Topic: The Bruno Strategy
“The Bruno Strategy” is a phrase I coined for these analyses when I recognized that a recurring theme throughout Project 2025 is the authors’ apparent belief that removing words from documents and forbidding people to talk about certain topics, makes those topics magically cease to exist. i.e., “We Don’t Talk About Bruno.”
“The next conservative President must make the institutions of American civil society hard targets for woke culture warriors. This starts with deleting the terms sexual orientation and gender identity (“SOGI”), diversity, equity, and inclusion (“DEI”), gender, gender equality, gender equity, gender awareness, gender-sensitive, abortion, reproductive health, reproductive rights, and any other term used to deprive Americans of their First Amendment rights out of every federal rule, agency regulation, contract, grant, regulation, and piece of legislation that exists.”
I’m curious how words merely existing are depriving Americans of their First Amendment Rights, and how deleting those words from government regulations/legislation is going to restore those rights. If anything, removing those words arbitrarily is a violation of 1A – it’s literally censorship by the government. Again, lots of cognitive dissonance here, and he’s unclear on what removing these words actually hopes to accomplish, other than effectively legalizing discrimination against anyone who fits into any of those phrases. Seriously? The phrase “reproductive health” is woke? Insanity.
Full contextual analysis of foreword here.
“Abolishing the Gender Policy Council would eliminate central promotion of abortion (“health services”); comprehensive sexuality education (“education”); and the new woke gender ideology, which has as a principal tenet “gender affirming care” and “sex-change” surgeries on minors.”
Vought seems to believe, about many things, that removing the words from documentation about a thing, banning talking about a thing, or banning research into a thing, will magically make the thing go away. This naive denialism is laughable at best, but he’s outright lying here – nobody, especially from the government, is promoting sex-change surgery for children.
Full contextual analysis of Section 1.2: Executive Office of the President of the United States here.
Share this quote from Project 2025:
“In addition, the next conservative Administration should rescind President Biden’s 2022 Gender Policy and refocus it on Women, Children, and Families and revise the agency’s regulation on “Integrating Gender Equality and Female Empowerment in USAID’s Program Cycle.” It should remove all references, examples, definitions, photos, and language on USAID websites, in agency publications and policies, and in all agency contracts and grants that include the following terms: “gender,” “gender equality,” “gender equity,” “gender diverse individuals,” “gender aware,” “gender sensitive,” etc. It should also remove references to “abortion,” “reproductive health,” and “sexual and reproductive rights” and controversial sexual education materials.”
Apparently, he’s taking a page from Russ Vought’s book where he appears to believe that if you don’t say the words that talk about a thing, then that thing ceases to exist. I touch on that in Section 1.2, but suffice it to say, this is not a policy position grounded in reality. Moreover, the term “reproductive health” is radical to him? That’s not the position of a normal person. Henceforth, I will be referring to this phenomenon as the “Bruno Strategy,” because?
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“Leadership should designate a political appointee to help coordinate cross-agency efforts to hold the U.S. government’s multilateral partners (U.N. and WHO agencies and other international organizations) to a higher level of financial and programmatic accountability, including assurances that language promoting abortion will be removed from U.N. documents, policy statements, and technical literature.”
There’s the Bruno Strategy again! Primorac is arguing here that we need to force the WHO (World Health Organization) and the United Nations (UN) to adopt these ridiculous practices of not mentioning reproductive health matters, specifically abortion.
Full contextual analysis of Section 2.6: Agency for International Development here.
“To accomplish these objectives, a new Administration should announce its principles through an executive order, the USDA should remove all references to transforming the food system on its web site and other department-disseminated material, and it should expressly and regularly communicate the principles informing the objectives listed above, as well as promote these principles through legislative efforts.”
There’s the Bruno Strategy at work there as well – if we don’t mention the need for sustainability in food production, it doesn’t exist! Not a thing! Don’t need to worry about it!
Full contextual analysis of Section 3.1: Department of Agriculture here.
“The new Administration must quickly move to rescind these changes, which add a new “nonbinary” sex category to OCR’S data collection and issue a new CRDC that will collect data directly relevant to OCR’s statutory enforcement authority.”
She’s arguing here for stopping the Office of Civil Rights Data Collection (CDRC) from collecting any information on nonbinary students and removing that as an option. Only students identifying as either male or female shall be counted.
This seems arbitrary and discriminatory for no good reason, and is another example of the Bruno Strategy at work. If we don’t count nonbinary students in our statistics, they stop existing!
Full contextual analysis of Section 3.2: Department of Education here.
“Remove the Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program (GHGRP) for any source category that is not currently being regulated. The overall reporting program imposes significant burdens on small businesses and companies that are not being regulated. This is either a pointless burden or a sword-of-Damocles threat of future regulation, neither of which is appropriate.”
The GHGRP, established by the EPA in 2009, requires large emitters of greenhouse gases (GHGs) to report their emissions. The program primarily covers facilities that emit 25,000 metric tons or more of CO2 equivalent per year. The purpose of the program is to collect accurate data on GHG emissions, which is essential for understanding emission trends, informing policy decisions, and guiding regulatory measures to reduce emissions.
Getting rid of collecting statistics is another example of the Bruno Strategy. “If we stop collecting data about greenhouse emissions, they don’t exist any more!” All this does is deprive policy makers of the ability to make informed decisions, in the absence of any data to review.
In terms of the program representing a significant burden for small businesses, this is an outright lie. THE GHGRP DOES NOT APPLY TO MOST SMALL BUSINESSES. It targets large emitters of GHGs, such as power plants, industrial facilities, and large manufacturing operations. The threshold of 25,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalent per year is set high enough that small businesses typically fall below this limit and are not required to report.
The “sword of Damocles” argument is creative, but misleading at best. The existence of a reporting program does not guarantee future regulation, but it does provide policymakers with the necessary information to make informed decisions. In any regulatory system, monitoring data is essential for understanding the scope of the issue and evaluating the effectiveness of any future measures.
Full contextual analysis of Section 3.4: Environmental Protection Agency here.
“The CDC should immediately end its collection of data on gender identity, which legitimizes the unscientific notion that men can become women (and vice versa) and encourages the phenomenon of ever-multiplying subjective identities.”
More of the Bruno Strategy at work, here. “If we don’t count transgender people, they don’t exist!” In this case, it’s a way of codifying into law the idea that transgender people are not people. They literally “don’t count.”
Full contextual analysis of Section 3.5: Department of Health and Human Services here.
“The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories.”
This would have severe public safety consequences. NOAA operates key systems such as the National Weather Service (NWS) and various satellites that provide real-time data for weather forecasting, severe storm warnings, and climate monitoring. Eliminating or privatizing these functions could reduce access to high-quality, reliable data.
NOAA plays a critical role in issuing early warnings for hurricanes, tornadoes, and other severe weather events. If these functions were privatized or handed over to states or territories, there could be inconsistencies in the quality and timeliness of warnings, leading to greater risks for communities during natural disasters.
If weather services were privatized, the general public and industries (e.g., agriculture, aviation, shipping) might have to pay for what are currently publicly funded services. This could increase costs, especially for smaller entities or states with limited budgets.
If states don’t have the budget and private entities aren’t able to do it as well, what happens? Blindsided by natural disasters!
Further, NOAA is a leader in climate science, conducting research on global warming, ocean acidification, and sea-level rise. Eliminating or reducing NOAA’s research functions could hinder efforts to understand and mitigate climate change, leaving gaps in the scientific knowledge used for global environmental policy.
Spoiler: That’s the part they care about. That’s why they want to dismantle the NOAA. THEY WANT TO PRETEND CLIMATE CHANGE DOESN’T EXIST, and they think that if we stop researching it or talking about it, it will simply go away. (See: The Bruno Strategy.)
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.
“Together, these form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future U.S. prosperity.”
This is more arguing for dismantling the NOAA / National Weather Service. So, I called it when I said before that the climate change thing is why they’re mad at the NOAA. As I have pointed out numerous times on this website, climate change is not speculative. More in the analysis.
Full contextual analysis of Section 4.1: Department of Commerce here.