The 2025 Presidential Transition Project, better known as Project 2025, is the effort of a broad coalition of more than 100 conservative organizations working together to ensure a successful new presidential administration begins Jan. 20.
Project 2025, spearheaded by The Heritage Foundation, seeks to restore democracy, to loosen it from the grip of the political elites in Washington, D.C.
But the fiercest attackers of Project 2025 are lining up to protect the deep state. In recent months, the project has faced outlandish, hyperbolic attacks.
The Biden-Harris campaign, talk show host Stephen Colbert, MSNBC host Rachel Maddow, and Rep. Ayanna Pressley, D-Mass., are just a few examples of those on the Left claiming that Project 2025 will be the end of America as we know it.
The Biden-Harris campaign even launched a large advertising buy to “expose” the dangers of Project 2025’s “far-right manifesto.” A group of House Democrats, including Reps. Ted Lieu, Jamie Raskin, and Pramila Jayapal recently established a “Stop Project 2025 Task Force.”
Lieu, a far-left California Democrat, said: “Project 25 [sic] is a radical, extreme, pro-authoritarianism plan pushed by conservatives who are desperate to take our country backwards.”
Although the project certainly would reform how the federal bureaucracy operates, the Left’s extreme fearmongering, misrepresentation, and outright lies are a gross exaggeration of its aims.
Here are five of the most outlandish myths the Left presents about this ambitious effort:
Myth 1: Project 2025 is part of Donald Trump’s campaign.
Project 2025 was launched in spring 2022, before any major presidential candidate, including Donald Trump, announced he or she was running for office.
“Mandate for Leadership,” which outlines conservative policy proposals for the executive branch and is available to the public for free online, was offered to all major presidential candidates, including Democrat Joe Biden and independent Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
Although individuals who served in the Trump administration participate in the project, they are not the only ones involved. Officials who served in different presidential administrations going back 50 years are involved.
Project 2025 is about people and policy. It isn’t advocating any particular candidate, but rather conservative ideals. Democrats and independents are welcome to its reform proposals as much as Republicans are.
The commonsense ideas in “Mandate for Leadership” transcend any one individual. They represent the solutions that millions of conservative and independent-minded Americans need after years of failed liberal leadership and bureaucratic bloat.
Myth 2: Project 2025 calls for a nationwide ban on abortion, in vitro fertilization, and contraception.
This claim is an outright lie. There are no calls for a nationwide ban on abortion or contraception anywhere in “Mandate for Leadership” or any other Project 2025 materials. In vitro fertilization isn’t even mentioned.
This would be easy to confirm for the politicians and TV hosts parroting claims of an imminent “Handmaid’s Tale” dystopia, but they are either too lazy or dishonest to do the homework.
Many of the attacks on Project 2025 are false attributions that are simply smears.
Myth 3: Project 2025 endorses the “authoritarian” unitary executive theory.
Project 2025 doesn’t mention the unitary executive theory. Although many Americans throughout our history have debated the constitutional extent of executive authority, the Constitution makes it clear that the executive branch should be under control of the executive.
The Constitution also makes clear that the administrative state is not a fourth, unaccountable branch that may undermine the president and ignore congressional and judicial oversight—the situation America now faces.
The “authoritarian” and “unconstitutional” fearmongering is simply a projection. Many on the left have ignored constitutional rights, including those enumerated in the Bill of Rights, to pursue their political goals.
The Biden administration has increasingly used the administrative state to attack the Left’s political enemies, from Trump to pro-life fathers and grandmothers.
Project 2025 would rein in rogue and authoritarian elements within the Justice Department, the Department of Homeland Security, and other parts of the U.S. government.
Myth 4: Project 2025 is the effort of a small group of elites to subvert and control the American people.
Project 2025, while organized by The Heritage Foundation, is the effort of over 100 conservative American organizations from across the broad spectrum of the Right.
Organizations associated with Project 2025 are united in their efforts to ensure a competent, conservative administration. Over 400 Americans contributed their policy expertise to “Mandate for Leadership,” coming from a variety of backgrounds and answering the call to propose real solutions to the bureaucratic swamp that is holding America back.
These organizations and contributors represent the views of and solutions for the millions of Americans who are unsatisfied with the ineffectiveness and even subversiveness of our administrative state. Importantly, not each organization in the Project 2025 coalition agrees with each policy proposal set forth in “Mandate for Leadership.”
Myth 5: Project 2025’s proposals to shrink the bureaucracy would harm Americans and are contrary to American values.
The Left claims that Project 2025 proposes to vastly shrink and in some senses “weaken” the government. On this point, the Left is correct.
However, those on the left are incorrect that these efforts would harm Americans. In fact, the efforts would make life much better.
As Ronald Reagan once said, “The nine most terrifying words in the English language are: I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” Many Americans agree.
The federal government is bloated and inefficient and has not been reformed in nearly 50 years.
Making it easier to fire obstructive, lazy, or incompetent civil servants would save Americans money and make the government run better. Removing and reorganizing redundant and obsolete offices would do the same.
The United States has a federal system, but the role of the states in governance has been increasingly coopted by the U.S. government’s bureaucracy. Winding down and eventually abolishing the Department of Education would ultimately be in the interest of Americans, increasing the quality of education. Reforming the FBI would protect Americans from the politically corrupt leadership that runs the agency today.
These are just a few of the ways in which Project 2025’s implementation would serve Americans.
The U.S. government isn’t a jobs program—it exists to serve the interests of the American people, not the other way around.
Finally, there’s nothing sinister about Project 2025. It is an open book. It works out in the light and respectfully engages American citizens rather than gaslight them. It’s all available to the public at project2025.org.
And while the Left fearmongers about the project, coalition partners have received feedback from many Americans, the great silent majority, that the solutions offered by Project 2025 are exactly what this country needs.
