New Project 2025 ad highlights sinister nature of Republican plan ahead of historic presidential debate

As Americans prepare to tune in to one of the most anticipated presidential debates in recent history, GLAAD has released a provocative new ad warning voters of the dangers posed by the Republican-backed Project 2025 plan.

The ad, “The Playbook,” is the latest in a trilogy of national campaigns launched by the LGBTQ+ media advocacy organization to expose what it describes as the plan’s severe economic and social consequences.

Timed just hours before presidential hopefuls Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump take the stage, the ad aims at the detailed 900-page manifesto developed by the conservative think tank, the Heritage Foundation.

The controversial plan calls for radical changes to the U.S. government, including dismantling protections for LGBTQ+ Americans, raising taxes on the middle class, and rolling back worker rights. According to GLAAD, Project 2025 is an existential threat not just to LGBTQ+ people but to all Americans who value democratic institutions and civil liberties.

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Narrated in stark, urgent tones, the ad warns that Project 2025 would empower corporate elites and strip everyday Americans of fundamental rights and protections. In the 30-second spot, the narrator describes the plan as a “costly blueprint” designed to enrich corporations at the expense of working families. The ad goes on to emphasize several troubling aspects of the proposal, including a new tax on health insurance, eliminating overtime pay for workers, and barring Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices.

“Project 2025, a 900-page plan to turn our president into a dictator and shift power from the people to the government and corporate bosses,” the narrator says ominously. “More big tax breaks for corporations and tax hikes on the middle class, including a new tax on health insurance, allows employers to stop paying overtime, bans Medicare from negotiating lower drug prices, and purges government workers who aren’t unconditionally loyal to the president. It’s a costly plan, and you’ll pay the price.”

GLAAD president and CEO Sarah Kate Ellis issued a statement accompanying the ad’s release, highlighting the unique challengesLGBTQ+ Americans face when economic issues intersect with their civil rights.

“Project 2025 is a direct assault on America’s middle class and our institutions of government,” Ellis said. “We’ve seen all too often that LGBTQ people experience disproportionate challenges when it comes to kitchen table issues like fair wages, affordable healthcare, and simply getting and keeping a job without fear of discrimination and harassment. It’s critical that our community understands what’s in this plan, how it would hurt them and their families, and how they can stop it.”

“The Playbook” is the third in a series of ads in GLAAD’s campaign against Project 2025, following the July release of “The Pledge.” That ad painted a dystopian vision of the future under a Republican administration intent on dismantling LGBTQ+ rights and pushing a conservative Christian nationalist agenda. In “The Pledge,” a classroom of children recites a chilling new version of the Pledge of Allegiance, swearing loyalty not to the nation but to the president and “the natural order of man and woman under God.”

GLAAD’s ads serve as a stark reminder of the potential rollback of LGBTQ+ protections if Project 2025 were to be implemented. The Heritage Foundation’s playbook includes proposals to erase LGBTQ+-inclusive language from federal agencies, end gender-affirming care, ban discussions of gender identity and sexual orientation in schools, and reinstate the ban on transgender military service. The plan also targets reproductive rights, aiming to eliminate abortion access and contraception for millions of Americans.

While LGBTQ+ rights are at the forefront of GLAAD’s campaign, “The Playbook” highlights how Project 2025 would impact many issues critical to all Americans. By removing federal funding for diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, purging federal employees who do not show unconditional loyalty to the president, and eliminating worker protections, the plan could consolidate power in the executive branch, destabilizing democratic institutions.

GLAAD notes that its ad release comes as voters are increasingly focused on kitchen-table issues like healthcare costs, wages, and job security—topics that “The Playbook” argues are central to Project 2025’s agenda. GLAAD has pointed to polling that shows LGBTQ+ Americans overwhelmingly prioritize these economic issues over the culture war rhetoric being advanced by conservative lawmakers.

A January 2024 national opinion poll conducted for GLAAD found that the economy, inflation, jobs, and healthcare were among the top five concerns for LGBTQ+ Americans, with an overwhelming majority urging politicians to shift focus to these priorities rather than discriminatory legislation targeting marginalized communities.