100 days in: Here's where President Trump's policies have mirrored Project 2025
He distanced himself on the campaign trail, but here's where Trump's policies align with the conservative playbook.
He distanced himself on the campaign trail, but here's where Trump's policies align with the conservative playbook.
He distanced himself on the campaign trail, but here's where Trump's policies align with the conservative playbook.
Despite distancing himself from Project 2025 on the campaign trail, there have been substantial parallels between the initiative and President Donald Trump’s second administration.
There was a lot of conversation surrounding Project 2025 in the months leading up to the November election, largely due to its calls to significantly reduce and reshape the scope of the federal government.
At the September debate against former Vice President Kamala Harris, Trump said he had “nothing to do with Project 2025.” On his Truth Social platform, Trump also repeatedly posted about having nothing to do with Project 2025, and in a July post he called parts of it “ridiculous and abysmal.”
Now, 100 days into his second administration, nearly 45% of Trump's executive orders closely mirror policy recommendations Project 2025 advocates for, according to an analysis by the Hearst Television Data Team.
Project 2025 is an initiative spearheaded by conservative think tank The Heritage Foundation that gives guidance for what policies the next conservative president should carry out. The initiative began in 2022, and its main policy guidebook — the 922-page “Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise” — was published a year later.
In order to determine if there were overlaps between Trump administration policies and Project 2025, the Hearst Television Data Team analyzed how many executive orders align with policy recommendations in the “Mandate for Leadership.” Any executive order involving tariffs was excluded from the analysis due to Project 2025’s conflicting recommendations on the issue.
Of the 126 non-tariff executive orders, 56 contain policy recommendations that closely mirror Project 2025.
One of the largest areas where there is overlap between Project 2025 and Trump’s executive orders is on the issue of government reform, accountability and deregulation.
While Project 2025 does not explicitly call for the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency, it does advocate for many of the government workforce and reduction changes that Trump’s executive orders carry out.
In his first 100 days, Trump has brought back Schedule F, making it easier to fire federal employees, eliminated DEI from the federal government, reinstated service members with backpay who were discharged under former President Joe Biden’s COVID-19 vaccine mandate, and called for agencies to cut back on costs. All of these actions were advocated for in Project 2025.
On March 30, Trump issued an Executive Order to begin the dismantling of the Department of Education — one of the policies in Project 2025 that made a lot of headlines before the election.
Trump and Project 2025 have also aligned on various policies to boost domestic energy production, strengthen immigration enforcement, and implement deregulations.
The two do differ on a couple of key issues.
Project 2025 calls for an outright ban on TikTok, citing national security risks. Trump has yet to make a final call on TikTok, but has delayed its banning in the U.S.
Project 2025 also gives conflicting advice regarding tariffs. Author Kent Lassman laid out an argument for free trade that critiqued tariffs. Author Peter Navarro — who ultimately Trump hired as his senior counselor for trade and manufacturing — argued for tariffs to strengthen domestic manufacturing.
While ideas are shared between Project 2025 and the executive orders Trump has signed, it is unclear the extent to which one influenced the other.
Project 2025 was created by a think tank whose aim is to influence political policy. It is just one of many similar proposals created by conservative policy groups — unique largely in how it captured the media’s attention last summer and Trump’s claim he had “nothing to do with it.”
Many authors of Project 2025 are now members of Trump’s top team of officials.
Budget Director Russ Vought, FCC Chair Brendan Carr and Navarro were all authors of Project 2025. Additionally, CIA Director John Ratcliffe, Border Czar Tom Homan, and Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Paul Atkins were all among the contributors to Project 2025.
