“When Fascism comes to America, it will be wrapped in the flag and carrying a cross”
- Sinclair Lewis
Insinuating that Donald Trump WON’T put the Heritage Foundation’s Mandate for Leadership into effect if he becomes President is utterly ridiculous. The plan was created by many that have already been promised Trump appointments, as well as former members of his administration. The Heritage Foundation has claimed to have met with Trump on several occasions, and Trump has publicly embraced more than two thirds of the policy recommendations outlined in the nine hundred page manifesto.
But what’s actually inside of this thing? And why is it so important? Let's take a look:
But what’s actually inside of this thing? And why is it so important? Let's take a look:
Executive Strongman
Project 2025 lays out exactly how it plans to overhaul the executive branch in excruciating detail. If put into effect, the government would take partisan control of the DOJ, FBI, FCC, FTC, DHS, and basically every other 3 letter government agency under the sun. The plan also wants to remove any non partisan civil service employees with fully partisan appointees.
It shouldn’t be hard to see why this is an awful idea. Replacing the entire arm of our government responsible for carrying out policy, full of trained professionals, with an army of people personally loyal to the president would essentially allow the president to take full control of the government. Any resistance from the secretary or judiciary would be silenced, as the president has the military and every government agency on his side. Every part of the government wouldn’t answer to Donald Trump rather than to the constitution. The FBI may become secret police, with the ability to silence and intimidate political dissidents and opponents. Don’t believe me? Here’s what Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a scholar on fascism from NYU has to say about the Mandate: “Project 2025 is a plan for an authoritarian takeover of the United States that goes by a deceptively neutral name. [The project’s intent] is to destroy the legal and governance cultures of liberal democracy and create new bureaucratic structures, staffed by new politically vetted cadres, to support autocratic rule.”
It is not an exaggeration to say that Trump would be elevated to the status of dictator. Sure, some of the old vessels of our democracy would stick around de jure, like the legislature and supreme court, but they would soon be filled with people loyal to the President, as a way of speeding up the rubber stamp on policy. In many ways, the United States would become like the Roman Republic in its final years. Sure, the Senate still existed, but all power was concentrated in Caesar, and the Senate was full of people who’s only qualification was undying loyalty to Caesar.
It shouldn’t be hard to see why this is an awful idea. Replacing the entire arm of our government responsible for carrying out policy, full of trained professionals, with an army of people personally loyal to the president would essentially allow the president to take full control of the government. Any resistance from the secretary or judiciary would be silenced, as the president has the military and every government agency on his side. Every part of the government wouldn’t answer to Donald Trump rather than to the constitution. The FBI may become secret police, with the ability to silence and intimidate political dissidents and opponents. Don’t believe me? Here’s what Ruth Ben-Ghiat, a scholar on fascism from NYU has to say about the Mandate: “Project 2025 is a plan for an authoritarian takeover of the United States that goes by a deceptively neutral name. [The project’s intent] is to destroy the legal and governance cultures of liberal democracy and create new bureaucratic structures, staffed by new politically vetted cadres, to support autocratic rule.”
It is not an exaggeration to say that Trump would be elevated to the status of dictator. Sure, some of the old vessels of our democracy would stick around de jure, like the legislature and supreme court, but they would soon be filled with people loyal to the President, as a way of speeding up the rubber stamp on policy. In many ways, the United States would become like the Roman Republic in its final years. Sure, the Senate still existed, but all power was concentrated in Caesar, and the Senate was full of people who’s only qualification was undying loyalty to Caesar.
christian nationalism
So what does the Heritage foundation hope to accomplish with their newly created officer of Dictator? Well, radical conservatism is a good start. Project 2025 accuses America of being plagued by “Woke Ideology,” and “Cultural Marxism” (fun fact: this was a dog whistle beloved by the actual Nazis, who used it to promote extreme antisemitism and secular modernism) which it seeks to weed out at all costs.
To do this, the Project plans to gut civil rights and anti-discrimination laws to combat “Anti-White Racism.” In effect, this means ensuring white supremacy in the United States, and ensuring that anyone non-white is a second class citizen. Safeguards against police brutality would be removed, allowing law enforcement to serve as the keepers of white supremacy. The Project also plans to remove all discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people. It plans to make pornography illegal, saying that it is “transgender propaganda,” and ensure that queer people are not depicted or allowed in public life whatsoever. The Project also explicitly states how it plans to infuse the government with conservative and chiefly Christian values. This has already been tested to some degree in Louisiana, where the 10 commandments are displayed in every public school. Speaking of public education, Project 2025 plans to eviscerate it and replace the vast majority of schools with private charter schools, the majority of which are Christian.
The Heritage Foundation wants you to know that if you are not a white cisgender heterosexual christian, you are not welcome in the United States. We can expect a Trump presidency to be a slow march towards a white Christian theocracy, where anyone who doesnt fit the desired image of an “American” is classified as an undesirable “Other.”
The schools will be seized to ensure that this vision of America is the one that children are brought up with, and that prevails in the minds of a new generation of Americans.
To do this, the Project plans to gut civil rights and anti-discrimination laws to combat “Anti-White Racism.” In effect, this means ensuring white supremacy in the United States, and ensuring that anyone non-white is a second class citizen. Safeguards against police brutality would be removed, allowing law enforcement to serve as the keepers of white supremacy. The Project also plans to remove all discrimination protections for LGBTQ+ people. It plans to make pornography illegal, saying that it is “transgender propaganda,” and ensure that queer people are not depicted or allowed in public life whatsoever. The Project also explicitly states how it plans to infuse the government with conservative and chiefly Christian values. This has already been tested to some degree in Louisiana, where the 10 commandments are displayed in every public school. Speaking of public education, Project 2025 plans to eviscerate it and replace the vast majority of schools with private charter schools, the majority of which are Christian.
The Heritage Foundation wants you to know that if you are not a white cisgender heterosexual christian, you are not welcome in the United States. We can expect a Trump presidency to be a slow march towards a white Christian theocracy, where anyone who doesnt fit the desired image of an “American” is classified as an undesirable “Other.”
The schools will be seized to ensure that this vision of America is the one that children are brought up with, and that prevails in the minds of a new generation of Americans.
another member of the club
These are pretty bleak visions for the future of our country. How can I be so sure of them? Well, it’s because this sort of thing has already happened in plenty of other countries. Turkey and Hungary, both in NATO along with the U.S. have adopted many of the same conservative or executive-strengthening policies. The result ended up being what I described: dictatorships with democratic facades, with unprecedented control over the personal lives of their citizens. In Turkey, following a failed coup to restore secularism, members of the government not loyal to leader Recep Erdoğan were purged from their positions, ensuring loyalty to the president, strengthened by a 2017 constitutional reform. In Hungary, Viktor Orban has solidified his power in much of the same way. In fact, all of these situations resemble what happened to Russia back in the early 2000s, a country now famous for its distinct lack of democracy and dictatorial president. If Trump is elected president, America will join this club of leaders, many of whom have already expressed their admiration for him.
If we would like to keep our democracy, we need everyone to vote. This election, more than ever, will decide the future of our nation. If you will be 18 before election day, don’t hesitate. Register.
If we would like to keep our democracy, we need everyone to vote. This election, more than ever, will decide the future of our nation. If you will be 18 before election day, don’t hesitate. Register.
