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Throughout the 2024 campaign, Donald Trump realized that the Project 2025 agenda was so radical and unpopular that he treated is as radioactive. “I know nothing about Project 2025. I have no idea who is behind it,” the Republican said over the summer about the blueprint largely written by members of his own team. He added, “I have nothing to do with them.”
As recently as two weeks ago, Trump went so far as to question whether it was even legal for people to air campaign ads pointing out his connections to Project 2025. It came on the heels of an online item in which he said in reference to the right-wing agenda, “I have, and had, nothing to do with it, NEVER READ IT, NEVER SAW IT.”
Election 2024 has obviously come and gone, and while time will tell the degree to which the incoming Trump administration follows the radical plan, Project 2025 is already working its way back into the spotlight.
Just hours after Trump was declared the winner, conservative commentator Matt Walsh published an item to social media that read, “Now that the election is over I think we can finally say that yeah actually Project 2025 is the agenda. Lol.”
Maybe he was joking or maybe he was just trying to get a rise out of the left, but Steve Bannon — recently released from prison — took time on his post-election show to highlight Walsh’s missive and describe it “fabulous.”
A report in The New Republic added, “Later during the livestream, Bannon could be seen holding a hard copy of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 ‘Mandate For Leadership’ up to the camera in celebration.”
Rolling Stone highlighted a handful of related examples: “Right-wing podcast Benny Johnson also gloated about the project. ‘It is my honor to inform you all that Project 2025 was real the whole time,’ he wrote. In a separate post, Tarrant County GOP Chair Bo French wrote, ‘So can we admit now that we are going to implement Project 2025?’”
I recognize trolling when I see it. These guys are probably needling opponents rather than ripping the mask off a sinister plan. But it’s worth keeping these comments in mind — we almost certainly haven’t heard the last of Project 2025.