In a bombshell new report, ProPublica has gotten its hands on 23 never-before-published training videos, totaling more than 14 hours of content, created by The Heritage Foundation for Project 2025’s Presidential Administration Academy. As ProPublica notes, “Project 2025’s plan to train an army of political appointees who could battle against the so-called deep state government bureaucracy on behalf of a future Trump administration remains on track.” It’s all part of The Heritage Foundation’s effort to, as ProPublica puts it, create a “Trump government-in-waiting.” They’re not hiding what they plan to do folks. They’ve written it down and now made friggin’ videos about their nefarious plans.
The Project 2025 videos coach future appointees on everything from the nuts and bolts of governing to how to outwit bureaucrats. There are strategies for avoiding embarrassing Freedom of Information Act disclosures and ensuring that conservative policies aren’t struck down by “left-wing judges.” Some of the content is routine advice that any incoming political appointee might be told. Other segments of the training offer guidance on radically changing how the federal government works and what it does.
Although Trump continues to try to distance himself from Project 2025, ProPublica’s review of the training videos found that 29 of the 36 speakers in the videos have worked for Trump in some capacity — on his 2016-17 transition team, in the administration or on his 2024 reelection campaign. This includes Karoline Leavitt, who is a key spokesperson for the Trump-Vance campaign (!).
ProPublica notes that the speakers in the videos are careful not to explicitly side with Trump talke about a future Trump administration. They instead refer to a future “conservative president” or a future “conservative administration.” I see what you did there.
The videos make clear that Project 2025’s Presidential Administration Academy is an attempt to help a — God forbid — next Trump administration ramp up quickly to get trained Trump/MAGA devotees into all key positions in the administration and to act quickly to reshape the government — and our country — to fit MAGA’s dystopian and regressive worldview.
ProPublica notes that several speakers in the videos acknowledge that the first Trump administration was slowed by staffing challenges and the inexperience of its political appointees. So they offer lessons learned from their stumbles on how to ramp up more quickly next time to create a MAGA government.
Rick Dearborn, who helped lead Trump’s 2016 transition team and later served in the Trump White House as deputy chief of staff, recalled in one video how “tough” it was to find people to fill all of the key positions in the early days of the administration.
The personnel part of Project 2025 is “so important to the next president,” Dearborn says. “Establishing all of this, providing the expertise, looking at a database of folks that can be part of the administration, talking to you like we are right now about what is a transition about, why do I want to be engaged in it, what would my role be — that’s a luxury that we didn’t have,” referring to a database of potential political appointees.
Dan Huff, a former legal adviser in the White House Presidential Personnel Office under Trump, says in another video that future appointees should be prepared to enact significant changes in American government and be ready to face blowback when they do.
A few highlights (or lowlights) from the training videos:
- One video, titled “Hidden Meanings: The Monsters in the Attic,” is a 50-minute discussion of supposed left-wing code words and biased language that future appointees should be aware of and root out.
- In one video, Bethany Kozma, a former deputy chief of staff at the U.S. Agency for International Development in the Trump administration, downplays the seriousness of climate change and claims its part of an effort to “control people.” “If the American people elect a conservative president, his administration will have to eradicate climate change references from absolutely everywhere,” Kozma says. She goes on to say: “I think about the people who don’t want you to have children because of the” — here she makes air-quotes — “impact on the environment.”
- Katie Sullivan, the former acting assistant attorney general under Trump, advocates in one video for removing critical race theory from public education without saying how the federal government would accomplish that. “The noxious tenets of critical race theory and gender ideology should be excised from curriculum in every single public school in this country,” Sullivan says.
- In a video entitled “The Political Appointee’s Survival Guide,” Max Primorac, a former deputy administrator at USAID during the Trump administration, warns viewers that Washington is a place that “does not share your conservative values,” and that new hires will find that “there’s so much hostility to basic traditional values.”
- In a video about oversight and investigations, a group of conservative investigators advise future appointees on how to avoid creating a paper trail of sensitive communications that could be obtained by congressional committees or outside groups under the Freedom of Information Act.
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In a video titled “The Administrative State: What it is & How to Address the Problem,” Paul Ray explains how a conservative administration could use its authority to rein in government regulation. Ray served as the administrator of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs during the Trump administration.
There’s much, much more in the report and I encourage you to read it all. This erases all doubt — if there were any doubts left — that Project 2025 is THE roadmap that will be used by the next Trump administration. The Heritage Foundation has developed the blueprint and a yet-to-be-revealed 180-day plan, they’ve developed this MAGA training academy, and they’re creating a database of future political appointees for Trump to choose from on Day One (when he becomes a dictator) to flood the federal government with Trump/MAGA acolytes.
We can’t let that happen people. Let’s keep fighting for Harris-Walz to win big in November. Because we’re not going back! EVER.
Update: HT to samanthab for reminding us that if you have any spare cash, please spend a few bucks to support ProPublica. They are a nonprofit newsroom that does stellar reporting and investigative work that the mainstream media just isn’t doing anymore, for the most part — work that is often vital to saving our democracy.
