PHOENIX — President Biden has been very vocal about Project 2025, a proposed playbook that would dramatically overhaul the United States government should the next conservative president adopt its proposals.
With a nearly 1,000-page “Project 2025” handbook and an “army” of Americans, the idea is to have the civic infrastructure in place on Day One to commandeer, reshape and do away with what Republicans deride as the “deep state” bureaucracy, in part by firing as many as 50,000 federal workers.
Numerous 12News viewers have asked for more information and an explanation of what's in the plan and what it would do.
What is Project 2025?
Project 2025 is a 900-page document by The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. At its core, it's a wishlist for right-wing conservatives that they would like the next Republican president to implement.
It focuses on four main areas: Policy, Personnel, Training and a Playbook. It would dramatically expand the powers of the presidency and change the way the country is governed.
Policy
The policy section deals with many traditionally conservative issues. It calls for a border wall and immigration reform. It focuses on different economic proposals and climate change issues. It does not call for an abortion ban but does advocate for the drug mifepristone to be removed from the market.
It would change or eliminate some federal agencies, including the Department of Education, under the banner of removing the "administrative state". It would also overhaul the FBI, calling the agency a “bloated, arrogant, increasingly lawless organization”.
The plan would also move many federal agencies directly under presidential control.
The Project 2025 playbook calls for far-reaching changes including rolling back protections for the LGBTQ community and infusing Christianity more deeply into society.
Personnel
Core to the Project 2025 plan is ousting thousands of civil servants and replacing them with personnel from a database of applicants, an effort to reverse the setbacks of Trump's first term, when many of his more extreme ideas were thwarted and blocked by those refusing to break norms or overextend presidential powers.
As part of an "administrative state" reorganization, Project 2025 calls for reinstating what's called Schedule F.
Schedule F was a Trump-era Executive Order that reclassified tens of thousands of federal employees as "political appointees." It never took effect because Trump lost the 2020 election and President Biden eliminated it.
Project 2025 would allow all employees to be fired by a new administration and replaced with those considered "loyal".
Project 2025's website calls for an "army" of loyal conservatives to be trained to fill those spots.
Training
Training, the third pillar of the plan, is basically an online school through The Heritage Foundation.
The classes are advertised at between 30 and 90 minutes and are free. They aim to educate people on how to be civil servants, to replace existing civil servants.
There would then be a Presidential Personnel database of acceptable candidates.
The 180-day playbook
Project 2025 has been preparing its own 180-day agenda for the next administration that it plans to share privately, rather than as part of its public-facing book of priorities for a Republican president. A key Trump ally, Russ Vought, who contributed to Project 2025 and is drafting this final pillar, is also on the Republican National Committee’s platform writing committee.
The website doesn't give many details about it, saying it will come later.
Who is responsible for Project 2025?
The Heritage Foundation lists three main people leading the Project 2025 effort: Paul Dans, Spencer Chretien and Troup Hemenway. All three are former Trump administration officials.
The project’s director is Dans, who served as chief of staff at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management under Trump. Trump's campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt was featured in one of Project 2025's videos.
John McEntee, a former director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office in the Trump administration, is a senior adviser. McEntee told the conservative news site The Daily Wire earlier this year that Project 2025's team would integrate a lot of its work with the campaign after the summer when Trump would announce his transition team.
What are they saying about it?
Despite it having heavy involvement from former Trump administration officials, the former president claims to know nothing about it.
“I know nothing about Project 2025," Trump wrote on Truth Social. "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 has outlined his own plans to remake the government if he wins a second term, including staging the largest deportation operation in U.S. history and imposing tariffs on potentially all imports. His campaign has previously warned outside allies not to presume to speak for the former president and suggested their transition-in-waiting efforts were unhelpful.
Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast Tuesday that Republicans are “in the process of taking this country back." Former U.S. Rep. Dave Brat of Virginia hosted the show for Bannon, who is serving a four-month prison term.
“We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be,” Roberts said.
His call for revolution and vague reference to violence also unnerved some Democrats who interpreted it as threatening.
“This is chilling,” former Democratic presidential candidate Marianne Williamson wrote on the social platform X. “Their idea of a second American Revolution is to undo the first one.”
President Biden has been very vocal about Project 2025 in the past few days.
“He’s trying to hide his connections to his allies’ extreme Project 2025 agenda,” Biden said of Trump in a statement released by his campaign Saturday. “The only problem? It was written for him, by those closest to him. Project 2025 should scare every single American."
Project 2025 said in a statement it was not tied to a specific candidate or campaign.
“We are a coalition of more than 110 conservative groups advocating policy and personnel recommendations for the next conservative president," it said. “But it is ultimately up to that president, who we believe will be President Trump, to decide which recommendations to implement.”
Decision 2024
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