Yahoo News Project 2025 Director Steps Down After Trump Criticism
(Bloomberg) -- The head of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, which sought to create a policy playbook for the next Republican White House, is stepping down from his role after Democrats repeatedly attacked the plan and Donald Trump denounced the effort.
Most Read from Bloomberg
Kamala Harris Wipes Out Trump’s Swing-State Lead in Election Dead Heat
Luxury Heir Alleges His $13 Billion Hermès Fortune Has Vanished
Intel to Cut Thousands of Jobs to Reduce Costs, Fund Rebound
Hamas Says Israel Killed Political Leader With Airstrike in Iran
Trump Attacks Harris, Jewish Husband Over Their Stance on Israel
Paul Dans, who directed Project 2025, will be “departing the team,” Kevin Roberts, the president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, said in a statement Tuesday.
Roberts said that the project had always planned to complete drafting policy proposals for a future GOP administration by this summer. He indicated that Project 2025’s work to identify conservatives to staff future administrations would proceed after Dans’ departure.
“Our collective efforts to build a personnel apparatus for policymakers of all levels—federal, state, and local—will continue,” he said.
Trump had repeatedly lambasted the effort, which provides a blueprint for a massive overhaul of the federal government, including replacing many civil service workers with loyalists and implementing a raft of socially conservative policies.
“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,” top Trump campaign officials Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita said in a statement Tuesday.
Democrats, including President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, the party’s presumptive nominee, have seized on the effort to attack Trump, casting Project 2025’s ideas as anathema to most American voters. The plan calls to further regulate abortion, remove diversity, equity and inclusion practices from the federal workforce and use the military for mass deportations of immigrants.
Trump has sought to distance himself from the project, saying he knew nothing about the initiative or who was behind it, despite the involvement of some of the most prominent advisers from his first term, including Housing Secretary Ben Carson, former acting Defense Secretary Chris Miller, economist and informal adviser Stephen Moore.
(Updates with Trump statement in the sixth paragraph)
Most Read from Bloomberg Businessweek
©2024 Bloomberg L.P.
