As the country looks ahead to the 2024 presidential election, a conservative initiative known as Project 2025, which includes transphobic policies, is facing controversy over its overtly anti-LGBTQ+ aspects.
Championed on Steve Bannon’s War Room podcast and closely tied to former President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign, the initiative is a stark embodiment of the retribution Trump has promised against his foes who have abandoned the MAGA movement.
At the heart of this project is a lengthy 900-page document, the 17-page forward of which is titled “A Promise to America” by Kevin D. Roberts, president of the right-wing Heritage Foundation, which has drawn scrutiny for its transphobic rhetoric.
Roberts outlines a vision of a nation in crisis. “Today, the American family is in crisis,” he wrote. “Children suffer the toxic normalization of transgenderism with drag queens and pornography invading their school libraries.”
These statements, which include archaic language, have ignited outrage and concern for their implications on the rights and well-being of the transgender community.
“Pornography, manifested today in the omnipresent propagation of transgender ideology and sexualization of children, for instance, is not a political Gordian knot inextricably binding up disparate claims about free speech, property rights, sexual liberation, and child welfare,” Roberts wrote. “It has no claim to First Amendment protection. Its purveyors are child predators and misogynistic exploiters of women.”
Media Matters has spotlighted Bannon’s platform as a central hub for Project 2025 and orchestrated by The Heritage Foundation. The podcast is steeped in election denialism, anti-immigrant sentiment, and a punitive stance toward dissenting Republicans, mirroring the divisiveness of Trump’s tenure and suggesting a potential continuation of such dynamics if he were to win another term.
The Washington Postreports suggest that within Trump’s circle and Project 2025, there are plans to use the powers of the federal government to penalize critics and potentially deploy the military against domestic protests — actions that would challenge the fabric of democratic governance.
However, the recent elections in Ohio and Virginia stand in stark contrast to the goals of Project 2025. Ohio voters approved a state constitutional amendment ensuring the right to bodily autonomy, pushing back against restrictive abortion policies. In Virginia, the Democratic Party gained control of both legislative houses, delivering a blow to Republican Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s policies, including those that threaten the privacy and safety of transgender students and his proposal for a 15-week abortion ban.
These election results reflect a social pushback against policies perceived as extreme and discriminatory, especially against transgender individuals. The conservative principles embedded in Project 2025, captured in Roberts’ document and promoted by Bannon’s advocacy, now face a litmus test against voters who haven't bought into far-right campaigns.
Summarizing the mission of the conservative movement as outlined in Project 2025, Roberts concludes, “It’s time to do it again. Now, as then, we know who we are fighting and what we are fighting for: for our Republic, our freedom, and for each other.”
