Originally by at AXIOS
Republican vice presidential nominee Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) wrote the foreword of an upcoming book from the architect of Project 2025, a right-wing blueprint for the next Republican administration.
Why it matters: Former President Trump, who chose Vance as his running mate last week, has attempted to distance himself from the Heritage Foundation-backed plan after Democrats seized on it to mobilize voters.
Driving the news: In publishing materials for Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts’ upcoming book, “Dawn’s Early Light: Taking Back Washington to Save America,” Vance said Roberts is presenting a “new future for conservatism.”
- Vance also uses incendiary imagery while praising the book, writing, “We are now all realizing that it’s time to circle the wagons and load the muskets. In the fights that lay ahead, these ideas are an essential weapon.”
Zoom in: The Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 are referenced in the first sentence of the book’s description, which also claims “America is on the brink of destruction.”
- “Chapter by chapter, it identifies institutions that conservatives need to build, others that we need to take back, and more still that are too corrupt to save: Ivy League colleges, the FBI, the New York Times, the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the Department of Education, BlackRock, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the National Endowment for Democracy, to name a few,” the description reads.
- “All these need to be dissolved if the American way of life is to be passed down to future generations.”
What they’re saying: “The foreword has nothing to do with Project 2025,” William Martin, a spokesperson from Vance’s Senate office told Axios.
- “Senator Vance has previously said that he has no involvement with it and has plenty of disagreements with what they’re calling for. Only President Trump sets the Trump policy agenda,” Martin said.
- The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to Axios’ request for comment or questions Thursday about whether Vance’s foreword amounts to an endorsement of recommendations in the plan or from Roberts.
Between the lines: In response to a promotion of the book from Vance last month, the Heritage Foundation said on social media “The Swamp is long overdue for a controlled burn. It’s time to take our country back.”
Zoom out: Trump disavowed Project 2025 earlier this month after Roberts said the U.S. was amid a “second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”
- “Many of the points are fine,” Trump said in an interview Thursday with Fox News when asked about the plan. “Many of the points are absolutely ridiculous… I have nothing to do with the document. I’ve never seen the document.”
State of play: Project 2025 proposes sweeping changes to the federal government, reproductive health care and American life
- It’s primary goal is to concentrate the next Republican president’s control over the executive branch to override checks that otherwise could restrain his power.
- A key tenet of the plan is what’s known as “Schedule F,” an executive order that would allow the president to strip thousands of federal employees of employment protections, fire them and replace them with ideological loyalists.
- It also recommends expansive changes to the social safety net that, if adopted, would reshape daily life for millions of Americans.
The big picture: The plan wasn’t created specifically for Trump, but at least 140 former Trump officials have worked on it.
- In his prior administration, Trump had adopted hundreds of the recommendations the foundation made in its 2015 mandate for Republican leadership.
- Recently, some Republicans have expressed buyer’s remorse over Trump’s selection of Vance as his running mate, with one telling Axios’ Zachary Basu and Andrew Solender that the Ohio senator “wasn’t the safe pick.”
Read the Original Story
