Trump Distances Himself from Project 2025, Locally Rep Block and Karl Melton Embrace Radical Aspects

Local politicians such as Rep. John Block and Karl Melton who is former employee of and fully endorsed the Heritage Foundation and its project 2025, as former president Trump attempts to distance himself from this roadmap to dismantle Veterans benefits, social security, Medicare retirement benefits and more, the Heritage Foundation links its ties to the former president. 

The plan from the Heritage Foundation, known as Project 2025, pitches a sweeping overhaul of the federal government should Trump win a second term, including far more power for the executive branch. Many people involved in the effort are former Trump administration officials, and Trump publicly allied himself with the think tank as president.

Despite that, Trump said on his Truth Social platform that he knows “nothing about Project 2025.”

“I have no idea who is behind it,” he wrote Friday. “I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.”

The Heritage Foundation’s president, Kevin Roberts, generated controversy three days ago for claiming in a media appearance that the country was in the middle of a “second American revolution” that will be bloodless “if the left allows it to be.”

In a statement posted to X, Project 2025 emphasized it was independent from the Trump campaign.

“As we’ve been saying for more than two years now, Project 2025 does not speak for any candidate or campaign,” the statement said, noting the project represents more than 110 conservative groups planning for the next GOP president. “But it is ultimately up to that president, who we believe will be President Trump, to decide which recommendations to implement.”

Trump’s campaign last year sought to downplay Project 2025 as “policy recommendations from external allies.”

Paul Dans, the project's director, said in April 2023 that Project 2025 is "systematically preparing to march into office and bring a new army, [of] aligned, trained, and essentially weaponized conservatives ready to do battle against the deep state." The Project proposes deploying the military for domestic law enforcement.

Project 2025 envisions widespread changes across the government, particularly economic and social policies and the role of the federal government and its agencies

The plan proposes taking partisan control of the Department of Justice (DOJ), the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Department of Commerce, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) and the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), dismantling the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), and sharply reducing environmental and climate change regulations to favor fossil fuel production. The blueprint seeks to institute tax cuts, though its writers disagree on the wisdom of protectionism. Project 2025 recommends abolishing the Department of Education, whose programs would be either transferred to other agencies, or terminated. Funding for climate research would be cut while the National Institutes of Health (NIH) would be reformed along conservative principles. 

The Project seeks to cut funding for Medicare and Medicaid, and urges the government to explicitly reject abortion as health care.

  The Project states that life begins at conception, and seeks to eliminate coverage of emergency contraception under the Affordable Care Act and enforce the Comstock Act to prosecute those who send and receive contraceptives and abortion pills nationwide. The Project seeks to infuse the government with elements of Christianity. It proposes criminalizing pornography, removing legal protections against discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, and terminating diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs, as well as affirmative action by instead having the DOJ prosecute "anti-white racism." The Project recommends the arrest, detention, and deportation of undocumented immigrants living in the United States by using the military to capture and place them in internment camps. The Insurrection Act of 1807 would be used to allow the military to engage in domestic policing and assist capturing undocumented immigrants. It promotes capital punishment and the speedy "finality" of those sentences.

Some conservatives and Republicans have criticized the plan for its stance on climate change and foreign trade. Other critics believe Project 2025 is rhetorical "window-dressing" for what would be four years of personal vengeance at any cost.

The project's authors also acknowledged that most of the proposals would require the Republican Party to control both the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate. 

Other aspects of the plan have recently been ruled unconstitutional by the Supreme Court and would face court challenges, while others still are norm-breaking proposals that might survive court challenges.

And yet Alamogordo’s very own Representative John Block and Republican nominee for Otero County Treasurer Karl Melton endorse this program. 

A detailed explanation of project 2025 and analysis can be found at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/jul/06/trump-pro…

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