Project 2025, a comprehensive 922-page document outlining controversial policy proposals, is gaining attention as the presidential election campaigns intensify.
Authored by at least two dozen members of Donald Trump's administration and allies, this project is organized by the conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation and supported by over 100 additional groups.
Democrats warn that the plan foreshadows a potential second Trump term, while Trump himself has attempted to distance from these proposals. "They are extreme, seriously extreme," Trump said at a rally on July 20. "I don’t know anything about it. I don’t want to know anything about it."
Officials from Project 2025 informed ABC News that it "does not speak for any candidate or campaign." However, several proposals in Project 2025 align with Trump's official campaign plan, Agenda47.
Key Goals of Project 2025
The project proposes dismantling federal agencies like the Department of Education and the Department of Homeland Security, privatizing others such as the Transportation Security Administration, and expanding presidential control over the executive branch.
"The modern conservative president’s task is to limit, control, and direct the executive branch on behalf of the American people," the project states in its opening section, "Taking the Reins of Government."
Health Care
The project recommends withdrawing the abortion pill mifepristone from the market, stopping the mailing of the drug, eliminating mandated insurance coverage for the morning-after pill, prohibiting funding for patients traveling across state lines for reproductive health care, and defunding health care centers that provide abortions.
Additionally, it suggests that the Department of Health and Human Services should "maintain a biblically based, social science-reinforced definition of marriage and family."
Climate Change
Project 2025 proposes cutting federal funding for research and investment in renewable energy and calls for the next president to "stop the war on oil and natural gas." The project aims to repeal preventive climate change initiatives and replace carbon-reduction goals with increased fossil fuel energy production and "energy security."
This aligns with Trump's Agenda47, where he plans to make America the "No. 1 producer of oil and natural gas in the world."
Economics
The project recommends cutting and restricting food stamps and social welfare programs, creating more eligibility requirements for Medicaid, implementing a two-rate individual tax system of 15% and 30%, reducing the corporate income tax rate, cutting rates for high-income investors, and canceling federal student loan forgiveness programs.
Housing
Project 2025 proposes reversing several Biden administration policies, including the Housing Supply Fund, which aims to increase housing supply and stabilize housing prices. It also seeks to remove programs addressing housing discrimination, such as the Property Appraisal and Valuation Equity program.
Trump's Agenda47 broadly supports new home construction, tax incentives, and reduced housing regulation.
Diversity
The project aims to eliminate terms like "sexual orientation," "gender," "gender equality," "gender awareness," "abortion," "reproductive health," "reproductive rights," "diversity, equity, and inclusion" from all federal regulations, contracts, and legislation.
Immigration
Project 2025 advocates for immediate deportation of unaccompanied children, increased funding for the U.S.-Mexico border wall, implementation of fees for asylum seekers, faster processing at a premium price, and pausing funding for nongovernmental immigration groups.
It also calls for a "merit-based immigration system," eliminating the existing employment visa process, family-based chain migration, and lottery systems in favor of a system awarding visas to the "best and brightest."
In Trump's Agenda47, he plans to carry out "the largest deportation operation in American history" and reinstate Trump-era policies with a focus on the border wall.
Education
The document calls for increased school choice and parental control over schools, limiting federal school accountability, and encouraging parents to direct their child's share of public education funding. It also bars public education employees from using names or pronouns not listed on a student's birth certificate without parental permission.
Trump similarly supports school choice policies, eliminating teacher tenure, defunding schools that "promote gender transition," and promoting "love of country" in education. He also plans to sue large private universities to fund a new institution called the American Academy.
Pornography
The project recommends outlawing pornography and criminalizing its distribution.
Trump's Connection to Project 2025
While Trump claims no knowledge of Project 2025, several of his current and former advisers and appointees have contributed to the project. These include Christopher Miller, Ben Carson, Brendan Carr, Adam Candeub, and Bernard L. McNamee.
The RNC platform committee's policy director, Russ Vough, and deputy policy director, Ed Martin, are also involved, along with other Trump-connected individuals.
Some conservatives, like former Trump adviser Stephen Miller, are distancing themselves from the project, requesting the removal of their organizations from its advisory board.
Despite Trump's attempts to distance himself, his Agenda47 and the proposals uplifted by the Republican National Committee share several goals with Project 2025.
President Joe Biden's campaign uses Project 2025 to mobilize voters against Trump, describing it as a plan to give Trump more power, undermine democratic checks and balances, and consolidate power in the Oval Office.