华盛顿-在过去的一年里，2025项目作为一种持久的力量存在于总统选举，其极右翼提案部署由民主主义者作为什么的简写唐纳德·特朗普可能与白宫的第二个任期有关。
尽管这位前总统的竞选团队极力与2025项目保持距离，但特朗普本人宣称他对此“一无所知”—清扫传统基金会提议掏空联邦劳动力解散联邦机构紧密对齐以他的眼光。项目2025的建筑师来自特朗普政府的队伍，顶级遗产官员已经向特朗普的团队介绍了这一点。
对于一个复杂的900页的政策手册在政治竞选中如此突出。但从它在智库的早期开始，到它在社交媒体上的病毒式传播,“2025项目”的兴衰和潜在的再次崛起，表明了政策意想不到的持久力，照亮了选举年，不仅威胁到特朗普，也威胁到共和党人国会议员竞选.
尽管如此，2025项目并没有消失。它不仅是下一届政府的政策蓝图，也是20，000名求职者的数据库特朗普白宫的工作人员以及一份尚未发布的“180天剧本”，内容是新总统在2025年1月20日就职后的第一天可以采取的行动。
传统基金会的主席凯文·罗伯茨最近接管了这个项目，他似乎很享受这场斗争，正全速前进。
“请放心，我们不会放弃，”罗伯茨今年夏天在给支持者的一封电子邮件中写道。“我们不会退缩。”
当2025项目于2023年4月首次亮相时，它承诺通过提出人员和政策这可以作为下一任保守派总统的路线图。
参与该项目的前特朗普政府官员表示，他们希望避免第一任特朗普白宫的错误，确保下一任共和党总统准备好实施其竞选优先事项的人员和政策。
“有一种真正进入角色的动力，”2025年总统过渡项目主任保罗·丹斯在2023年接受美联社采访时说。
这本书以华盛顿特区备受尊敬的保守派智库传统基金会(Heritage Foundation)为中心，其概念可以追溯到更早的版本，即里根时代的“领导力使命”，据说这在白宫非常受欢迎，以至于副本被放在办公桌上，以指导新总统。
至少有100个保守团体，很多都有特朗普政府的校友共同起草了对联邦政府进行大规模重组的提案——从在司法部任命更多的政治官员，到重新指派有执法背景的政府工作人员处理非法移民，再到解散教育部。
其中一项核心提议是，通过将大约5万名工人重新分类到可能被解雇的岗位，让政府更容易配备特朗普的忠诚者——所谓的复兴附表F政策特朗普在离任前试图实施的政策。这个想法现在是保守派拆除“深层国家”官僚机构的核心愿景，他们指责这种官僚机构阻碍了特朗普的优先事项。
在基金会成立50周年之际，2025项目的推出对罗伯茨来说也算是首次亮相;他此前被视为特朗普竞争对手罗恩·德桑蒂斯的盟友，德桑蒂斯在总统初选季节开始时在庆祝活动中担任主旨发言人。
罗伯茨在声明中说:“保守派运动正在团结起来，为下一届保守党政府做准备。”他说，遗产寻求“确保下一任总统有正确的政策和必要的人员来拆除行政国家。”
乔·拜登总统的竞选团队早在4月份发表国情咨文之前就在社交媒体上警告过2025项目，众议院民主党人也警告过发射一个2025项目特别工作组在6月强调了他们的担忧。几天后，喜剧演员约翰·奥利弗在他的HBO节目中对此进行了嘲讽。
但是直到拜登的令人沮丧的辩论表演随着特朗普6月份的到来，2025项目迎来了它的病毒时刻。
与其说是总统辩论中说了什么，不如说是没说什么:拜登甚至没有真正提到2025年项目，粉碎了盟友的期望，他们期待更多的击倒拳。
据民主党竞选团队称，那个周末，X上关于2025项目的一个帖子开始流行，聚集了近2000万次观看。女演员塔拉吉·P·汉森在BET Awards节目的一个片段中与副总统卡玛拉·哈里斯交谈过，她警告黄金时段的观众:“2025项目计划不是游戏。查一下!”无数年轻的抖音创作者直接对着他们的相机解释了他们认为2025项目对他们的公民权利、生育权和其他权利构成的威胁，这些视频在网上疯传。
美国进步中心的乔·拉多塞维奇说:“这确实是草根阶层反抗的一个例子。”。"他们认为所提供的是竞赛的轮廓，并完全拒绝了它。"
尤其是在战后最高法院的多布斯裁决这结束了对堕胎的宪法保护，民主党人及其盟友希望表明总统选举将如何影响未来人们的生活，而不是简单地让选民在个性之间做出选择。
Radosevich说，人们想要一场关于政策的辩论，而不是一场“纯粹凭感觉”的选举。
哈里斯竞选团队表示，截至6月底，谷歌对“2025项目”的搜索量超过了对泰勒·斯威夫特和美国国家橄榄球联盟的搜索量。
当《2025计划》的巨型复制品在民主党全国代表大会上被拖上台接受晚间嘲笑时，嘲笑它的不仅仅是名人和自由派代表。保守派开始指责传统和2025项目损害了特朗普的选举机会。
特朗普的竞选团队从未接受2025项目，并积极回避它，尽管这位前总统在白宫时期熟悉的人和政策很接近。
其他与特朗普关系密切的保守团体也在为白宫的第二个任期做准备。特朗普的竞选团队曾多次警告传统基金会低调行事，不要将2025项目描述为特朗普竞选的一部分。
但是罗伯茨似乎没有被吓倒，即使他7月份遭到攻击因为他建议，在最高法院批准总统广泛免于起诉在1月6日的起义中，这个国家正处于“第二次美国革命，如果左派允许的话，它将保持不流血。”
特朗普在2025天后强烈反对Project 2025。
“我对2025项目一无所知，”特朗普在自己的社交媒体账户上发帖称。“我不知道谁是幕后黑手。我不同意他们说的一些事情，他们说的一些事情是绝对荒谬和糟糕的。他们做的任何事，我都祝他们好运，但与我无关。”
特朗普当时正在共和党全国代表大会之前推出自己的政策平台，该平台部分由他的前政府官员之一、保守派领导人鲁斯·沃特(Russ Vought)起草，他也为2025项目及其180天剧本做出了贡献。
遗产与丹斯分道扬镳“2025项目”的总设计师，他在月底辞职，这一举动显然让特朗普的团队感到高兴。
特朗普竞选经理苏西·怀尔斯(Susie Wiles)和克里斯·拉西维塔(Chris LaCivita)在一份联合声明中表示，“关于2025项目(Project 2025)消亡的报道将受到极大欢迎，并应该成为试图歪曲他们对特朗普总统及其竞选活动的影响的任何人或任何团体的注意——这对你来说不会有好结果。”
随着对国会控制权的争夺越来越激烈单座可能会决定哪个政党控制众议院或参议院，项目2025正被民主党结盟的外部团体用来形容共和党与其强硬路线的建议有关。
众议院问责项目(House Accountability Project)在一些最具争议的席位上为十几个众议院共和党人创建了微型网站，将他们过去在堕胎、政府资助和其他问题上的投票与2025年项目提案联系起来。
“就在我们说话的时候，众议院共和党实际上正在推动2025项目中的政策，”众议院问责战情室发言人丹尼·特克尔说。"他们已经把这些政策带到了国会大厦。"
众议院共和党竞选委员会辩称，其候选人与2025项目无关，这些攻击是民主党人捏造的，旨在转移人们对他们自己的边境和通胀政策的注意力。
“他们根据众议院共和党人从未读过的东西捏造了一个错误的攻击，”全国共和党国会委员会新闻秘书威尔·赖纳特说。
他称这些攻击是“绝望的谎言”，因为众议院民主党人“看到他们重新获得多数席位的机会正在减少。”
How Project 2025's rightward vision became a flashpoint in this year's election
WASHINGTON --For the past year,Project 2025has endured as a persistent force in thepresidential election, its far-right proposals deployed byDemocratsas shorthand for whatDonald Trumpwould potentially do with a second term at the White House.
Even though the former president’s campaign has vigorously distanced itself from Project 2025 — Trump himself declared heknows “nothing” about it— the sweeping Heritage Foundation's proposal togut the federal workforceand dismantle federal agenciesaligns closelywith his vision. Project 2025’s architects come from the ranks of Trump’s administration and top Heritage officials have briefed Trump’s team about it.
It’s rare for a complex900-page policy bookto figure so dominantly in a political campaign. But from its early start at a think tank, to its viral spread on social media, the rise and fall and potential rise again of Project 2025 shows the unexpected staying power of policy to light up an election year and threaten not only Trump atop the ticket but down-ballot Republicans inraces for Congress.
Through it all, Project 2025 has not gone away. It exists not only as a policy blueprint for the next administration, but as a database of some 20,000 job-seekers who couldstaff a Trump White Houseand administration and a still unreleased "180-day playbook” of actions a new president could employ on Day One after the inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025.
The Heritage Foundation’s president, Kevin Roberts, who recently took the helm of the project, appears to relish the fight, moving full steam ahead.
“Rest assured we will not give up,” Roberts wrote in an email to supporters this summer. “We will not back down.”
When Project 2025 debuted in April 2023, it promised to “dismantle the administrative state” by putting forward thepersonnel and the policiesthat could serve as a roadmap for the next conservative president.
The former Trump administration officials working on the project said they wanted to avoid the mistakes of the first Trump White House by ensuring the next Republican president would be ready with personnel and policies to enact his campaign priorities.
“There is an impetus to really hit the ground running," said Paul Dans, director of the 2025 Presidential Transition Project, in a 2023 Associated Press interview.
Centered at the Heritage Foundation, the venerable conservative think tank in Washington, D.C., the concept for the book touched back to an earlier version, its Reagan-era “Mandate for Leadership” that was said to be so popular at the White House that copies were put on work desks to guide the new presidency.
At least 100 conservative groups, many withalumni from the Trump administration, came together to craft the proposals for a vast restructuring of the federal government — from installing more political appointees at the Justice Department to reassigning government workers with law enforcement backgrounds to handle illegal immigration to dismantling the Department of Education.
One of the core proposals would make it easier to staff the government with Trump loyalists by reclassifying some 50,000 workers into jobs where they can be fired — a revival of the so-calledSchedule F policythat Trump tried to put in place before leaving office. The idea is now central to the conservative vision of dismantling the “deep state” bureaucracy that they blame for blocking Trump priorities.
The rollout of Project 2025 on the foundation’s 50th anniversary was also a debut of sorts for Roberts; he had previously been seen as an ally to Trump rival Ron DeSantis, who keynoted the gala event at the start of the presidential primary season.
"The conservative movement is coming together to prepare for the next conservative administration,” Roberts said in the announcement. Heritage, he said, sought “to ensure that the next president has the right policy and personnel necessary to dismantle the administrative state.”
President Joe Biden's campaign had warned against Project 2025 early on, in social media posts ahead of his State of the Union address in April, and House Democratslauncheda Project 2025 Task Force to amplify their concerns in June. Days later, comedian John Oliver mocked it on his HBO show.
But it wasn’t until Biden’sdismal debate performancewith Trump in June that Project 2025 had its viral moment.
It wasn’t so much what was said at the presidential debate as what went unsaid: Biden failed to really even mention Project 2025, crushing the expectations of allies who expected more of a knock-out punch.
That weekend, a single thread on X about Project 2025 took off, amassing nearly 20 million views, according to the Democratic campaign. Actress Taraji P. Henson, who had spoken to Vice President Kamala Harris in a segment for the BET Awards show, warned prime-time viewers: "The Project 2025 plan is not a game. Look it up!" And countless young TikTok creators speaking directly into their cameras explained the threat they believed Project 2025 posed to their civil rights, reproductive rights and other rights in videos that went viral.
“This is really a case of the grassroots revolting,” said Joe Radosevich at the Center for American Progress. “They saw what was being offered as the contours of the race and completely rejected it.”
Especially in the aftermath of theSupreme Court's Dobbs rulingthat ended the constitutional protections for abortion, Democrats and their allies wanted to make the case showing how the presidential election would impact people’s lives in the future, rather than simply giving voters a choice between the personalities.
People wanted a debate about policies, Radosevich said, not an election “purely on vibes.”
By the end of June, Google searches for “Project 2025” surpassed searches for Taylor Swift and the NFL, the Harris campaign said.
And by the time a giant-size replica of the Project 2025 book was hauled on stage for nightly ridicule at the Democratic National Convention, it wasn’t just celebrities and liberal convention-goers who were mocking it. Conservatives began blaming Heritage and Project 2025 for hurting Trump’s election chances.
Trump’s campaign never embraced Project 2025 and actively shunned it, despite the proximity of people and policies familiar to the former president’s time in the White House.
Other conservative groups with close ties to Trump are also preparing for a second term in the White House. Trump’s campaign team had repeatedly warned Heritage to tone it down and not portray Project 2025 as part of Trump's campaign.
But Roberts appeared undeterred, even as hecame under fire in Julyfor suggesting, after the Supreme Court ruling granting the presidentbroad immunity from prosecutionover the Jan. 6 insurrection, that the country was in the midst of a “second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”
Trump spoke up forcefully against Project 2025 days later.
“I know nothing about Project 2025,” Trump posted on his own social media account. “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 at the time was rolling out his own policy platform ahead of the Republican National Convention, drafted partly by one of his former administration officials, the conservative leader Russ Vought, who also contributed to Project 2025 and its 180-day playbook.
Heritageparted ways with Dans, the chief architect of Project 2025, who resigned at the end of the month, a move that apparently pleased Trump’s team.
“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,” said Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, the Trump campaign managers, in a joint statement.
As the races for control of Congress tighten to the point where asingle seatcould determine which party controls the House or Senate, Project 2025 is being used by Democratic-aligned outside groups to portray Republicans as linked to its hardline proposals.
The House Accountability Project has created micro-websites for more than a dozen House Republicans in some of the most contested seats, tying their past votes on abortion, government funding and other issues to Project 2025 proposals.
“The House GOP is actually pushing policies that are in Project 2025 as we speak,” said Danny Turkel, spokesman for the House Accountability War Room. “They're already taking these policies into the Capitol.”
The House Republican campaign committee argues its candidates have nothing to do with Project 2025, and the attacks are concocted by Democrats to shift attention from their own border and inflation policies.
“They fabricated a false attack based on something House Republicans had never even read,” said Will Reinert, press secretary for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
He called the attacks a “desperate lie” as the House Democrats "see their chances of regaining the majority dwindling.”
