A graphic with different images pertaining to Project 2025.A graphic with different images pertaining to Project 2025.

Project 2025, Explained

Learn more about The Heritage Foundation initiative that threatens to erode our civil rights and civil liberties during a second Trump term.

The ACLU doesn’t endorse or oppose candidates for elected office — but we recognize that the re-election of Donald Trump as president will have immense implications for the future of our democratic norms, institutions, and processes. In 2022, The Heritage Foundation, a conservative-leaning think tank, and 140 former Trump staffers authored Project 2025 -- a roadmap for how to replace the rule of law with ring-wing ideals.

Learn more about this initiative and its perilous implications for our civil rights and civil liberties below — as well as how the ACLU will use all of the tools at its disposal – from advocacy to litigation to community organizing – to defend our democracy.


What is Project 2025?

Project 2025 is a federal policy agenda and blueprint for a radical restructuring of the executive branch authored and published by former Trump administration officials in partnership with The Heritage Foundation, a longstanding conservative think tank that opposes abortion and reproductive rights, LGBTQ rights, immigrants’ rights, and racial equity. Project 2025’s largest publication, “Mandate For Leadership,” is a 900-page manual for reorganizing the entire federal government agency by agency to serve a conservative agenda.

Project 2025 includes a long list of extreme policy recommendations touching on nearly every aspect of American life, from immigration and abortion rights, to free speech and racial justice. A number of its recommendations rely on support from the executive branch and from Congress. Many other initiatives are outright unconstitutional.


What Are Some Plans/Proposals Included in Project 2025?

Project 2025 calls for hundreds of individual policy changes that will impact our constitutional freedoms, and every aspect of our lives. Among them are:

Gutting Abortion Access

The Plan:

  • Revive a 19th century law, the Comstock Act, to ban any abortion medications and materials preventing materials from being sent through the U.S. Postal Service
  • Reversal of the FDA’s approval of mifepristone

Second Trump Administration Connections:

Pam Bondi

U.S. Attorney General

Defended President Trump during his first impeachment trial and upheld Florida’s restrictive abortion ban. Pam Bondi is an ardent Project 2025 supporter and was actively working to implement Project 2025 before President Donald Trump nominated her for U.S. Attorney General.

Russell Vought

Office of Management and Budget

As director of the OMB, Vought will lead the implementation and enforcement of presidential policy across the federal government. As a co-author of Project 2025, he advocated for abolishing the Gender Policy Counsel to eliminate the promotion of abortion and comprehensive sex education.

Martin Makary

FDA Commissioner

Fox News Contributor who has pushed anti-abortion disinformation on the network and is associated with Paragon Health Institute, a conservative think tank that advocates for decreased federal health care spending.

What you can do with us today:

Mass Deportations

The Plan:

  • Target immigrant communities through mass deportations and raids.
  • End birthright citizenship.
  • Separate families.
  • Dismantle the asylum system.

Second Trump Administration Connections:

Tom Homan

Border Czar

Contributor, Project 2025

Stephen Miller

Deputy Chief of Staff

Led an interest group that advised Project 2025 on policy.

What you can do with us today:

Abusing Warrantless Surveillance

The Plan

  • Exploit the executive branch’s vast and unprecedented power to spy on Americans
  • Dismantle guardrails that prevent the president from abusing the executive branch’s power

Second Trump Administration Connections:

Russell Vought

Office of Management and Budget

As director of the OMB, Vought will lead the implementation and enforcement of presidential policy across the federal government. Authored Project 2025’s chapter on the Executive Office of the President of the United States and reportedly spearheaded the project’s playbook for Trump’s first 180 days.

John Ratcliffe

CIA Director

Hasp pledged to keep and support the use of contested electronic intelligence gathering tools.

Learn more:

Unleashing Undue Force on Protestors

The Plan

  • Violate the First Amendment to target journalists and protesters
  • Dismantle guardrails that prevent the president from abusing executive power

Second Trump Administration Connections

Russell Vought

Office of Management and Budget

As director of the OMB, Vought will lead the implementation and enforcement of presidential policy across the federal government. Authored Project 2025’s chapter on the Executive Office of the President of the United States and reportedly spearheaded the project’s playbook for Trump’s first 180 days.

Learn more:

Severely Limiting Voting Access

The Plan

  • Abuse executive power to interfere in our elections by criminalizing the voting process and damaging fair representation

Second Trump Administration Connections

Pam Bondi

Attorney General

As co-chair for the America First Policy Institute's Center for Law and Justice, she has spearheaded efforts to restrict and disenfranchise voters. She led a multistate effort to overturn a pro-voting Biden Administration executive order that would have expanded voting access. Pam Bondi is an ardent Project 2025 supporter and was actively working to implement Project 2025 before President Donald Trump nominated her for U.S. Attorney General.

Harmeet Dhillon

Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division

Has focused her career on dismantling civil rights, rather than protecting them. She has worked to restrict voting access and helped fuel 2020 election lies and challenged the election results on several occasions by using disinformation.

What you can do with us today:

Censoring Critical Discussions in Classrooms

The Plan

  • Censor academic discussions about race, gender, and systemic oppression

Second Trump Administration Connections

Linda McMahon

Secretary of Education

Plans to send education back to the states and has actively championed anti-trans rhetoric. She has promoted policies aligned with Project 2025 including promoting vouchers to drain resources from public schools and send taxpayer money to private schools that permit discrimination. Linda McMahon is the Chair of the Board and Chair of the Center for the American Worker for the America First Policy Institute

What you can do with us today:

Rolling Back Trans Rights

The Plan

  • Remove federal nondiscrimination protections
  • Mandate discrimination against LGBTQ people by the federal government
  • Exclude trans people from serving in the military
  • Permit faith-based, taxpayer-funded contracts to exclude trans people from disaster assistance and care for unaccompanied refugee

Second Trump Administration Connections

Pam Bondi

U.S. Attorney General

Actively fought against the legalization of same-sex marriage as Florida Attorney General and sought to uphold Flordia’s ban on marriage equality. Pam Bondi is an ardent Project 2025 supporter and was actively working to implement Project 2025 before President Donald Trump nominated her for U.S. Attorney General.

Linda McMahon

Secretary of Education

Chair of the board at the America First Policy Institute, a conservative think tank she launched with former Trump administration officials. The non-profit is openly anti-trans, claims to combat “radical gender ideology”, and actively campaigns against policies that support trans rights in education.

What you can do with us today:


What are President-Elect Trump’s connections to Project 2025?

Project 2025 was published by The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank with direct ties to Trump’s first administration. Though Trump has falsely claimed he is not connected to Project 2025, a recent report from CNN found at least 140 people who worked on Project 2025 that previously worked in Trump’s administration, and Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts–who previously worked on Trump’s transition team in 2016–has described his organization’s role as “institutionalizing Trumpism.”

Roberts was also one of the principle advocates for overturning the 2020 election to keep Donald Trump in office after he lost the election. Heritage Foundation executive Mike Howell called the 2024 election illegitimate before voting even began, claiming without evidence that any result other than a Trump victory will have been the result of fraud.


How is the ACLU Fighting Back?

In a series of seven memos, the ACLU details the civil rights and civil liberties challenges that a second Trump presidency will present and provides a roadmap for how we will fight to protect and expand the freedom of all people. This includes:

  • Going to court to preserve and advance the rights of immigrants, LGBTQ rights, abortion access, nondiscrimination laws, voting rights, and the free speech of all people
  • Working with Congress members to enact policy solutions to many of the most extreme proposals in Project 2025 and using Congress’s constitutional powers to provide oversight, investigate wrongdoing, and defund executive branch policies that threaten our most fundamental rights and freedoms
  • Working with state lawmakers around the country to enact proactive laws that protect people from federal interference.
  • Organizing in communities to educate the public about their rights, the harms of Project 2025, and what they can do to protect and expand our freedoms

For more info, visit aclu.org/47