What is Project 2025? The controversial plans linked to Donald Trump’s presidency
With Donald Trump preparing to return to the White House, attention has turned once again to Project 2025 – controversial plans for government linked to the president-elect.
The 922-page blueprint for government could reshape American democracy, it has been claimed.
It was written by an influential conservative thinktank, the Heritage Foundation.
It sets out policy proposals for a Republican win in the US presidential election, which was achieved when Mr Trump took Wisconsin yesterday morning, taking him past the 270 electoral college vote required for victory.
What policies are included in the document?
The document proposes a four pillar approach – the first sets out policies to be enacted, the others how those policies will be put in place.
This includes setting up a list of personnel who it says will be willing to move to Washington to form “an army of aligned, vetted, trained, and prepared conservatives to go to work on Day One to deconstruct the Administrative State”.
At its heart, it says, is the need to “restore the family” to the centre of US life, recommending that once a conservative president is inaugurated “Federal power must… be wielded to reverse the crisis and rescue America’s kids from familial breakdown.”
The policy agenda includes criminalising pornography, disbanding the departments for education and homeland security and overhauling the FBI.
It rejects the concept of abortion as healthcare and proposes the rollback of LGBTQ+ rights, ending climate projections and using the military to tackle large-scale protests.
On immigration, the blueprint calls for the largest deportation in history, a policy for which Donald Trump has also expressed his support.
The database of personnel willing to help deliver Project 25 would create a pool of politically-appointed civil servants, who would be trained via an online presidential academy.
A 180-day action plan for how the government would achieve its goals is the fourth pillar of the project.
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What is the Heritage Foundation?
The Heritage Foundation, based in Washington DC, was founded in 1973.
Its mission upon its creation was to mould America into a more Christian, conservative country.
“Essentially, what this boils down to is a vision of the country that privileges and prioritises Christians,” said US historian Dr Kristin Kobes Du Mez.
In 1981, the foundation wrote its first manifesto, which promised to roll back the state and unleash free market capitalism, the same year in which, in the January, Ronald Reagan was inaugurated as president.
One of the report’s authors says in its introduction: “By the end of that year, more than 60% of its recommendations had become policy.”
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What has Trump said about the document?
Donald Trump tried to distance himself from Project 2025 during the election campaign, but the president-elect has previously spoken at Heritage Foundation events.
In April 2022, he said: “This is a great group and they’re going to lay the groundwork in detailed plans for exactly what our movement will do and what your movement will do when the American people give us a colossal mandate to save America.”
But in a rally this summer, he said the project had been designed by some on the “severe right”, and in September’s presidential debate he said he had “nothing to do with Project 2025”.
What have the Democrats said?
During the election campaign, the Democrats used Project 2025 as a major political attack point.
President Biden said the project would “destroy America”, while vice president Harris called it “extreme” and said would “weaken the middle class”.
Would such a large number of political appointees be possible?
Many positions in the US administration have to be vetted and go through a series of rounds of approval before they can be appointed.
Read more:
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Some have questioned whether a plan to put such a large number of politically aligned appointees into positions across government would be possible.
Javed Ali, a security analyst and former senior director of counterterrorism under Donald Trump, told Sky News: “Depending on who is prefered by [Trump], will they go through the traditional process by which you have to be presidentially appointed, confirmed by the US senate, go through an extensive background investigation process to get your security clearance? Those are all things that have stood the test of time.
“If President Trump wants to bypass those, I’m not sure of the legal basis on which he can operate, or if there is some executive basis he might have as commander in chief, but that will be a fascinating aspect of this.”
US
Matt Gaetz: Ex-Trump attorney general pick paid women for sex, including with a 17-year-old girl, US House report says
Matt Gaetz, who was briefly Donald Trump’s nominee for US attorney general, paid women for sex, including with a 17-year-old girl, and used drugs while he was a member of Congress, a committee has said.
The House Ethics Committee’s report concluded there was “substantial evidence” that the former Florida congressman violated House rules, state and federal laws, and other standards of conduct banning prostitution, statutory rape, illicit drug use, and obstruction of Congress.
And the committee accused the 42-year-old of accepting gifts of luxury travel in excess of permissible limits with a trip to the Bahamas in 2018.
The House of Representatives panel wrote: “From 2017 to 2020, Representative Gaetz made tens of thousands of dollars in payments to women that the Committee determined were likely in connection with sexual activity and/or drug use.”
The Republican, who denies any wrongdoing, had sought a restraining order against the committee in a bid to halt the release of its report summarising its investigation.
The filing accused the committee of an “unconstitutional” attempt “to exercise jurisdiction over a private citizen through the threatened release of an investigative report containing potentially defamatory allegations, in violation of the committee’s own rules”.
Last month, Trump ally Mr Gaetz withdrew his name from consideration to be the next US attorney general – the country’s top legal official.
Mr Gaetz said his selection was “unfairly becoming a distraction” to the transition of Mr Trump’s administration into the White House.
Donald Trump and Matt Gaetz in August 2023. Pic: Reuters
The Florida Republican had faced scrutiny over previous sex trafficking allegations which were investigated by the department he had been picked by the president-elect to lead.
Mr Gaetz was re-elected to the House of Representatives in November this year but resigned after Mr Trump nominated him as attorney general.
The 37-page House report said: “From at least 2017 to 2020, Representative Gaetz regularly paid women for engaging in sexual activity with him.
“In 2017, Representative Gaetz engaged in sexual activity with a 17-year-old girl. During the period 2017 to 2019, Representative Gaetz used or possessed illegal drugs, including cocaine and ecstasy, on multiple occasions.”
‘Sex with 17-year-old girl’
The ethics panel received testimony that Mr Gaetz had sex with a 17-year-old girl, described in the report as Victim A.
It said: “Victim A recalled receiving $400 in cash from Representative Gaetz that evening, which she understood to be payment for sex.
“Victim A said that she did not inform Representative Gaetz that she was under 18 at the time, nor did he ask her age.”
Mr Gaetz was investigated by the Justice Department for three years over sex trafficking allegations. No criminal charges were brought.
The ethics panel said there was not enough evidence that Mr Gaetz violated the federal sex trafficking statute.
All of the women who testified said the sexual encounters with Mr Gaetz were consensual.
‘I feel violated’
However, one woman told the committee that the use of drugs at the parties and events they attended may have “impair[ed their] ability to really know what was going on or fully consent”.
Another woman told the committee: “When I look back on certain moments, I feel violated.”
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