Whether you agree or disagree with the framework of the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025,” it has become a political hot potato. If you are a conservative, there is a lot to like about Project 2025. On the other hand, the Democrats – most without reading it in detail, I would bet – have called in nothing short of the Necronomicon!
With his opponents equating Project 2025 to the coming of the Apocalypse, President Trump has tried to distance himself from the document on the campaign trail. Now seemingly bowing to pressure from the Trump Campaign, Paul Dans, the director of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, has stepped down.
His exit comes after the project “completed exactly what it set out to do: bringing together over 110 leading conservative organizations to create a unified conservative vision, motivated to devolve power from the unelected administrative state, and returning it to the people,” Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts said in a statement.
Democrats, for the past several months, have made Project 2025 a key election-year cudgel, pointing to the ultraconservative policy blueprint as a glimpse into how extreme another Trump administration could be.
The nearly 1,000-page handbook lays out sweeping changes in the federal government, including altering personnel rules to – according to the Dems — “ensure government workers are more loyal to the president.”
Yet Trump has repeatedly disavowed the document, saying on social media he hasn’t read it and doesn’t know anything about it. At a rally in Michigan earlier this month, he said Project 2025 was written by people on the “severe right,” and some of the things in it are “seriously extreme.”
While not directly commenting on Dans’ resignation, Trump campaign advisers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita said in a statement to the press, “President Trump’s campaign has been very clear for over a year that Project 2025 had nothing to do with the campaign, did not speak for the campaign, and should not be associated with the campaign or the President in any way.”
When pushed after the release of the statement Trump’s representatives offered no comment when asked about whether the campaign asked or pushed for Dans to step down from the project.
However they did add, “Reports of Project 2025’s demise would be greatly welcomed and should serve as notice to anyone or any group trying to misrepresent their influence with President Trump and his campaign — it will not end well for you.”
Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign and top Democrats have repeatedly tied Trump to Project 2025 as they argue against a second term for the former president.