdrawal from the presidential race, “Project 2025 should terrify every American because it will give Trump limitless power over our daily lives.”

“Project 2025 will criminalize the distribution of medical drugs intended for abortion, destroy the civil service by replacing officials with Trump supporters, obstruct government health insurance programs, and lead to higher drug prices,” Biden added.

Concerns have been growing among some Trump opponents that the project's attempts to consolidate the president's power would be dangerous, especially after the Supreme Court's decision in early July granting presidents broad immunity from prosecution for actions they take while in office.

On the other hand, after Project 2025 gained momentum in the media, senior Trump campaign officials expressed their annoyance with the project, and continued to stress that the project proposals had no connection to the campaign’s official political program.

Senior Trump adviser Danielle Alvarez pointed out that the campaign has been saying for months that these outside groups don’t represent Trump. 

She stressed that the Trump team has its own policy proposals, Agenda 47, and the Republican platform.

Alvarez also responded to Democrats’ focus on the project, accusing Biden of trying to distract from questions about his mental acuity and staying power.

New Vision

Although many of the people involved in Project 2025 worked in the White House during Trump's previous term and will likely help shape his administration should he win the November 2024 election. 

However, Trump opposed and denied any link between him and this project in order to preserve his electoral base, as it is expected that the project’s ideas, which are opposed by a segment of US voters, will affect Trump’s recently growing popularity.

By rejecting this project, Trump is trying to assure voters that his second term will be different, and that his government will be full of people who agree with his policies and ideas and not those who help him radicalize.

In turn, Democratic Congressman from California Jared Huffman called for project 2025 to be stopped, describing it as a miserable conspiracy to dismantle American democratic institutions.

He said that the project would eliminate checks and balances, limit the separation of church and state, and impose an extreme right-wing agenda that violates basic freedoms and violates the general will. 

Others also believed that this project would cause an American civil war, and that it would likely lead to the division of the United States.

It is noteworthy that Trump supports many proposals central to Project 2025, such as granting himself the ability to increase the number of appointees to political positions in the government, and abolishing the Department of Education, but he does not agree with other proposals, such as imposing restrictions on abortion drugs.

According to analysts, Project 2025 represents a revolution for conservatives in America that may begin with Trump, but it will not end with his departure.

On its part, New Republic magazine saw Project 2025 as a remarkably detailed guide to turning the United States into a fascist’s paradise, explaining that the project's core document outlines what is essentially a Christian nationalist vision for the United States.

The Jewish News of Northern California newspaper also pointed out that the danger of the 2025 project lies in the fact that it implicitly promotes the idea that the country is Christian and should be governed as such.

According to the newspaper, Christian nationalists hope to use political force to break the separation of church and state and to harmonize laws related to social issues with evangelical religious doctrine.