Trump Scrambles to Distance Himself From Controversial Project 2025 Plan for Presidency Cooked Up by His Allies

Donald Trump on Friday suddenly tried to distance himself from the extremist Project 2025 plan for the nation even though it was created by some of his White House aides and he has already espoused a number of positions in the paper.

"I know nothing about Project 2025," Trump insisted on Truth Social. "I have no idea who is behind it."

He added: "I disagree with some of the things they are saying and some of the things they're saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal."

Nevertheless, he emphasized: "Anything they do, I wish them luck ... but I have nothing to do with them."

Critics quickly pointed out that Trump noted he had reservations about some aspects of the 922-page plan he claimed to "know nothing about."

Three key people behind Project 2025 — John McEntee, Russ Vought and plan promoter Karoline Leavitt — worked in Trump's White House.

Project 2025 has been created under the auspices of the right-wing think tank Heritage Foundation, which Trump has often extolled and for which he gave a keynote address in 2017, praising its "devotion to our country."

Trump's SuperPac runs promotions on Project 2025, and has referred to it as "Trump's Project 2025." (The Heritage Foundation boasted that Trump enacted 66% of the organization's policies in his first year in the White House.)

McEntee has boasted to Trump's former White House strategist Steve Bannon that Trump would move immediately enact the plan when he takes office.

Project 2025 outlines plans to crack down further on abortion rights and IVF treatments, as well as on members of the LGBTQ community. It would ban pornography.

The plan would shut down the Board of Education (which Trump just espoused late last month) and would also end or curtail Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, would use public funds for Christian education, and would move quickly to execute all prisoners on death row.

It would slash taxes again, and cut federal funds for research and investment in renewable energy, and "stop the war on oil and natural gas."

A mass of federal employees would be deemed political appointees and be replaced by right-wing loyalists under the plan.

On Wednesday Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts sparked a fiery blowback when he appeared to threaten bloodshed if the left doesn't fall in line with a "second American Revolution." It will only "remain bloodless if the left allows it to be," he emphasized.

Ammar Moussa, spokesperson for President Biden's campaign, called Project 2025 the "extreme policy and personnel playbook for Trump's second term that should scare the hell out of the American people."

She added that far from having nothing to do with Trump, Project 2025 "staff and leadership routinely tout their connections to Trump's team and are the same people leading the RNC [Republican National Committee] policy platform and Trump's debate prep, campaign and inner circle."

Trump's "Supreme Court and Project 2025 have designed the playbook for Trump to achieve his dream of being a dictator on day one, with unchecked imperial power," she added.

Yet Project 2025 (which could be the first year of Trump's next administration) insisted in a statement on Twitter that it's not connected to any particular presidential campaign, simply the next conservative president.

The Project 2025 website states that it is a "2025 Presidential Transition Project" with a goal of building on "four pillars that will, collectively, pave the way for an effective conservative administration: a policy agenda, personnel, training, and a 180-day playbook."

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