Project 2025 is a conservative manifesto if a Republican
is elected President in 2024. Crafted by the
Heritage Foundation, the 900 page book
comprehensively addresses every agency that
the President can influence, with suggestions
for the agencies that should be eliminated or
altered. It is an attack on our merit-based
civil service system, suggesting that
presidential appointees should replace
long-term civil servants. African Americans
should note that we are over-represented in
the federal workforce – 18.2 percent compared
to 12.6 percent of the total population.
Whites are also overrepresented, being 61
percent of the federal workforce, compared to
59 percent of the overall population.
Hispanics (using the federal designation) are
the most underrepresented of any population.
Interestingly, if Project 2025 and Project 47
had their way, we would not even know these
numbers. They’ve both proposed stopping counts
by race, as they want our society to be “color
blind”.
While Project 2025 was put together by
the Heritage Foundation, it reeks of the 45th
President. Many of his loyalists and former
employees have contributed to the volume. For
example, Dr. Ben Carson wrote the chapter on
HUD, Peter Navarro, another Trump crony who
was, among other things, Assistant to the
President, authored a chapter on trade.
Incidentally, Navarro is currently serving
jail time for contempt of Congress. But the
45th President says that, if elected, he would
“absolutely” bring Navarro back. You can dive
into the volume, replete with an
authoritarianism recidivism, by checking it out at project2025.org.
While the African American community is not mentioned
explicitly (except for the mandate to
eliminate affirmative action and diversity,
equity and inclusion efforts), the policies
that Project 2025 are aligned with
conservative policy. Project 2025 would cut
spending in education, housing assistance, and
other areas where African Americans and others
frequently benefit. The project would also
reduce government regulation, especially in
labor markets. Project 2025 is a comprehensive
attack on contemporary government
organization, and it also has a component that
is actively seeking the most conservative
people to populate a new Republican
administration.
The former President goes even further than Project 2025,
since the Heritage Foundation is a tax exempt
organization that cannot support any
particular candidate. Project 47 comes from
the Trump Administration and embraces much of
Project 2025, but also more aggressively
addresses the Department of Justice, which
would be weaponized to get revenge on
President Biden (even though he didn’t do
anything to the former president) by going
after him for offenses, real or imagined.
Project 47 would actually establish the next
Republican president as a dictator who can
hire and fire at will, eliminate agencies at
will, and do whatever he wants.
The plan would weaken or eliminate the Department of
Education, sending some federal funds,
especially Title I funds that are targeted
toward low income students, back to the
states. While President Biden has attempted
student debt relief, the next President would
eliminate those efforts. Other discretionary
funds that the Secretary of Education can
grant will also be cut under Project 2025.
Project 2025 reeks of Christian conservatism, describing
our nation as one with “Judeo-Christian
values”. From that perspective, the agenda
emphasizes the “traditional family,” perhaps
excluding the majority of the population. It
would also impose work requirements on
Medicaid, but where would those affected work,
and how much would they be paid? The Project
2025 document would shred the safety net,
leaving the poor to fend for themselves,
ignoring employment discrimination and the
structural inequities that result in the
poverty that so many people experience.
Reproductive rights? Forget about it. Project 2025 would
reduce abortion access and even criminalize
abortion is some cases. Its “leave it to the
states” perspective could mean that more than
half of all women would have no access to
reproductive medical services.
In the past month or so we have seen a number of weather
challenges that are related to climate change
– tornadoes, hurricanes, extreme heat. But
Project 2025 would gut climate policy and roll
back the Inflation Reduction Act. Since Black
people live close to pollution sources and
have disproportionate health effects from
climate issues, ignoring climate issues is an
attack on Black people. And let’s not talk
about voting rights. Project 2025 would
tighten voting regulations, perhaps
eliminating early voting and mail voting,
imperiling the African Americans voter
franchise.
Project 2025 began in 2022, and was
released in book form last year as A
Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative
Promise. It lays out a frightening Republican
agenda, a reversal of many of the hard-won
victories of the past several decades. I’d
like for some of the Black Americans who think
our 45th president “wasn’t so bad,” to read
the book and govern themselves accordingly.
President Biden likes to say that democracy is
on the ballot. He should also say that
economic justice, health access, and
educational equity are also on the line.
