 At the time of this writing the Republican National Convention is just getting underway, and the country is coming to grips with a failed assassination attempt on Donald Trump. Voices across the political spectrum are calling for the political rhetoric to be toned down and for the campaigns to focus on issues rather than personalities. Democrats are scrambling to divert attention away from their struggling candidate Joe Biden, so the timing couldn’t be better to turn the focus to policies. Democrats are doing so by raising the alarm about a conservative agenda for the next Republican administration called Project 2025. What is Project 2025, who is behind it, and is it something we should be concerned about?  Heritage Foundation (Heritage): Founded in 1973 the Heritage Foundation’s mission is to formulate and promote conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values and a strong national defense. This prominent conservative think tank is based in Washington D.C. The Heritage Foundation is the driving force behind Project 2025 and promotes conservative governing principles through its publication of “Mandate for Leadership”.  Mandate for Leadership: According to Heritage’s website, the vision for Mandate for Leadership was that it would serve as a guidebook of specific policy recommendations for reducing the size and scope of the federal government and for ensuring that it stayed within its constitutional bounds. It was first published in January 1981 and served as a conservative plan of action for the Reagan Administration. Mandate for Leadership was a collective work by conservative thought leaders and former government insiders, many from outside of Heritage, which set out policy prescriptions, agency by agency for the incoming President. The book literally put the conservative movement and the Reagan Administration on the same page. After that first edition, a new Mandate for Leadership was produced every four years. Soon after President Donald Trump was sworn in, his administration began to implement major parts of the 2016 Mandate for Leadership. During the first year alone his administration had implemented 64 percent of its policy recommendations. From the original 1981 Mandate for Leadership to the current 2025 edition, the purpose is to present concrete proposals to revitalize the economy, strengthen national security, and halt the centralization of power in the federal government. The latest edition is called “2025 Presidential Transition Project”, or simply “Project 2025”.  Project 2025: Simply put, it is the conservative movement’s playbook or blueprint for the next conservative administration, presumably Trump’s, to be ready to govern on January 20, 2025. Facilitated by the Heritage Foundation, Project 2025 is the work of over 50 conservative organizations. The full document is 920 pages laid out in 30 chapters revealing hundreds of concrete policy recommendations for White House offices, Cabinet departments, Congress, agencies, commissions, and boards. Project 2025 is built on four pillars.  Four Pillars of Project 2025:
1. Restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children. 2. Dismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people. 3. Defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats. 4. Secure our God-given individual rights to live freely—what our Constitution calls “the Blessings of Liberty.”  Democrats’ Opposition to Project 2025: Democrats fear that if Donald Trump is elected and follows the Project 2025 blueprint it will erode democratic institutions, reduce the rights of citizens, and give him unchecked powers over the federal government. The head of “Stop Project 2025 Task Force’”, Democrat Congressman Jared Huffman, stated that Project 2025 will “abolish checks and balances, chip away at church-state separation, and impose a far-right agenda that infringes on basic liberties and violates public will.” Here are some of the most controversial sections of Project 2025: Personnel: As of 2022, the executive branch of the federal government employed nearly 2.2 million full-time civil servants across more than 400 agencies and departments. This figure does not include the U.S. Postal Service or uniformed military personnel. Currently an incoming president must fill approximately 4,000 positions with political appointees. Project 2025 proposes to revamp the civil service and vastly increase the number of positions that will be appointed by and beholden to the president. This would involve creating a new job category for federal employees, known as Schedule F, that would exempt these employees from civil service protections and make them easier to remove. Federal Agencies: Several agencies would be eliminated or folded into other agencies. These include the Department of Education, Homeland Security, National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Some agencies would be privatized, including the Transportation Security Administration. Transgender Rights: Transgender rights and gender identity beyond biological sex are roundly rejected, with such steps as reinstating the ban on transgender Americans serving in the military, prohibiting public school educators from referring to students by anything other than their birth name and pronouns without parental permission, and ensuring no federal funds are used to provide gender-affirming care. DEI and LGBTQ Rights: Project 2025 seeks to eliminate diversity, equity and inclusion programs from throughout the federal government and in universities. It also calls for changing laws that bar discrimination based on sex to exclude sexual orientation and gender identity. Climate Change: The proposal would undo much of the federal government’s climate work, including by leaving the Paris Climate Agreement. It would overhaul the Department of Energy to promote oil and natural gas, deemphasize green energy sources and curtail climate research. The size and scope of the EPA would be reduced. Abortion: Project 2025 recommends that the Food and Drug Administration revoke its approval of the abortion drug mifepristone. It would prevent any abortion equipment or medication from being mailed, bar federal funds being used to provide healthcare coverage for abortion and require states to report all abortions that take place there to the federal government. Education: The Department of Education would be eliminated, leaving the states to direct education policy. An emphasis would be placed on a “school choice” policies that direct public funds to be used for students to attend private or religious schools. The Head Start Program that promotes the school readiness of children from birth to age five would be eliminated. Student Loans: Student loan relief efforts would come to an end, including the public service loan forgiveness program and income-driven repayment plans. Big Tech: TikTok would be banned, and tech companies and social media networks would be shielded from being sued over content on their platforms. Laws would be promoted, like those passed in Florida and Texas, that seek to punish social media companies who ban or suspend users based on their “viewpoints.” Justice Department: Project 2025 calls for a “top-to-bottom overhaul” of the DOJ and FBI. These agencies would be filled with far more political appointees, making them more accountable to the president. Taxes: Project 2025 would seek to get rid of current tax rates and most deductions and credits, instead proposing a 15% rate for anyone under the Social Security wage base ($168,000 in 2024) and 30% for taxpayers earning more than that. This means the lowest-income taxpayers will now pay more and some higher earners will pay less. The corporate income tax rate would be lowered to 18%. Foreign Relations: Project 2025 directs the U.S. to pull out of international organizations when they don’t serve the administration’s interests, including the World Health Organization and various United Nations agencies. Healthcare: Project 2025 does not seek to overturn the Affordable Care Act but would make significant cuts to Medicaid and impose work requirements to receive coverage. It would reform Medicare and make Medicare Advantage, a paid supplement to Medicare, the default option for patients. Medicare’s ability to negotiate drug prices would be repealed. Immigration: More money would be provided to build the wall on the U.S.-Mexico border and the Department of Homeland Security would be dismantled. U.S. Customs and Border Protection would be combined with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to increase their focus and power to secure the border.  Trump Responds: Facing pushback from Democrats, Donald Trump is attempting to distance himself from Project 2025. “I know nothing about Project 2025,” Trump recently posted on his social media platform. He also claimed “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. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.” Trump’s assertions that he knows nothing about Project 2025 are disingenuous to put it kindly. As stated earlier, his administration implemented major parts of the 2016 Mandate for Leadership. Several of Trump’s appointees during his administration are now affiliated with Project 2025, including the project’s director Paul Dans who served as the chief of staff at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.  My Views on Project 2025: It is very common for presidential campaigns and presidential administrations to enlist the services of think tanks to help draft policy proposals and to promote partisan causes. The Heritage Foundation has been working with Republican administrations and other conservative groups since it was founded in the 1970s. Liberal think tanks, particularly the Center for American Progress, was used extensively by the Obama and Biden Administrations to develop progressive policies. I’m concerned about Project 2025, but not panicked. It is a wish-list, a compendium of conservative thought that has been tailored to align with what Donald Trump and his supporters have been saying for the past ten years. What is laid out in minute detail in Project 2025 should not come as a surprise. Trump is not shy about telling the American people what he intends to do if he regains the White House; much of which is spelled out in his Agenda47. Project 2025 aligns with Trump’s vision of being an all-powerful executive. It also provides him with a means to wrestle control from those departments that were less than loyal or outright opposed him during his first administration. Stripping career civil servants of protections and making them politically accountable to an all-powerful executive is very disturbing. All sorts of mischief can result if the federal bureaucracy is subject to the whims of a new administration every four years, not to mention the chaos it would create. Project 2025 serves as a counterweight to what Trump and his conservative allies view as Biden’s “woke” agenda, which requires DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) and climate mitigation steps be included in every policy and piece of legislation. I believe in the separation of church and state, and Project 2025 would certainly blur the lines between the two. An attempt to legislate morality, as Project 2025 does, would infringe upon individual rights and stifle diverse views and opinions.  The federal bureaucracy is vast and mind numbing in its complexity. No one president or administration can even begin to grasp the intricacies, much less effectively manage the sprawling maze of over 400 departments and millions of employees of the federal government. I welcome any organization, inside or outside the government, willing to examine the bureaucracy with an eye to improving efficiency and effectiveness. Afterall, our country has a mind-boggling national debt of $34 trillion which grows larger by the second. Untangling the vast web of the federal bureaucracy is necessary to begin an effort to reduce that debt. Project 2025 lays out for all to see the conservative playbook for governing, now it’s time for the Democrats or progressives to show us theirs.  If you enjoy reading this type of commentary, please subscribe to my blog and tell a friend. You will receive an email notification when new blogs are posted. The email will come from the site’s email: armchairamerican1776@gmail.com.
Thanks, Armchair American
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