What is Project 2025? What does it all mean?
You might have heard of Project 2025, but do you really understand what it is?
Here's what you need to know about Project 2025.
What is Project 2025?
Project 2025 aims to completely overhaul the federal government as we know it. Following backlash from Democrats and former President Donald Trump, the project director, Paul Dans of the Heritage Foundation, stepped down recently.
Also known as the 2025 Presidential Transition Project, Project 2025 was created by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank in Washington, D.C.
It’s essentially a 900-page playbook designed to help the next conservative president and their administration implement their policy agendas with new personnel within the first 180 days in office.
Is Trump part of Project 2025?
Former President Donal Trump has tried to distance himself from the controversial Project 2025, denying any knowledge of it. Despite his claims, many of his former administration officials, including Paul Dans, who served as his chief of staff for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, are linked to the project and the Heritage Foundation.
Over 140 people who previously worked for Trump are known to have contributed to Project 2025, according to news reports.
What is in Project 2025?
The Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership contains 30 chapters with hundreds of detailed policy recommendations for the White House, Cabinet departments, Congress, and various government agencies. The goal is to begin restructuring the government starting Jan. 20, 2025, with a conservative president at the helm.
The focus areas include:
- Restoring the family as the centerpiece of American life and protecting children: The project aims to eliminate terms related to sexual orientation, gender identity, diversity, equity, inclusion, and transgender ideology.
- Dismantling the government and returning self-governance to the people: It seeks to reduce the size of the federal government and criticizes federal spending and bureaucracy for stifling energy production and allowing migrant criminals.
- Defending the nation's sovereignty, borders, and resources: The project calls for ending economic ties with China, exploiting America's oil and natural gas reserves, and boosting industrial and manufacturing sectors.
- Securing people's "God-given" individual rights: It emphasizes the rights to "Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" and advocates for tax and regulatory reform, antitrust enforcement, and educational opportunities outside of the public education system.
To see the full Project 2025: Mandate for Leadership, click here.
What is the backlash toward Project 2025?
The backlash toward Project 2025 from politicians and lawmakers and social media focuses on several controversial proposals:
- Recommending that the Food and Drug Administration reverse its 24-year-old approval of the widely used abortion pill mifepristone and that the Justice Department enforce the Comstock Act, which prohibits mailing items used for abortion.
- Eliminating the Education Department to return control of education to states, ending the Head Start program for preschool children, and rejecting efforts to provide universal free school meals.
- Reintroducing policies that prohibit transgender individuals from serving in the military.
- Repealing tax breaks for green energy companies and withdrawing from climate change agreements seen as harmful to the American economy.