A video clip has surfaced of Donald Trump extolling the "detailed plans" the Heritage Foundation has devised for his return to the White House just days after he insisted he knew "nothing about" the plans in the right-wing organization's controversial 900-page Project 2025 manifesto.
Trump has scrambled to distance himself from the dramatic right-wing policy changes in the extreme manisfesto after the presidentthe Heritage Foundation indicated there would be bloodshed if the left doesn't accept a conservative "second American revolution" outlined in Project 2025.
Yet CNN has identified 140 people, including at least three top people, who worked on the manual who also worked in Trump's White House. A number of the policies, including shutting down the Department of Education, have already been pitched by Trump.
When Trump was the keynote speaker for a Heritage Foundation conference in 2022, he stumbled over the word "Heritage," but called it a "great organization" that's laying the "groundwork and detailed plans for exactly what our movement will do ... when the American people give us a colossal mandate to save America."
"Already we have shown the power of our winning formula, working closely with many of the great people at Heritage over the four incredible years that we've worked with you a lot and we were just discussing it with Kevin," Trump said, referring to Heritage President Kevin Roberts.
Trump, in April '22, keynoted a Heritage dinner as it began work on Project 2025:
— Vaughn Hillyard (@VaughnHillyard) July 11, 2024
“This is a great group & they’re going to lay the groundwork & detail plans for exactly what our movement will do ... when the American people give us a colossal mandate to save America." pic.twitter.com/2ni0XESMci
Trump doesn't name Project 2025 in his address, but its "Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise" plan is only creation of the foundation that lays out extensive policy changes for the next conservative administration, dated 2025, when Trump is hoping to return to power.
The plan was published a year after Trump spoke, but was developed over years with several of the policies already decided.
Among other controversial issues, Project 2025 calls for quickly executing everyone on death row, dismantling the "administrative state," and classifying as many as 50,000 federal civil servants as political appointees so they can be replaced with conservative loyalists.
It also calls for massive tax cuts, elminating Social Security, and for further crackdowns on abortion rights and on the LGBTQ community because it views married heterosexuality as the sole legitimate relationship in American life.
"I know nothing about Project 2025. I have not seen it, have no idea who is in charge of it, and unlike our very well received Republican Platform, had nothing to do with it," Trump claimed on Truth Social late Wednesday, repeating what he insisted last week.
