How Trump’s Policies Already Align With Project 2025 | WSJ

Summary of YouTube Video:

Key Concepts:

• Project 2025: A 922-page radical conservative blueprint created by the Heritage Foundation.
• Administrative State: The collective power and influence of the federal bureaucracy.
• Schedule F: A classification that would make it easier to fire policy-making federal employees.
• DOGE (Department of Government Efficiency): A newly created department, purportedly led by Elon Musk, focused on reducing the size and improving the efficiency of the federal government.
• DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion): Initiatives aimed at promoting diversity, equity, and inclusion in government, schools, and the private sector.
• Wokeness: A term used to describe progressive ideologies and policies, often in a pejorative way.
• Deep State: A term used to describe a perceived entrenched bureaucracy that resists political change.

1. Alignment of Trump's Policies with Project 2025:

• The video highlights the significant overlap between President Trump's executive orders and the recommendations outlined in Project 2025, despite his initial disavowal of the project.
• Within his first two months, Trump issued a record 92 executive orders, with a majority mirroring ideas in Project 2025.
• The narrator states, "The number of the policies that he's pushing out at breakneck speed are almost identical to what Project 2025 wanted to impose."
• The video suggests that Trump's actions indicate a potential roadmap for his second term, heavily influenced by the conservative blueprint.

2. Dismantling the Administrative State:

• A central theme of Project 2025 is the dismantling of the federal bureaucracy, which Republicans have advocated for decades, arguing that the government is "too big, too sprawling, involved in too many things," and wastes taxpayer money.
• Trump has focused on reducing the size of the government and changing its staffing, with over a quarter of his executive orders addressing the power of the federal government and its workforce.
• Trump reinstated the Schedule F classification, making it easier to fire policy-making employees, aligning with Project 2025's recommendations.
• He also asserted authority over independent agencies like the FTC and SEC, as advocated by Project 2025.

3. Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE):

• Trump created the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), purportedly led by Elon Musk, to reduce the size of the federal workforce, approve hiring, consult on new agency regulations, and scrutinize agency payments.
• While Project 2025 didn't specifically call for a DOGE, there is significant overlap in their objectives, such as eliminating duplicated functions and programs, "handcuffing the bureaucracy," and restoring fiscal limits.
• In some instances, DOGE has gone further than Project 2025 envisioned, such as the potential "entire dismantlement of USAID."

4. Immigration Policies:

• Trump has signed eight executive orders related to immigration, many of which align with Project 2025 recommendations, such as sending troops to the southern border, declaring a national emergency, and sanctioning countries that refuse to take back deportees.
• Trump has also proposed policies that go beyond Project 2025, such as banning birthright citizenship, a move not explicitly called for in the blueprint.
• Trump promised "the largest deportation operation in the history of our country."

5. Combating "Wokeness" and DEI Initiatives:

• Approximately 10% of Trump's executive orders focus on eliminating DEI initiatives in government, schools, and the private sector, mirroring Project 2025 proposals.
• These orders include terminating federal DEI programs, recognizing only male and female sexes, and emphasizing merit-based hiring over race, sex, or religion.
• The rationale behind targeting "wokeness" is the belief that it represents a "big liberal agenda item" that undermines government efficiency and fairness.
• The video quotes Trump saying, "There will be no wokeness... We're not gonna be woke."

6. Perspectives and Reactions:

• The White House stated that Trump is "swiftly deliver[ing] on key campaign promises."
• The Heritage Foundation claims that Trump's actions "Aren't about its recommendations in Project 2025, and that he and his team deserve the credit."
• Democrats argue that the overlap is too significant to ignore, suggesting that Trump is implementing Project 2025 by another name.
• Paul Dans, the former director of Project 2025, stated that Trump's current agenda is "Beyond his wildest dreams."

7. Conclusion:

• The video concludes that the alignment between Trump's policies and Project 2025 suggests that he may not deem any idea too controversial or conservative.
• His rapid implementation of these policies makes it difficult for critics to push back, potentially leading to significant changes in the federal government.
• The narrator states, "He's doing so much so fast that it's hard for his critics to push back and he sees that it can actually be quite effective to kind of go for it, especially in the first 100 days of his administration."