Material Contributors - What Does Project 2025 Say?

In this March 2024¹ article authored by Daren Bakst, he claims that EPA rules about tailpipe emissions amount to “a chilling abuse of power” and “wanton disregard for individual freedom”, rather than as protective of the environment.

Daren Bakst is Deputy Director, Center for Energy and Environment, and Senior Fellow at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI). Before joining CEI, Daren was a Senior Research Fellow at The Heritage Foundation, where he played a leading role in the launch of the organization’s new energy and environmental center. For a decade, he led Heritage’s food and agricultural policy work, and he edited and co-authored Heritage’s book Farms and Free Enterprise. He has testified numerous times before Congress, has appeared frequently on media outlets, and has played leadership roles in such organizations such as the Federalist Society, American Agricultural Law Association, and Food and Drug Law Institute (serving on the Food and Drug Law Journal’s editorial advisory board).

Jonathan Berry

Authored the section about: Section 3.9: Department of Labor and Related Agencies

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Berry served as counsel to the assistant attorney general in the Department of Justice (DOJ) in 2017 and 2018. Berry was also part of Trump’s presidential transition team in 2016 and 2017, advising on ethics and legal policy.

Berry is the author of the book “Satisfaction Guaranteed” (2016), which is a self-help book for same-sex attracted Christians (as he himself is one) designed to help them resist those attractions, and purports that real satisfaction can only be found via a relationship with Jesus Christ.

Jonathan Berry is managing partner at Boyden Gray & Associates PLLC. He served as acting Assistant Secretary for Policy at the U.S. Department of Labor, overseeing all aspects of rulemaking and policy development. At the U.S. Depart- ment of Justice, he assisted with the development of regulatory policy and with the nominations of Justice Neil Gorsuch and dozens of other judges. He previ- ously served as Chief Counsel for the Trump transition and earlier clerked for Associate Justice Samuel Alito and Judge Jerry Smith of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. He is a graduate of Yale College and Columbia University School of Law.

Lindsey M. Burke

Authored the section about: Section 3.2: Department of Education

Served in the Trump Administration: No, but served on Conservative Governor Glenn Youngkin (R-VA)’s education team (see full bio.)

“Public-school officials, like all government bureaucrats, primarily engage in the worst kind of spending: They spend other people’s money on children who are not their own.” Lindsey M. Burke, National Affairs, 2015² Ms. Burke supports dismantling the current public education system in favor of school choice and vouchers.

Lindsey M. Burke is Director of the Center for Education Policy at The Heritage Foundation. Burke served on Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin’s transition steering committee and landing team for education. She serves on the Board of Visitors for George Mason University, the board of the Educational Free- dom Institute, and the advisory board of the Independent Women’s Forum’s Education Freedom Center. Dr. Burke’s research has been published in such journals as Social Science Quarterly, Educational Research and Evaluation, and Research in Educational Administration and Leadership. She holds a BA from Hollins University, an MA from the University of Virginia, and a PhD from George Mason University.

David R. Burton

Authored the section about: Section 4.2: Department of the Treasury (with William L. Walton and Stephen Moore), and Section 5.1: Financial Regulatory Agencies (with Robert Bowes.)

Served in the Trump Administration: No.

In Mr. Burton’s testimony before the Committee of Small Business, United States House of Representatives on March 14, 2015³, he cited having to provide health care to employees and comply with “burdensome and complex” environmental, safety, and labor laws to be a real problem for business owners. Mr. Burton supports deregulating businesses, repealing Obamacare, and prohibiting all greenhouse gas regulations. He also argued that the U.S. immigration system makes it too difficult for businesses to hire employees from abroad and proposed the creation of “STEM Visas.”

David R. Burton is Senior Fellow in Economic Policy in the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. He focuses on securities regulation, tax policy, business law, entrepreneurship, administrative law, financial privacy, the U.S. Department of Commerce, corporate welfare, international investment, international information sharing, the U.S. economic relationship with China, and climate-related financial risk. Previously, Burton was General Counsel at the National Small Business Association; a partner in the Argus Group; Vice President, Finance, and General Counsel for New England Machinery; and manager of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Tax Policy Center. He holds a JD from the University of Maryland School of Law and a BA in Economics from the University of Chicago.

Adam Candeub

Authored the section about: Section 5.4: Federal Trade Commission

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Candeub served in the DOJ as the deputy associate attorney general in 2020. In 2019, he served as a high-ranking commerce official in the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA).

In an interview given to Hungary Today in March 2024⁴, Candeub appears to believe that social media companies censoring certain viewpoints on their platforms is a First Amendment violation, which is not true unless the platform is being run by the government, nor unless we revisit the Co. vs. Riggs SCOTUS decision of 1906, which held that for (many) legal purposes, corporations are “persons”, who therefore do not owe anyone a platform from which to share their viewpoints.

Adam Candeub is a professor of law at Michigan State University. His scholarly research focuses on telecommunication, antitrust, and Internet issues. He served as acting Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Deputy Associate Attorney General at the Justice Department during the Trump Administration. He received his BA magna cum laude from Yale University and his JD magna cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.

Dustin J. Carmack

Authored the section about: Section 2.4: Intelligence Community

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Carmack served as the chief of staff to the director of national intelligence in 2020 and 2021.

In May 2024, Carmack started a new position as Director of Public Policy for Meta, thus now having some authority over how social media (Facebook, Instagram) is governed.

Dustin J. Carmack is Research Fellow for Cybersecurity, Intelligence, and Emerging Technologies in the Border Security and Immigration Center at The Heritage Foundation. Previously, he served in the Intelligence Community as Chief of Staff to the Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe. In Congress, he served as Chief of Staff to Congressman John Ratcliffe (TX-04) and Congressman Ron DeSantis (FL-06). Mr. Carmack studied at Truman State University in Missouri and Tel Aviv University in Israel.

Brendan Carr

Authored the section about: Section 5.2: Federal Communications Commission

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. A member of both the Trump and the Biden administrations, Carr was appointed to the Federal Communications Commission by Trump. His post expired in 2023 and was renewed by Biden; it will expire in 2028.

Supports better infrastructure, especially for broadband, but also supports getting rid of regulations to support the safety of the infrastructure: “As Republican Leader Cathy McMorris Rodgers knows from spending time nearly 200 feet in the air with a tower crew in Spokane, infrastructure work is already hard enough and we don’t need outdated regulations making it even more difficult.” – Brendan Carr’s Testimony Before the House of Representatives, March 2022⁵, page 3, second full paragraph.

Brendan Carr has nearly 20 years of private-sector and public-sector experience in communications and tech policy. He currently serves as the senior Republican on the Federal Communications Commission. Prior to this role, Carr served as the Federal Communication Commission’s General Counsel. Earlier, he worked as an attorney at Wiley Rein LLP. Previously, he clerked on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit. After graduating from Georgetown University, he earned his JD magna cum laude from the Catholic University of America’s Columbus School of Law where he served as an editor of the Catholic Univer- sity Law Review.

Benjamin "Ben" S. Carson Sr., M.D.

Authored the section about: Section 3.6: Department of Housing and Urban Development

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Carson served as the 17^th United States Secretary of Housing and Urban Development from 2017 until 2021. Carson ran in the 2016 Republican primary, before eventually dropping out and endorsing Trump.

Ben Carson has no shortage of controversial remarks⁶. Notably, he believes that climate change is “irrelevant”, supports dismantling the department of Education in favor of charter, private, or homeschooling, few or no limits on gun ownership, replacing the ACA with health savings accounts, and the establishment of a flat tax. He also appears to support abortion up to 20 weeks, and is supportive of gay marriage. [citations]⁷

Benjamin S. Carson, Sr., MD, is Founder and Chairman of the American Cornerstone Institute and previously served as the 17th Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Born in Detroit to a single mother with a third-grade education, Dr. Carson was raised to love reading and education. He attended Yale and earned his MD from the University of Michigan Medical School. For nearly 30 years, Dr. Carson served as Director of Pediatric Neurosurgery at the Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, where he performed the first separation of twins conjoined at the back of the head.

Ken Cuccinelli

Authored the section about: Section 2.2: Department of Homeland Security

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Cuccinelli served as the acting Secretary of Homeland Security from 2019 until 2021. In 2020, a congressional watchdog issued a report saying that he was unlawfully appointed to this position.

Ken Cuccinelli is opposed to gay marriage⁸, supports unlawful racial profiling and other cruel and inhumane border policies⁹, wants to repeal the ACA, and sought to deny unemployment benefits¹⁰ to legal citizens who do not speak English.

Ken Cuccinelli served as Acting Director of U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services in 2019 and then, from November 2019 through the end of the Trump Administration, as Acting Deputy Secretary for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. During his tenure as Acting Deputy Secretary, Ken also served as the Chief Regulatory Officer for the Department of Homeland Security. He also has served the Commonwealth of Virginia, first as a state senator and then as Virginia’s 46th Attorney General.

Rick Dearborn

Authored the section about: Section 1.1: White House Office.

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Dearborn served as a deputy chief of staff in Trump’s White House in 2017 and 2018. Prior to Trump’s inauguration, Dearborn worked as the staff director in the presidential transition team.

Rick Dearborn is a lobbyist whose clients have included Amazon, Meta, and Shell.

Rick Dearborn served as Deputy Chief of Staff for President Donald Trump and was responsible for the day-to-day operations of five separate departments of the Executive Office of the President. He also served as Executive Director of the 2016 President-elect Donald Trump transition team. Before that, Rick served in several roles, including as Chief of Staff, in the office of then-U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) for nearly two decades. Between his two tours in Senator Sessions’ office, he was appointed by President George W. Bush as Assistant Secretary of Energy for Congressional Affairs. Earlier in his career, Rick worked for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the Senate Republican Conference, and the Senate Steering Committee. He graduated from the University of Oklahoma with a BA in Public Administration and a minor in economics.

Veronique de Rugy

Authored the section about: Section 4.3: Export-Import Bank (with Jennifer Hazelton).

Served in the Trump Administration: No. And in fact has criticized Trump’s idea of exempting social security benefits from taxes as “terrible.”¹¹

Ms. de Rugy appears to support reforming Social Security and Medicare by reducing benefits (National Review, July 3, 2024¹²), although this particular piece reads more as a blanket critique of the current system than a path forward.

Veronique de Rugy is the George Gibbs Chair in Political Economy and Senior Research Fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University and a nation- ally syndicated columnist. Her primary research interests include the U.S. economy, the federal budget, taxation, tax competition, and cronyism. De Rugy is the author of a weekly opinion column for the Creators Syndicate, writes regular columns for Reason magazine, and blogs about economics at National Review Online’s The Corner. She received her MA in economics from the Paris Dauphine University and her PhD in economics from the Panthéon-Sorbonne University.

Donald Devine

Authored the section about: Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: Managing the Bureaucracy (with Dennis Dean Kirk and Paul Dans.)

Served in the Trump Administration: No.

Mr. Devine was dubbed Reagan’s “Terrible Swift Sword” in his capacity for reducing the Federal Workforce by over 100,000 workers. Devine is a fusionist, who is attributed by one analyst with summarizing fusionism’s doctrine in one phrase as “utilizing libertarian means in a conservative society for traditionalist ends.” More about Fusionism¹³.

Donald Devine is Senior Scholar at The Fund for American Studies in Washington, DC. He was President Ronald Reagan’s first-term Office of Personnel Management Director when The Washington Post labeled him “Reagan’s Terrible Swift Sword of the Civil Service” for cutting bureaucracy and reducing spending by billions of dollars. He was a professor at the University of Maryland and Bellevue University and is a columnist and author of 10 books, including his recent The Enduring Tension.

Diana Furchtgott-Roth

Authored the section about: Section 3.10: Department of Transportation

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Furchtgott-Roth served as acting assistant secretary for economic policy at the Department of the Treasury in 2018 and 2019.

Furchtgott-Roth believes that the government shouldn’t regulate or nationalize energy production, and approves of more drilling for oil, both offshore and onshore.

“Under a new Republican administration, rather than slowing down pipeline approval, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would focus on speeding it up. The Bureau of Land Management would prioritize approving both onshore and offshore drilling permits. The Security and Exchange Commission would no longer look at climate effects of companies’ investments, and the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency would not look at the climate effects of bank loans.” – A Republican Admin Would Eliminate Costly Energy Mandates¹⁴, July 2024, Diana Furchtgott-Roth

Diana Furchtgott-Roth, an Oxford-educated economist, directs the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment at The Heritage Foundation and is adjunct professor of economics at George Washington University. Diana served as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Research and Technology at the U.S. Department of Trans- portation, where she directed the Department’s $1.2 billion research budget; the Office of Positioning, Navigation and Timing and Spectrum Management; and the University Transportation Center program. Diana worked in senior roles in the White House under Presidents Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and George W. Bush, where she was Chief of Staff of the Council of Economic Advisers.

Thomas F. Gilman

Authored the section about: Section 4.1: Department of Commerce

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Gilman served in two roles in the Department of Commerce simultaneously from 2019 until 2021: chief financial officer as well as assistant secretary for administration.

Gilman has defended trade wars despite their harm to famers¹⁵, and commercializing/privatizing the National Weather Service, requiring Americans to pay for weather reports¹⁶. Gilman is a climate change denialist who supports appointing Trump loyalists to the NOAA¹⁷, with the aim of disallowing them from discussing climate change or policies which are at odds with the Administration’s.

Thomas F. Gilman served as Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Administration and Chief Financial Officer of the U.S. Department of Commerce in the Trump Administration. Currently, he is a Director of ACLJ Action and Chairman of Torn- gat Metals. Tom is the former CEO of Chrysler Financial and has had a 40-plus year career as a senior executive and entrepreneur in the global automotive industry, including roles at Chrysler Corporation, Cerberus Capital Management, Asbury Automotive Group, TD Auto Finance, and Automotive Capital Services. He holds a BS in finance from Villanova University.

Mandy M. Gunesekara

Authored the section about: Section 3.4: Environmental Protection Agency

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Gunasekara served as the chief of staff for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 2020 and 2021. She had worked as a senior policy adviser for the EPA since 2017.

Claims climate change activists thrive on guilt and fear and want to “ruin your day.”¹⁸

She also supports withdrawing from the UNFCCC as well as the Paris Accords¹⁹, so that the USA would not have to fulfill protective climate obligations or keep track of emissions or carbon sinks.

Mandy M. Gunasekara of Oxford, Mississippi, is a principal at Section VII Strategies, a Senior Policy Analyst at the Independent Women’s Forum, and Visiting Fellow in the Center for Energy, Climate, and Environment at The Heritage Foundation. During the Trump Administration, Mandy served as the Chief of Staff at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as well as Principal Deputy Assistant Administrator for the Office of Air and Radiation. She previously served in numer- ous roles at the U.S. House of Representatives and U.S. Senate, including as Majority Counsel for the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee under Chair- man Jim Inhofe. She received her BA from Mississippi College and her JD from the University of Mississippi School of Law.

Gene Hamilton

Authored the section about: Section 3.8: Department of Justice

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Hamilton served as counsel for the attorney general in the DOJ from 2017 until 2021.

Hamilton created the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” family separation policy, resulting in upwards of 2,000 children being separated from their families at the border.

When questioned before Congress about whether or not he regretted his role in the inhumane and cruel policy, Hamilton refused to answer²⁰.

Hamilton is currently a member of America First Legal, a conservative group led by Trump Senior Adviser Steven Miller²¹, whose purpose is to legally challenge Biden administration policies²².

Gene Hamilton is Vice-President and General Counsel of America First Legal Foundation. Gene served as Counselor to the Attorney General at the U.S. Department of Justice; Senior Counselor to the Secretary of Homeland Security; General Counsel on the Senate Committee on the Judiciary; Assistant Chief Counsel at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement; and as an Attorney Advisor in the Secretary’s Honors Program for Attorneys at the Department of Homeland Security. Gene graduated from the Washington and Lee University School of Law magna cum laude and Order of the Coif and has a BA in international affairs from the University of Georgia.

Jennifer Hazelton

Authored the section about: Section 4.3: Export-Import Bank (with Veronique de Rugy)

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Hazelton served as public affairs official at the Agency for International Development (USAID) in 2020 and 2021. She also served as a public affairs official in the State Department in 2017.

I couldn’t find anything noteworthy to include here – Ms. Hazelton has very little internet presence at all.

Jennifer Hazelton has worked as a senior strategic consultant for the Department of Defense in Industrial Base Policy and has held senior positions at USAID, the Export-Import Bank of the United States, and the State Department. She was also a communications director in the U.S. Congress and worked as an award-win- ning journalist for CNN and Fox News Channel. Hazelton holds an MA in business administration from Emory University and earned her BA from the University of Georgia.

Karen Kerrigan

Authored the section about: Section 4.5: Small Business Administration

Served in the Trump Administration: No.

Supports startups and entrepreneurs, but believes that deregulation²³ is key to them succeeding (her words, linked interview.)

In this article, penned by Kerrigan²⁴ (paywalled), she proposes making it easier for startups to get patents (because if you have a patent, you’re more likely to get venture capital), and supports the bipartisan Patent Eligibility Restoration Act²⁵.

She also supports the PREVAIL act²⁶, which would protect small inventors from “excessive and costly litigation.”

Karen Kerrigan is President and CEO of the Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council and has helped to strengthen U.S. entrepreneurship and global business growth for 28 years. She has provided counsel across the globe via training missions focused on entrepreneurial development, effective advocacy, policy formation, and implementation. Karen testifies regularly before Congress and has served on numerous federal advisory boards representing the interests of entrepreneurs and small businesses.

Dennis Dean Kirk

Authored the section about: Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: Managing the Bureaucracy (with Donald Devine and Paul Dans.)

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Kirk was supposed to serve as chairman of the Merit Systems Protection Board, an agency which gives federal employees, including whistleblowers, a place to appeal if they feel they have been unfairly fired. Trump nominated him to the position in 2018. However, the Senate delayed confirming him and he never ended up serving in the role, meaning the Board did not have enough members to function during Trump’s administration. This created a backlog of complaints. Kirk did serve as Trump’s senior adviser at the Office of Personnel Management.

“When President Donald Trump issued three executive orders that made it easier to fire poorly performing government employees, the backlash from public-sector unions was fierce. Union leaders did not like it—one called it an “assault on federal employees²⁷.” But a poll following the signature of these Executive Orders found that the majority of government workers— 51 percent —support the Administration’s efforts.” Kirk, August 11, 2020 [Source]²⁸

Dennis Dean Kirk is Associate Director for Personnel Policy with the 2025 Presidential Transition Project at The Heritage Foundation. Born and raised in Kansas, he graduated with honors from Northern Arizona University and Washburn Uni- versity Law School. Dennis has over 45 years of experience in private law and public federal government counsel services. He served in President George Bush’s Administration in the U.S. Army’s Office of General Counsel and later as Associate General Counsel for Strategic Integration and Business Transformation, where he was recognized with the Exceptional Civilian and Meritorious Civilian Service Awards and other awards. During the Trump Administration, Dennis served in senior positions at the Office of Personnel Management and was nominated by President Trump to be Chairman of the Merit Systems Protection Board.

Kent Lassman

Authored the section about: Section 4.6: Trade (with Peter Navarro)

Served in the Trump Administration: No.

Lassman is currently the CEO of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, whose mission is “to reform America’s unaccountable regulatory state”. The organization is primarily associated with tobacco disinformation and climate change denial, having received substantial funding from political advocacy groups and companies in the tobacco, energy, technology, and automotive industries. [more here]²⁹

Kent Lassman is President and CEO of the Competitive Enterprise Institute. Educated at the Catholic University of America and North Carolina State University, he has written on telecommunications, privacy, environmental, antitrust, and consumer protection regulation as well as trade policy and the design of regulatory systems. Kent’s policy research and advocacy have taken him to 45 state capitals, more than a dozen countries, and deep into the heart of the federal regulatory state.

Bernard L. McNamee

Authored the section about: Section 3.3: Department of Energy and Related Commissions

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. McNamee served as commissioner for the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission from 2018 until 2020.

McNamee drew fire from clean energy advocates and lawmakers like Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia, the top Democrat on the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, in late 2018 when a video surfaced of his comments at a Texas Public Policy Foundation event in Austin. At the free-market group’s event, McNamee emphasized the need for public awareness that “fossil fuels are not something dirty, something we need to get away from,” but instead are the “key to our prosperity” and a “clean environment.” He said “renewables, when they come on and off, it screws up the whole physics of the grid.” He also decried the “tyranny” of environmental groups that back renewable power (E&E News PM, Nov. 20, 2018).³⁰ He has claimed since that he is “not anti-renewable”³¹, but his actions do not bear out this claim.

Bernard L. McNamee is an energy and regulatory attorney with a major law firm and was formerly a member of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission. He is also the Street Distinguished Visiting Professor of Law at the Appalachian School of Law. In addition to serving as a Federal Energy Regulatory Commissioner, McNamee has served in various senior policy and legal positions throughout his career, including at the U.S. Department of Energy, for U.S. Senator Ted Cruz, and for Virginia Governor George Allen. McNamee also served four attorneys general in two states (Virginia and Texas).

Christopher Miller

Authored the section about: Section 2.1: Department of Defense

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Miller served in three roles in the Trump administration in a period of only seven months. In June 2020, he was appointed as the acting assistant secretary of defense, in August 2020, he was named director of the National Counterterrorism Center, and from November 2020 until January 2021, he served as the acting secretary of defense.

When Miller was tapped out of nowhere to replace Mark Esper as Trump’s Secretary of Defense, these were his words:

‘Miller knew his name was circulating in the White House, but the announcement came abruptly and was not greeted with warmth by his life partner. “Yeah, my wife is like, ‘The only thing we have is our name and you’re ruining it,’” Miller recalled. “She’s like, ‘You’re an idiot. I think this is the stupidest thing that’s ever happened.’ And I’m like, ‘Yes dear, I know that.’” Source: The Intercept, 3/11/23³²

This left Miller in charge of the Pentagon on January 6, 2021, and he is accused of delaying the deployment of National Guard Troops to mitigate the issue. When called “AWOL”, “disgusting”, and “ridiculous” by Democratic Members of Congress, he replied “thank you for your thoughts.”³³

Evidence seems to suggest that he is a deeply disenfranchised former soldier³⁴.

Christopher Miller served in several positions during the Trump Administration, including as Acting U.S. Secretary of Defense, Director of the National Counter- terrorism Center, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Combating Terrorism, and Senior Director for Counterterrorism and Transnational Threats at the National Security Council. Before his civilian service in the Department of Defense, Miller was an Army Green Beret in the 5th Special Forces Group with multiple combat tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, achieving the rank of colonel. Miller earned a BA from George Washington University and an MA from the Naval War College. He also graduated from the College of Naval Command and Staff and the Army War College.

Stephen Moore

Authored the section about: Section 4.2: Department of the Treasury (with William L. Walton and David R. Burton)

Served in the Trump Administration: Moore was not a member of Trump’s administration, but advised on his 2016 presidential campaign. Trump nominated Moore to serve as governor of the Federal Reserve, but he withdrew his name after facing criticism following the resurfacing of historic articles he wrote disparaging female athletes.³⁵

“The only thing holding back our boundless natural gas future is government. We need permits for more liquified natural gas terminals, leases for drilling, and pipelines so we can transport our natural gas resources to every region of the country and export it across the world.

Former President Donald Trump is for all of this. Harris is on the record as being against fracking and wanting to ban it. Can you think of anything dumber?” Source: Stephen Moore, Northern Virginia Daily, August 15, 2024³⁶

Moore also claims in the above article that the U.S. gets less than 10% of its energy from green sources (According to the Department of Energy³⁷, it’s 20% and climbing), and makes the erroneous point that water (using the example of bottled water in the grocery store) is cheaper than an equal amount of natural gas.

Stephen Moore is a conservative economist and author. He is currently a senior economist at FreedomWorks, a Distinguished Fellow at The Heritage Foundation, and a Fox News analyst. From 2005 to 2014, Moore served as the senior economics writer for The Wall Street Journal editorial page and as a member of the Journal’s editorial board. He still contributes regularly to the Journal’s editorial page. He is a frequent lecturer to business investment and university audiences around the world on the U.S. economic and political outlook in Washington, DC.

Mora Namdar

Authored the section about: Section 2.5: Media Agencies: U.S. Agency for Global Media (with additional contributor Mike Gonzales.)

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Namdar served as the acting assistant secretary of state in the State Department from December 2020 until January 2021. She previously worked as a policy adviser in the same department since 2019.

As a guest on Glenn Beck’s podcast³⁸, Namdar heaped blame on the Biden administration’s Iran policy, alleging that Biden’s border and immigration policy is allowing terrorists into the United States (despite being the daughter of Irani immigrants herself.) These are, of course, false claims.

Mora Namdar is an attorney and Senior Fellow at the American Foreign Policy Council. She speaks fluent Farsi and is an expert on U.S. national security, human rights, global communications, the Middle East, and international law. Mora served as senior advisor for critical issues at the U.S. State Department and was appointed by President Donald Trump to perform the duties of the Assistant Secretary of State for Consular Affairs. She also served as Vice President of Legal, Compliance, and Risk at the U.S. Agency for Global Media.

Peter Navarro

Authored the section about: Section 4.6: Trade (with Kent Lassman)

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. One of the most prominent members of the Trump administration, Navarro served as the director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy from 2017 until 2021. He was also the director of the National Trade Council in 2017. Navarro was a close adviser to Trump, largely on trade, but he also advised on the COVID-19 response and Trump’s false election fraud claims. Navarro refused to comply with the House Select Committee on the January 6 attack. He was indicted by a grand jury on two counts of contempt of Congress and eventually pled guilty. He was convicted and sentenced to four months jail and fined $9,500. He was released from prison in July 2024.

In this interview from prison³⁹, Navarro details the “new MAGA deal”, which includes “mass deportations”, and “more Chinese tariffs.”

Peter Navarro holds a PhD in economics from Harvard and was one of only three senior White House officials to serve with Donald Trump from the 2016 campaign to the end of the President’s first term. He was the West Wing’s chief China hawk and trade czar and served as Director of the Office of Trade and Manufacturing Policy and Defense Production Act Policy Coordinator. His books include The Coming China Wars (2006); Death by China (2011); Crouching Tiger (2015); and his White House memoirs In Trump Time (2021) and Taking Back Trump’s America (2022). His top-rated Taking Back Trump’s America podcast appears on Apple Podcasts and Google Podcasts.

William Perry Pendley

Authored the section about: Section 3.7: Department of the Interior

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Pendley served as the acting director of the Bureau of Land Management from 2019 until 2021.

Wants to repeal the Antiquities Act⁴⁰, which protects federal lands and national monuments. From the above article: “Pendley opposes the set-aside of national monuments — under the Antiquities Act, presidents can designate existing public lands to protect areas of cultural, historic or scientific interest — because it can restrict future extractive industry or other activities on multiple-use lands. He describes monuments as “outrageous, unilateral withdrawals from public use.”

William Perry Pendley was born in Cheyenne, Wyoming. He earned a BA and an MA from George Washington University, was a U.S. Marine Corps captain, and earned his JD from the University of Wyoming College of Law. He was an attorney on Capitol Hill, a senior official for President Ronald Reagan, and leader of the Bureau of Land Management for President Donald Trump. For 30 years, he was president of Mountain States Legal Foundation where he argued and won cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. He authored five books, includ- ing Sagebrush Rebel: Reagan’s Battle with Environmental Extremists and Why It Matters Today.

Max Primorac

Authored the section about: Section 2.6: Agency for International Development

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Primorac served as the acting chief operating officer for USAID from November 2020 until January 2021. He had previously worked as an adviser in the same agency since 2018.

Media Matters⁴¹ observes that “Max Primorac suggests the next administration ‘rescind all climate policies from its foreign aid programs’ and shut down any offices or departments connected to the Paris Climate Agreement. Project 2025 also suggests eliminating or curtailing funding to dozens of federal programs or offices related to climate change.”

Max Primorac is Director of the Douglas and Sarah Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation. He was acting Chief Operating Officer and Assistant to the Administrator, Bureau for Humanitarian Assistance, at the U.S. Agency for International Development. Previously he was deputy director of Iraq’s reconstruction program at the U.S. Department of State and a senior adviser in the Office of the Secretary. Max was educated at Franklin and Marshall College and the University of Chicago.

Roger Severino

Authored the section about: Section 3.5: Department of Health and Human Services

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Severino served in the Department of Health and Human Services as director of the Civil Rights Office from 2017 until 2021.

The son of Columbian immigrants, Severino has been described by the Human Rights Campaign as a “radical anti-LGBTQ activist.” As director of the HHS Office for Civil Rights, Severino removed nondiscrimination protections for LGBTQ individuals⁴² established in the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Removing the provision allowed health care providers to deny care based on a patient’s sexuality or gender identity.

On a far weirder note, The Atlantic⁵⁷ notes that his office is “sparsely decorated, with a crucifix and a Clarence Thomas bobblehead.”

Roger Severino is Vice President of Domestic Policy at The Heritage Foundation. As director of the Office for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) from 2017 to 2021, he led a team of more than 250 staff enforcing civil rights, conscience, and health information privacy laws. Roger subsequently founded the HHS Accountability Project at the Ethics & Public Policy Center. He holds a JD from Harvard Law School, an MA in public policy from Carnegie Mellon University, and a BA from the University of Southern California.

Kiron K. Skinner

Authored the section about: Section 2.3: Department of State

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Skinner served as director of policy planning in the State Department from 2018 until 2019. She previously worked for Trump’s transition team.

Skinner was fired from the Trump administration after several members of her staff threatened to quit if she wasn’t removed. Two State Department officials said that “…Skinner was unprofessional in multiple ways, including yelling in public and using homophobic language. She retaliated against employees by kicking them out of their offices and even alleged that some people were having affairs.” Source: Politico, August 2019⁴³

Kiron K. Skinner is President and CEO of the Foundation for America and the World, Taube Professor of International Relations and Politics at Pepperdine University’s School of Public Policy, W. Glenn Campbell Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution, and a Visiting Fellow and Senior Advisor at The Heritage Foundation. Skinner served as Director of Policy Planning and Senior Advisor at the U.S. Department of State from 2018 to 2019 and was a member of the Defense Business Board at the U.S. Department of Defense in 2020. Skinner holds an MA and a PhD in political science from Harvard University and undergraduate degrees from Spelman College and Sacramento City College.

Brooks D. Tucker

Authored the section about: Section 3.11: Department of Veterans Affairs

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Tucker served as chief of staff for the Department of Veterans Affairs from April 2020 until January 2021. He had previously served as an assistant secretary in the same department.

Tucker wants to privatize the VA (Department of Veteran’s Affairs) health care. In his words: “Rescind all departmental clinical policy directives that are contrary to principles of conservative governance starting with abortion services and gender reassignment surgery.” Tucker sees abortion as “unrelated to military service” and that the VA “lacks the legal authority…to perform.” Further, Tucker sees abortion as “grotesque… violence against the child in the womb.”

This is a deliberately incendiary and false argument – he’s essentially arguing that we nuke health care for ALL veterans because the VA currently performs a neglible number of abortions⁴⁴ and provides gender-affirming care, and he doesn’t like that.

Brooks D. Tucker served in the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs as Assis- tant Secretary for Congressional and Legislative Affairs from 2017 to 2021 and as Acting Chief of Staff from 2020 to 2021. He helped to craft the policy framework for President-elect Trump’s transition team and served as the Senior Policy Adviser for National Security and Veterans Affairs to Senator Richard Burr from 2010 to 2015. A retired Marine lieutenant colonel, Brooks served in Afghanistan, Iraq, North Africa, the Caucasus, and the Western Pacific. He is a graduate of the University of Maryland, Marine Corps Infantry Officer Course, and Marine Corps Command and Staff College and holds a Certificate in Legislative Studies from Georgetown University.

Hans A. von Spakovsky

Authored the section about: Section 5.3: Federal Election Commission

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Von Spakovsky served on Trump’s short lived Voter Fraud Commission, which operated from May 2017 until January 2018. He previously served a brief and controversial stint as commissioner of the Federal Election Commission in the Bush administration from 2006 until 2007.

In February 2017, von Spakovsky sent an email arguing against the appointment of Democrats and “mainstream Republicans” to the Trump administration’s Presidential Advisory Commission on Election Integrity.

His original appointment to the FEC in 2006 by George W. Bush was contested by Democratic senators who accused him of being partisan, and von Spakovsky ultimately withdrew from the confirmation process.

von Spakovsky famously claimed in 2008 that 1,400 votes (four times the margin of victory) were cast by ineligible prisoners in the 2008 Minnesota race for the U.S. Senate. These claims were deemed fraudulent after investigation.

von Spakovsky is also a climate-change denier and a bigot. [Source]⁴⁵ In fact, he has built a career out of peddling election lies⁴⁶.

Hans A. von Spakovsky is Senior Legal Fellow and Manager of the Election Law Reform Initiative in the Edwin Meese Center III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation. He is a former member of President Donald Trump’s Advisory Commission on Election Integrity. From 2006 to 2007, von Spakovsky was a Commissioner on the Federal Election Commission. He served as career Counsel to the Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights at the U.S. Department of Justice from 2002 to 2005.

Russ Vought

Authored the section about: Section 1.2: Executive Office of the President of the United States

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Vought served as director the Office of Management and Budget, the largest office in the executive branch of government, from July 2020 until January 2021. He had served as deputy and then acting director between 2018 and 2020.

Vought admitted on tape⁴⁷ that the GOP was “too focused on religious liberty instead of Christian Nationalism”, and detailed his plans in a second Trump term to “restrict pornography”, and supports the “mass deportations” of immigrants that Trump has called for publicly.

At one point, he tells interviewers, “I want to make sure that we can say, ‘We’re a Christian nation.’ And my viewpoint is mostly that I would probably be ‘Christian nationism.’ That’s pretty close to Christian nationalism because I also believe in nationalism.” Vought then adds that it’s “time to rehabilitate Christian nationalism.”⁴⁸

Russ Vought is Founder and President of the Center for Renewing America. A longtime conservative leader on Capitol Hill, Russ served in President Trump’s Cabinet as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, where he oversaw the implementation of the presidential budget, key policies on deregulation, and a landmark effort to eliminate critical race theory and other radical ideologies in executive agencies. Prior to his White House service, Russ spent nearly two decades in the broader conservative movement on Capitol Hill, including as Policy Director for the House Republican Conference, Executive Director of the Republican Study Committee, and Legislative Assistant to former U.S. Senator Phil Gramm. Russ graduated with a BA from Wheaton College and received a JD from George Washington University Law School.

William L. "Bill" Walton

Authored the section about: Section 4.2: Department of the Treasury (with Stephen Moore and David R. Burton)

Served in the Trump Administration: Although not a member of Trump’s administration, Walton served on his 2016 transition team as co-head of economic issues for federal agencies.

One person who has worked with Walton called him a “right-wing libertarian who doesn’t believe in government at all.” This person added: “The idea that he’s talking about helping transition to a government agency is remarkable in that he hates government and bristles at regulation.” [source⁴⁹]

In an episode of his show, entitled “Why the Federal Reserve has done more harm than good”⁵⁰, Walton makes that argument for disbanding the Federal Reserve, which would result in destabilizing banks and limit the ability to control inflation.

William L. Walton is Chairman of the Resolute Protector Foundation and host of The Bill Walton Show. In 2016 and 2017, Mr. Walton served in President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team as Agency Action Leader for all the federal economic agencies. He served as Chairman of the Board and CEO of Allied Capital Corporation, a $6 billion NYSE-traded private investment firm, from 1997 to 2010. He is the immediate past President of the Council for National Policy. His extensive board service includes The Heritage Foundation, American Conservative Union, American Enterprise Institute, U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Venture Capital Association, and Financial Services Roundtable.

Paul Winfree

Authored the section about: Section 4.4: Federal Reserve

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Winfree served in three roles in Trump’s White House in 2017: deputy assistant to the president for domestic policy, deputy director of the Domestic Policy Council, and director of budget policy. He left the White House at the end of 2017. Trump appointed him to the Fullbright Foreign Scholarship Board in 2019.

Winfree claimed in his May 2, 2024 testimony to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation (Subcommittee on Communications, Media, and Broadband)⁵¹ that deregulation reduces the cost of high-speed internet and broadband/wi-fi services, and also proposed repealing subsidies (the ACP, for example), which help low-income families afford broadband services.

Winfree has also argued for expanding Trump’s tax cuts to the wealthy⁵², which added, by this estimation, $7.8 trillion⁵³ to the National Debt.

Paul Winfree is Distinguished Fellow in Economic Policy and Public Leadership at The Heritage Foundation. Before rejoining Heritage in 2018, Paul was Deputy Assistant to the President, Deputy Director of the Domestic Policy Council, and Director of Budget Policy at the White House. During the 2016 presidential transition, he led the team responsible for the Office of Management and Budget. He also has served as a senior staff member for the U.S. Senate Committee on the Budget. Paul served in both the Biden and Trump Administrations for three terms as the Chair of the Fulbright Foreign Scholarship Board that oversees the Fulbright program and educational exchanges sponsored by the Department of State.

Editors

Paul Dans

Authored the section about: Section 1.3: Central Personnel Agencies: Managing the Bureaucracy (with Dennis Dean Kirk and Donald Devine.)

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Dans served as chief of staff at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management from February 2020 until December 2020. One of Dans’ tasks was liaising with the White House to help fill rolls for the approximately 4,000 presidential appointees across the federal government. Dans is the director of Project 2025, and stepped down on July 30, 2024⁵⁴, ostensibly to give Trump some plausible deniability about his (Trump’s) involvement in the project.

“We’re going to make this [Project 2025] happen under President Trump,” Dans said. “And this is ultimately his direction and his team’s direction.” [source]⁵⁵

Paul Dans is Director of the 2025 Presidential Transition Project at The Heritage Foundation, organizing policy and personnel recommendations and training for appointees in the next presidential Administration. Before joining Heritage, he served in the Trump Administration as Chief of Staff at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management, as OPM’s White House liaison, and as a senior advisor at the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Paul has extensive experience in high-stakes commercial litigation and worked for several large international law firms in New York City from 1997 to 2012 before founding his own law firm. He is a graduate of the University of Virginia School of Law and received his graduate and undergraduate degrees from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Steven Groves

Served in the Trump Administration: Yes. Groves served as special assistant to Trump to defend him against Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible Russian interference in the 2016 election. He served as Trump’s deputy press secretary in 2019 and 2020. He previously served in 2017 as chief of staff to Nikki Haley while she was U.S. ambassador to the United Nations.

In a July 29, 2024 radio interview on WFEA⁵⁶, Steven Groves said “The Heritage Foundation is a Conservative think tank. The purpose of it is to make policy recommendations to the next conservative President – in this case, President Trump.”