A project by Democracy Forward | June 2024

The
People’s
Guide toProject 2025

Breaking down the far-right playbook
to take our country backward.

Project 2025 is among themost profound threats
to the American people.
What is Project 2025?
The Project 2025 Presidential Transition Project isa well-funded (eight-figure) effort of the Heritage
Foundation and more than 100 organizations
to enable a future anti-democratic presidential
administration to take swift, far-right action thatwould cut wages for working people, dismantle social
safety net programs, reverse decades of progress forcivil rights, redefine the way our society operates, andundermine our economy.
A central pillar of Project 2025 is the“Mandate for
Leadership,” a 900+ page policy playbook authoredby former Trump administration officials and otherextremists that provides a radical vision for our nation
and a roadmap to implement it.

We read Project 2025’s entire 900+ page “Mandate for
Leadership” so that you don’t have to.
What we discovered was a systemic, ruthless plan to undermine thequality of life of millions of Americans, remove critical protections
and dismantle programs for communities across the nation, andprioritize special interests and ideological extremism over people.
From attacking overtime pay, student loans, and reproductive
rights, to allowing more discrimination, pollution, and price gouging,those behind Project 2025 are preparing to go to incredible lengths
to create a country only for some, not for all of us.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

2

If these plans are enacted, even without congressional approval, 4.3 million people
could lose overtime protections, 40 million people could have their food assistance
reduced, 220,000 American jobs could be lost, and much, much, more. The stakes
are higher than ever for democracy and for people.
These threats aren’t hypothetical. These are their real plans.
The Heritage Foundation and the 100+ organizations that make up the Project2025 Advisory Board have mapped out exactly how they will achieve their extreme
ends. They aim to carry out many of the most troubling proposals through ananti-democratic president and political loyalists installed in the executive branch,without waiting for congressional action. And, while many of these plans are
unlawful, winning in court is not guaranteed given that the same far-right movementthat is behind Project 2025 has shaped our current court system.
To combat the threats posed by Project 2025, we have to first understand them.
What follows are some of the most dangerous proposals that make up Project 2025,
specifically those that could be implemented through federal agencies and a farright executive branch.
The majority of Americans share the same values and priorities, but Project 2025
wants to push an extreme, out-of-touch agenda on all of us. By reading this guideand sharing it, we can begin to address these threats and go on offense towards
building a bold, inclusive democracy for all people.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

3

Project 2025 Snapshot
Proposals from Project 2025,
discussed in detail throughout thisguide, that could be implemented
through executive branch action
alone — so without new legislation— include:

Cut American Rescue Plan (ARP)
programs that have created or saved

220,000 jobs

Limit access to food assistance,
which an average of more than
40 million people rely on monthly,

Roll back civil rights protections
across multiple fronts, including
cutting diversity, equity, andinclusion-related (DEI) programs
and LGBTQ+ rights in health care,education, and workplaces.

21.6 million
households

Eliminate the Head Start early education
program, which serves over1 million children
Cut overtime protections for4.3 million
workers

Stop efforts tolower prescription
drug prices

Push more people towards Medicare
Advantage and other worse, private
options, that’s

33 million people

Restrict access to medication abortion

Expose the

Deny students in 25 states andWashington, D.C. access to student loans
because their school provides in-state
tuition to undocumented immigrants

in foster care to risk ofincreased discrimination

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

368,000
children4

Contents:
Here’s what’s under attack

Cut Wages, Create Unsafe Workplaces,
and Destabilize Our Economy

06

Make It Harder for Americans to Make Ends Meet

11

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Healthcare

17

Enable Discrimination Across Society

24

Set Polluters Loose and Undo Climate Action

31

Make Education Unaffordable and Unwelcoming

36

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

41

The People’s Guide to Project 20255

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Cut Wages,
Create Unsafe
Workplaces,
and Destabilize
Our Economy

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

6

Destabilize Our Economy

democracyforward.org

Project 2025 would enablecorporations to cut overtime
pay, relax worker safety
rules, allow workplace
discrimination, and more.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

7

Destabilize Our Economy

1

How they’d do it:

Stop people from earning overtime pay. Project 2025
wants the Department of Labor to make it harder for
people to earn overtime pay.

In 2024, the Biden administration issued a policy that will make over four million
workers newly eligible to qualify for overtime pay. The U.S. Department of Labor
did this by raising the “overtime threshold,” which is the salary ceiling under whichsalaried workers still qualify automatically for overtime pay if they work more than 40hours in a week, even though those workers are not paid hourly. Raising the overtime
threshold increases the number of workers with guaranteed overtime protections.
Currently, the threshold protects non-hourly workers who make up to $43,888
annually, and it’s set to rise again in 2025 to apply to people making up to $58,656.
Project 2025 doesn’t want to raise this threshold. Instead, Project 2025 proposes
lowering the threshold and taking away overtime eligibility for millions of workers.
This would leave at least four million working people in industries that pay annually
but still at lower wages stuck working long hours without overtime pay — everythingfrom hospitality to manufacturing, administrative roles, and more.

From Mandate for Leadership p. 492

2

How they’d do it:

Cut funding for local job-creating programs.
Project 2025 proposes to destroy a program thatplays a pivotal role in facilitating transformative
economic growth for local economies.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

8

Destabilize Our Economy

The Economic Development Administration (EDA) was responsible for investingbillions of ARP dollars into transformative infrastructure projects across the nation.
According to their 2022 report, these investments resulted in 220,000 jobs andgenerated nearly $20 billion in private investment.
Project 2025 proposes that EDA grants “should be consolidated with otherprograms and/or eliminated,” which would undermine the ability of the federal
government to invest in communities across the nation — with effects that could
devastate working people, small businesses, and the overall health of our economy.

From Mandate for Leadership p. 664

3

How they’d do it:

Manipulate data that businesses rely on to keep our
economy functioning. By consolidating the Bureau
of Economic Analysis, Census Bureau, and Bureauof Labor Statistics, Project 2025 would kneecap
the data-collection capacities of these important
agencies — with effects felt by working people
across the nation.

Data compiled by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is intentionallyindependent from partisan interests and is frequently relied on by the public,
employers, researchers, and government organizations. According to BLS, they“measure employment, compensation, worker safety, productivity, and pricemovements. This information is used by jobseekers, workers, business leaders, andothers to help them make sound decisions at work and at home.”
Project 2025, however, wants to consolidate the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis
and Census Bureau with BLS into one agency. While formal reorganization requires
explicit delegation from Congress to go through, the Trump administration madean attempt in 2018 to bypass Congress and use other executive powers to do so. If
an extremist were to occupy the executive branch again, Project 2025 would wantthem to go even further.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

9

Destabilize Our Economy

Politicizing BLS and reducing the data collection capacity of the agency byconsolidating it into the Census Bureau would make it harder to know how oureconomy is doing, whether families’ paychecks are growing, and what steps we mayneed to take to make sure small businesses are thriving and people have enough intheir bank accounts to make ends meet.

4

How they’d do it:

Weaken child labor protections. Project 2025 would
amend hazard regulations to allow employers to put
young people in unsafe working conditions.

The authors of Project 2025 think that young people should be able to workin “inherently dangerous jobs,” in roles that are currently not permitted due tosignificant safety concerns that have long been established and enforced by the
U.S. Department of Labor (DOL).
Project 2025 would change DOL policies and allow America’s youth to work thesejobs, meaning young people entering the labor force out of economic necessity
could be subjected to more dangerous work because they need the income morethan others — and cannot access a safer job or get paid as well.

In their own words: Hazard-Order
Regulations. Some young adults
show an interest in inherently
dangerous jobs. Current rules forbid
many young people, even if theirfamily is running the business, fromworking in such jobs. This results inworker shortages in dangerous fields
and often discourages otherwiseinterested young workers from trying
the more dangerous job.”
Mandate for Leadership p. 595

The People’s Guide to Project 202510

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Make It Harderfor Americans
to MakeEnds Meet

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

11

Make It Harder for Americans To Make Ends Meetdemocracyforward.org

A strong democracy is
one where people havethe resources they need to
thrive, not worry about how
they will make ends meet.
Project 2025 proposals
would only make daily
life harder for people –with fewer people able toaccess food assistance andaffordable early education,less support for veteranswith disabilities, and cuts
to support for farmers.
The People’s Guide to Project 2025

12

Make It Harder for Americans To Make Ends Meet1

How they’d do it:

Restrict access to food assistance. Project 2025
would make it harder for people to access foodassistance by adding ineffective requirements
and reevaluating important programs.

According to research from the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), 86% of all
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits go to households that
include a child, elderly person, or person with disabilities — and ~92% of all SNAP
benefits go to households with income at or below the federal poverty line.
The Thrifty Food Plan plays an important role in ensuring recipients of foodassistance are able to access food that composes a balanced and nutritious diet.
In tandem, the Biden administration has increased food assistance outlays toaccount for increased costs associated with more nutritious foods.
Project 2025 wants to reverse course and reimpose ineffective work requirements— which recent studies have shown do not actually increase employment but dostill drive down the number of people who use food assistance — onto SNAP andreevaluate the Thrifty Food Plan.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 299 & 300

2

How they’d do it:

Eliminate the Head Start program. Project 2025
would destroy a program that is critical to
uplifting children across the nation from lower
socioeconomic backgrounds.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

13

Make It Harder for Americans To Make Ends Meet

Head Start is a critical program that helps over one million children across thenation become ready for school by providing them with mental, emotional, andsocial support programming. This program provides targeted assistance to lowincome children as an important method to bridge inequities and ensure that all
children receive a solid foundation as they embark on their educational journey.
Project 2025 proposes to eliminate the program. Without Head Start, families who
are already struggling financially could experience even greater economic burdens
as they would have to spend more on childcare and education.

From Mandate for Leadership page 482

3

How they’d do it:

Limit which disabilities qualify veterans for benefits.
The authors of Project 2025 think that too many
veterans qualify for disability benefits.

Disability benefits are often criticallifelines for veterans who became
disabled as a result of their military
service — and can be the difference
between a veteran being able to put
food on the table or not”
Project 2025 proposes to have the U.S.
Department of Veterans Affairs cut
costs by having fewer health conditions
qualify veterans for disability benefits— a proposal could greatly restrict
disabled veterans’ access to lifesustaining benefits.
From Mandate for Leadershipp. 649-650

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

14

Make It Harder for Americans To Make Ends Meet

4

How they’d do it:

Remove safety nets for farmers. Project 2025 thinksthat farmers are receiving too much assistance.

The people who put food on our tables and ensure ourcommunities get fed are often subject to the whims of
unpredictable weather patterns and market conditions.
This means that while some years a farmer may be doing
great, the next they could be on the brink of economic failure.
That’s where safety nets come in.
Project 2025 wants to restrict safety nets for farmers to‘unusual situations’ — even though we know that the difficult
conditions farmers experience are not unusual but common.
A restriction of assistance to farmers would disparately
impact low-income farmers and those without extensive
assets to fall back on when things go awry.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 297

5

How they’d do it:

Eliminate funding for key public transportation
projects. Despite its transformational investments incommunities across the U.S., the Capital Investment
Grants (CIG) program is a Project 2025 target forelimination.

The People’s Guide to Project 202515

Make It Harder for Americans To Make Ends Meet

The CIG program plays an important role in awarding federal grants to local
communities in order to fund infrastructure projects. After the Bipartisan
Infrastructure Law was passed in 2021, CIG was responsible for awarding billionsof dollars for key public transportation projects across the country.
Project 2025 wants to eliminate CIG, which could make it much harder for Americans
without cars to get to work and travel around town — to work or just to be with family
and friends.

From Mandate for Leadership p. 635

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

16

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Restrict
Reproductive
Rights & Accessto Health Care

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

17

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Caredemocracyforward.org

Despite the majority ofAmericans supporting
comprehensive healthcare and reproductive
freedom, Project 2025
would prefer a far different
reality. Their attacks would
undermine Medicare, keepprescription drug prices
high, and restrict access to
reproductive care.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

18

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Care1

How they’d do it:

Keep the cost of lifesaving medication too high.
Project 2025 would undo Medicare’s new ability
to negotiate lower prescription prices for seniors.

Medicare’s new ability to negotiate lower prescription
drug prices for seniors, established through the
Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), will be transformative
for millions of seniors in the United States.
According to the Center for American Progress,
these negotiations are targeting some of the mostexpensive drugs frequently used by seniors, saving
hundreds of thousands of dollars in drug costs
each year. These negotiations are also critical foradvancing health equity, given that many of theprescriptions targeted by the negotiations treat
conditions disparately experienced by people
who have historically experienced marginalization
because of their race or gender.
While Project 2025’s plan is to specifically instruct
Congress to repeal this part of the IRA, they could alsoeasily advise the Department of Justice (DOJ)
to stop defending Medicare’s ability to negotiate drug
prices in courts, where the program currently faces
numerous challenges.
Project 2025’s attacks on Medicare’s ability tonegotiate drug prices would negatively impact
millions of elderly Americans, particularly elderly
people of color and those with low incomes.

From Mandate for Leadership p. 465

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

19

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Care2

How they’d do it:

End medication abortion use, or make it incredibly
difficult to access. Project 2025 would revoke approval
from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA),
criminalize mailing medication abortion, or even enlist
the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) as partof their anti-abortion efforts.

Over two decades of medical practice show that mifepristone — medicationabortion — is safe and effective. In fact, just last year, nearly two-thirds of all
pregnant people relied on medication abortion for their abortion care. This is oneof the last lifelines for millions of pregnant people across the United States, as manystate governments are ramping up attacks.
The anti-abortion extremists behind Project 2025, not content with merely
overturning Roe v. Wade, want to attack access to medication abortion nationwide
by any means necessary.
a. Project 2025 would weaponize the long-dormant Comstock Act to try andmake the delivery of medication abortion by mail illegal.
Originally passed in the 19th century to restrict the types of things that could be
mailed, the Comstock Act is, today, in District Court Judge Robert Chambers’ own
words: a “widely abrogated 19th century statute.”
Despite the DOJ, the courts, and Congress already making clear that the Comstock
Act does not apply to legal abortion care, Project 2025 plans to weaponize the DOJ
and resurrect this Act to ban nationwide medication abortion access.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 562

b. Project 2025 would have the FDA reverse approval of this safe andeffective medication.
Reversing federal approval of medication abortion could deprive people of essential
health care, even in states where abortion remains legal. In states where abortion

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

20

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Careis banned or restricted, this would further subject people to the whims of statelegislatures, many of which have actively pushed or enacted abortion restrictions
since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 458

c. Project 2025 would further undermine medication abortion by mail byreimposing unnecessary and burdensome requirements that mifepristone
be dispensed in person and by a doctor.
Post-Dobbs, the FDA has played an important role by allowing the distributionof mifepristone by mail and at certain pharmacies. This has allowed increased
access to care, given that not everyone has the privilege of convenient in-person
doctor access. If these plans were implemented, it will become harder for
everyone to access abortion care, particularly low-income pregnant people andthose in rural communities.

In their own words: A bare-minimum policy of limiting abortion pills tothe pre-2016 policy of 49 days gestation, returning to the pre-2021 inperson dispensing requirement, and returning to requiring prescribers
to report all serious adverse events, not just deaths, to the drugsponsor would increase women’s health and safety.”
Mandate for Leadership p. 459

d. If all else fails, Project 2025 would turn to the EPA to apply restrictive
regulations to medication abortion.
Project 2025 wants an anti-democratic president to direct the EPA to classify
medication abortion as containing ‘forever chemicals’ — which are subject tostricter regulations. If the EPA were to classify medication abortion as a “forever
chemical,” it would stifle the approval and distribution of medication abortion.
According to Politico’s ‘Anti-abortion forces plan for a Trump return’:In their own words: Using the EPA to classify the chemicals in abortion
pill mifepristone as “forever chemicals” subject to stricter regulations.”

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

21

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Care3

How they’d do it:

Push people towards private Medicare plansthat worsen health outcomes. Under the guiseof allowing greater choice, Project 2025 would
push policies that favor private, worse-performing
alternatives to Medicare.

While many of Project 2025’s plans for Medicare require congressional action,
they also encourage a future administration to use all possible levers, including theCenters for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), to alter this critical program
however they can.
Several of their proposals would push people towards private Medicare alternatives,
which are not real alternatives at all — with reports showing that “Medicare
Advantage plans threaten rural hospitals and patients” and misled people into
signing up for them. While Project 2025 may pitch these Medicare ‘reforms’ asencouraging consumer choice, in reality they will leave seniors worse off across thecountry — putting the health of many of the 33 million people enrolled in traditional
Medicare at risk.

In their own words: Medicare
regulations restrict choiceof coverage and care. The
next Administration should
reintroduce and restore
regulations and demonstrations
from the Trump Administrationthat were withdrawn, weakened,or never finalized by the Biden
Administration”
Mandate for Leadership p. 463

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

22

Restrict Reproductive Rights and Access to Health Care4

How they’d do it:

Make it easier for extremists to access personal
information about patients’ reproductive care.
Project 2025 would remove protections the Biden
administration put in place post-Dobbs to protect
the personal information of people who receive
reproductive care.

In the immediate aftermath of the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, theBiden administration issued HIPAA guidance to “ensure doctors and other medical
providers and health plans know that, with limited exceptions, they are not required– and in many cases, are not permitted – to disclose patients’ private information,
including to law enforcement.” The administration later finalized a rule to shield the
medical records of patients from criminal investigations if they cross state lines toseek an abortion where it is legal.
Even as extremists in Texas actively try to use the courts to access information
about people receiving abortions out of state, Project 2025 claims that the Biden
administration’s privacy guidance is “fear mongering” and would have a futureadministration withdraw it. As more states move to pass increasingly severe efforts
to criminalize abortion, this would put medical providers and all pregnant people atincreased risk.

In their own words: OCR should withdraw its Health Insurance
Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA)86 guidance on abortion.
OCR should withdraw its June 2022 guidance87 that purports toaddress patient privacy concerns following the Dobbs decision but isactually a politicized statement in favor of abortion and against Dobbs.”
Mandate for Leadership p. 497

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

23

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

EnableDiscrimination
Across Society

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

24

Discrimination Across Society

democracyforward.org

Threatened by decades ofprogress in advancing civilrights and equality for all,the authors of Project 2025
want to create a country
that allows for more
discrimination where we
live, study, work, and play
— and roll back hard-fought
victories by our movementsfor progress.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

25

Discrimination Across Society

1

How they’d do it:

Embolden racial discrimination in everything fromhousing to education to employment. Project 2025
proposes that the president should remove a key
tool that the federal government uses to enforce
civil rights protections.

Project 2025 proposes that the federal government stop the long-standing use of“disparate impact” in assessing discrimination by ending its use in discrimination
cases and even bringing lawsuits that challenge the standard’s constitutionality.
The disparate impact standard has long been used in determining discrimination,
under Title VI and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Fair Housing
Act of 1968. It is important for evaluating when ‘facially neutral’ programs havedisparate impacts on certain groups of people. The Civil Rights Division of the DOJ
determines disparate impact as, “does the adverse effect of the policy or practicefall disproportionately on a race, color, or national origin group?”This standard provides an important remedy for DOJ and others to bring civilrights cases when groups of people have their civil rights violated in areas such as
employment discrimination and fair housing, so discontinuing its use will make itharder for the federal government to enforce civil rights protections in everythingfrom housing to education to employment.
Disparate impact standards have long been ruled constitutional by the United States
Supreme Court, so Project 2025’s attempts are baseless.

In their own words: Courts have ruled that even without evidenceof overt, intentional discrimination, such results might suggest
discrimination. This doctrine of disparate impact could be ended
legislatively or at least narrowed through the regulatory process
by a future Administration.” Mandate for Leadership p. 72 (and p. 583)

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

26

Discrimination Across Society

2

How they’d do it:

Make it harder for historically under-resourced
communities to access Medicaid, Head Start, andother government programs. Population counts
can be essential to groups receiving appropriations
and resources from the federal government like
Medicaid, Head Start, community mental healthprograms, and much more — so Project 2025’s plans
to undercount or undermine the accuracy of thesecounts would hurt communities that have been
economically marginalized.

The special interests behind Project 2025 want to reverse the longstanding body ofwork by civil rights activists who have encouraged the federal government to collect
more sophisticated data when it comes to racial and ethnic groups, which has
helped ensure communities that have been historically under-resourced becauseof their racial demographics receive proper allocations of resources.
As recently as March 2024, the Biden administration issued a revision to Statistical
Directive No.15, which governs “standards for maintaining, collecting, andpresenting federal data on race and ethnicity.” The revision is for more accurate
and useful race and ethnicity data collection across various agencies of the U.S.
federal government.

In their own words: Review forthcoming changes to race and ethnicity
questions. The current Administration has announced its intent tochange data collection methods regarding race and ethnicity by
combining the two questions on the decennial questionnaire andincreasing the number of available options. A new conservative
Administration should take control of this process and thoroughly
review any changes.” Mandate for Leadership p. 680

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

27

Discrimination Across Society

Project 2025 would advise a future administration to hamstring these revisions by
instructing the White House Office of Management and Budget to reverse them andensure that other federal agencies are not aiding in the collection of more accurate
data. This would leave historically underrepresented communities at a disadvantage
when it comes to accessing critical programs we rely on every day — from Medicaid
to Head Start.

3

How they’d do it:

Undermine gender equity across the government.
Project 2025 would eliminate the White House
Gender Policy Council, which is key to promoting
contraception access, gender-based violence
prevention, and women’s health equity.

Under the Biden administration, the White House Gender Policy Council has led
efforts to increase access to contraception, published the National Plan to End
Gender-Based Violence, and begun groundbreaking research into how women’s
health is studied across the country. Project 2025 would immediately disband
the Council and prioritize coordinating efforts that push for “promoting life” andemphasize a narrow vision of what defines a “family.”
From Mandate for Leadership p. 62

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

28

Discrimination Across Society

4

How they’d do it:

Allow more discrimination against LGBTQ+ youth
in adoption and foster care agencies. Project 2025
would make it easier for state and child welfare
agencies — which are charged by the public toprovide appropriate care for children — to cite
religious exemptions as a way to promote bigotry.

In 2022, more than 368,000 children were enrolled in foster care in the U.S. Project2025 would instruct the Department of Health and Human Services to repeal a 2016
regulation that provides additional protections for foster youth, related to sexual
orientation and gender identity.
Enabling adoption and foster care agencies to subject vulnerable children to thewhims of extreme religious beliefs would be detrimental to the physical, mental,
and emotional health of fostered/adopted youth, especially LGBTQ+ youth, who
are already dealing with intense adversities.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 477

5

How they’d do it:

Put Black communities and others that havehistorically borne the brunt of health impacts
from pollution and other environmental harms atincreased risk. Project 2025 proposes to eliminate
the EPA’s Office of Environmental Justice andExternal Civil Rights.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

29

Discrimination Across Society

EPA’s newly-created Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights is theagency’s dedicated office for ensuring that environmental and public health policies
are crafted and implemented in ways that ensure no communities are left behind or
disproportionately harmed.
Eliminating this office would put the communities that have historically borne thebrunt of harms from pollution, climate change, and other hazards — which are too
often Black and brown communities — at increased risk.

6

How they’d do it:

Enable discrimination based on sexual orientationand gender identity. By misinterpreting Supreme
Court precedent and allowing more religious
exemptions, Project 2025 would roll back protections
against discrimination against LGBTQ+ people andothers in the workplace.

LGBTQ+ Americans have had to fight for protections under the law and inrecent years we have witnessed important gains, including the Supreme Court’s
confirmation of federal protections in the workplace, which logically extend to otherareas like health care and schools. Yet, Project 2025 wants to reverse this progress.
Project 2025 plans to restrict the application of a critical 2020 Supreme Court casecalled Bostock v. Clayton County that assures workplace protections for LGBTQ+
people through making clear that discrimination against LGBTQ+ people is a form ofsex discrimination prohibited by our federal civil rights laws. Project 2025 would try
to enable greater workplace discrimination through allowing employers to impose
their religious or moral beliefs on their employees.
Additionally, the Biden administration has helped to ensure protections from gender
identity discrimination across many aspects of our lives, including “health care,housing, education, credit and lending services, and community safety programs.”
Project 2025, however, would roll back and severely limit those protections andleave already-vulnerable people at increased risk for discrimination when trying torent an apartment, go to school, and more.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 584 & 586

The People’s Guide to Project 202530

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Set Polluters
Loose andUndo Climate
ActionThe People’s Guide to Project 2025

31

Set Polluters Loose and Undo Climate Action

democracyforward.org

We’ve waited decades formeaningful and robust
federal action to combat
climate change and protect
people from the harmsof pollution. Project 2025
couldn’t care less about
these threats — and now
they want to destroy ourhard-fought gains.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

32

Set Polluters Loose and Undo Climate Action

1

How they’d do it:

Make our air dirtier and worsen climate change.
Project 2025 would make it even harder for the EPA
to take action against climate change by attacking
the “Endangerment Finding.”

Much of what the EPA does is tied to the Endangerment Finding, which according
to the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) “requires the EPA to take action
under the Clean Air Act to curb emissions of carbon dioxide, methane, and fourother heat-trapping air pollutants from vehicles, power plants, and other industries.”
Project 2025, however, wants to establish a system to ‘update’ the 2009
Endangerment Finding. According to NRDC, ‘updating’ the Endangerment Findingmeans restricting the federal government’s mandate to combat climate change inorder to advance the public health and welfare of the American people and our lands.
If Project 2025 were successful in getting the federal government to ‘update’ theEndangerment Finding, it could become much harder for the EPA, under the Clean
Air Act, to take measures to combat greenhouse gas emissions, pollution, and otherharmful effects of climate change.

From Mandate for Leadership p. 425

2

How they’d do it:

Cut off weather, ocean, and climate data by
disbanding NOAA. Project 2025 would disband
the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA), which provides critical
weather data and insightful scientific research.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

33

Set Polluters Loose and Undo Climate Action

The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) plays acritical role in helping us understand the effects of human behavior on the world’s
oceans and atmosphere. NOAA issues “daily weather forecasts,” “severe storm
warnings,” and more. It also monitors the climate, manages fisheries, restores
coastal environments, and supports marine commerce. According to NOAA, theagency’s “products and services support economic vitality and affect more than
one-third of America’s gross domestic product.”
Additionally, NOAA’s reports have made important discoveries about the effects ofclimate change. NOAA’s expertise is frequently relied on by other federal agencies
to “understand how they can respond to and adapt to climate change.”
The proposal to disband NOAA would leave federal agencies unequipped tocombat climate change, not to mention deprive scientists, businesses, and the
public of key data.

In their own words: The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions
eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under thecontrol of states and territories.” Mandate for Leadership p. 664

3

How they’d do it:

Transfer environmental funding
away from mission-based entities
to state regulators who, in manycases, do not support sustainable
policies. Project 2025 seeks toundo progress made through the
Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) by
any means necessary.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

34

Set Polluters Loose and Undo Climate Action

The IRA creates ambitious and expansive investment in climate action andinfrastructure development, and is a top target of Project 2025. Even without
new legislation, Project 2025 advocates to shift climate-related IRA funds awayfrom mission-based organizations with subject matter expertise and toward state
regulatory entities. This would, in our estimation, allow state leaders not committed
to climate sustainability (or those who deny climate change altogether) to misuse
funds in a way that would set back climate action.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 424

4

How they’d do it:

Expand offshore oil and natural gas drilling on public
lands and waters. Project 2025 would push the
Department of the Interior to allow oil and natural
gas lease sales “to the maximum extent permitted.”

The groups behind the Mandate for Leadership want to “conduct offshore oil andnatural gas lease sales to the maximum extent permitted.”
This section of the Mandate for Leadership was written by William Perry Pendley,
a former Trump administration official who had to recuse himself from dozens
of matters before the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) while he was leading it,
due to flagrant conflicts of interest as the former president of a special interest
organization that called for the widespread transfer of federal public lands to
private holders. Not only that, Pendley has referred to climate science as ‘junkscience’ and likened the existence of climate change to unicorns.
This proposal would allow fossil fuel companies to drill on more public lands andwaters, undoing progress made by the current administration to decrease thisharmful practice.

In their own words: Conduct offshore oil and natural gas lease sales tothe maximum extent permitted under the 2023–2028 lease program,34
with the possibility to move forward under a previously studied but
unselected plan alternative.” Mandate for Leadership p.523

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

35

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Make Education
Unaffordable &Unwelcoming

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

36

Make Education Unaffordable and Unwelcoming

democracyforward.org

Our public schools arefoundational to our
democracy. When special
interests undermine publicschools, they undermine
the ability of students
from all backgrounds tolearn, feel safe in theircommunity, and develop
skills and knowledge thatenable students to thrive. If
Project 2025 has their way,
our public schools could
be stripped of funding,protections for students,and high-quality curricula.
The People’s Guide to Project 2025

37

Make Education Unaffordable and Unwelcoming

1

How they’d do it:

Cut federal loan programs that help parents ofcollege students, graduate students, and immigrants
afford higher education. Project 2025 would rollback federal student loan programs that are criticalto ensuring higher education is not reserved for
only the wealthy and well-connected.

As the cost of higher education soars in the country, accessible and stable student
loans are a critical way to ensure that people from all backgrounds can accesshigher education.
The special interests behind Project 2025 want to kneecap the federal government’s
provision of student loans — taking away the ability of parents of college students
to take out Parent PLUS loans, graduate students to take out Graduate PLUS
loans, and undocumented immigrants to take out federal loans entirely. This would
devastate the futures of millions of college students.
They would also deny loan access to students at schools that provide in-state
tuition to undocumented immigrants. That means students in 25 states andWashington D.C. will not be able to access student loans.
From Mandate for Leadership p. 167 & 354

2

How they’d do it:

Make public schools even more dangerous for
LGBTQ+ students. Project 2025 would have theSecretary of Education remove a host of protections
for LGBTQ+ students in schools.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

38

Make Education Unaffordable and Unwelcoming

Public schools are already dangerous for LGBTQ+ students across the nation,
especially LGBTQ+ students of color. Project 2025 would make matters even worse
by directing a future Secretary of Education to rescind the Biden administration’s
expanded Title IX protections for LGBTQ+ students, and reinstate the regressive rules
previously imposed by the Trump administration. Project 2025 emphasizes that any
definition of ‘sex’ under Title IX should mean only biological sex assigned at birth.
These actions threaten to put transgender, non-binary, and gender nonconforming
students at risk, particularly when their gender identity doesn’t correspond with their
sex assigned at birth.

In their own words: On its first day in office, the next Administration
should signal its intent to enter the rulemaking process to restore the
Trump Administration’s Title IX regulation, with the additional insistencethat “sex” is properly understood as a fixed biological fact. Official
notice-and-comment should be posted immediately.”
Mandate for Leadership p.333-334

3

How they’d do it:

Push ideology onto funding forinternational business programs. Project2025 wants to dictate what students learn
in higher education by disproportionately
funding programs that push an ideologicalagenda that they agree with.

In trying to dictate what people can and cannot learn, the special interest authors
behind Project 2025 want to direct funding to international business programs thatteach their preferred subjects, with t nearly half (at minimum) of Department of
Education funding going to these programs. These programs are geared towards
providing students a better understanding of markets across the world, in all
different forms.
From Mandate for Leadership page 356

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

39

Make Education Unaffordable and Unwelcoming

4

How they’d do it:

Make it easier for charter schools to discriminate
against LGBTQ+ students. Project 2025 would
loosen data collection requirements for charterschools, undoing recent progress made by the
Biden administration which has ensured that datacollection better includes transgender, non-binary,and gender nonconforming students.

Data collection that better includes people across gender identities and sexual
orientations is important for ensuring LGBTQ+ students’ civil rights are protected.
During the Biden administration, the U.S. Department of Education’s Office of Civil
Rights (OCR) has required all charter schools to enhance the accuracy of student
demographic data collection by requiring that schools provide “nonbinary” as an
option for self-selection.
Additionally, in 2021 OCR instructed charter schools to retire collection of datathat presents purely binary depictions of the composition of school sports teams —meaning that data demographics of these teams were relegated to strictly male andfemale — at the exclusion of nonbinary and gender nonconforming students.
Project 2025 would advise the Department of Education to rescind these changes
and issue a new Civil Rights Data Collection instructive that “will collect data
directly relevant to OCR’s [authority].” In other words, that would mean only thedata that Project 2025’s authors think are valid — which excludes LGBTQ+ students.
Without this data, it will be harder to know where LGBTQ+ students are experiencing
discrimination, allowing it to fester and harm people across the country.

In their own words: The new Administration must quickly move torescind 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.”
Mandate for Leadership p.332

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

40

democracyforward.org

Their proposals will:

Undermine
Government’s
Ability to
Deliver for
PeopleThe People’s Guide to Project 2025

41

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

democracyforward.org

Civil servants are federal
employees who workand live in all 50 states —the more than 2 million
people who keep our
air clean, water safe,
consumers protected, andmail delivered. Attacks
on the nation’s civil
service are attacks on thegovernment’s ability towork for the people.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

42

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

1

How they’d do it:

Replace non-partisan federal employees withpartisan loyalists. Project 2025 would have a futurepresident reissue the Trump administration’s
Schedule F executive order to make it easier to fire
federal employees.

Civil servants deliver our mail, keep our air and water clean, and protect consumers
from abuse. President Trump’s Executive Order 13957 (Schedule F) attempted toremove critical protections for millions of these federal employees so it would beeasier for him and his cronies to fire them. If Schedule F were to be reinstated, thesefunctions could be in the hands of partisan loyalists instead of qualified experts.
Firing civil servants at will simply because they’re not hyperpartisan or extreme
enough would be a disservice to the millions of Americans who depend on federal
workers and the services they deliver every day.
Democracy Forward submitted a comment on behalf of 27 organizations in supportof the Biden administration’s final rule, in addition to other supportive comments,that proactively creates additional protections for the nation’s civil service — andprovides an important safeguard against a potential anti-democratic administration.

Democracy Forward sent a letter onbehalf of 27 organizations in support ofthe Biden administration’s final rule, in
addition to other supportive comments,that proactively creates additional
protections for the nation’s civil service— and provides an important safeguard
against a potential anti-democratic
administration.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

43

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

In their own words: The Trump Administration issued Executive
Order 13957 to make career professionals in positions that are notnormally subject to change as a result of a presidential transition but
who discharge significant duties and exercise significant discretion in
formulating and implementing executive branch policy and programs
an exception to the competitive hiring rules and examinations for career
positions under a new Schedule F. It ordered the Director of OPM andagency heads to set procedures to prepare lists of such confidential,
policy-determining, policymaking, or policy-advocating positions andprepare procedures to create exceptions from civil service rules whencareerists hold such positions, from which they can relocate back to
the regular civil service after such service. The order was subsequently
reversed by President.” Mandate for Leadership p.80-81

2

How they’d do it:

Force career experts out of government byrelocating federal agencies. While the vast majorityof civil servants already live and work outside of
Washington, D.C., Project 2025 still proposes torelocate D.C.-based offices in an effort to box out
long-serving, nonpartisan experts.

Of the 2.2 million federal employees, most already do not work in Washington,
D.C. Still, we know that many of our nation’s foremost experts in their respective
fields are situated in Washington, D.C., serving the American people every day atfederal agencies.
In 2019, the Trump administration relocated the Bureau of Land Management (BLM)
to Colorado, resulting in 77% of the bureau’s employees resigning from their positions.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

44

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

If federal agencies are relocated without thoughtful consideration and public input,
critical agencies could lose major sects of their labor force, limiting the ability of thefederal government to deliver for the people it is meant to serve.

In their own words: BLM headquarters belongs in the American West...
the Trump Administration’s decision to relocate BLM headquarters from
Washington, D.C., to the West was the epitome of good governance”
Mandate for Leadership p.524, also read p. 535

3

How they’d do it:

Administer ideologically biased or discriminatory
tests for federal workers. Project 2025 would issue
problematic civil service tests for prospective
federal employees.

The special interests behind Project 2025 want to create their own pipeline forimportant roles within our federal government, and they have already created apersonnel database for those who would like to be considered for positions during
a future administration. Registration for this database includes a questionnaire
which evaluates candidates through ideologically biased questions.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

45

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

They would also utilize legislative or regulatory processes — including through the
Office of Personnel Management — to reinstate the usage of general intelligencetests, which have not been in use since the Carter administration. At the time, civilrights groups contended that the general intelligence exam (the Professional and
Administration Career Exam, or PACE) used to hire for certain agency positions wasdiscriminatory. After a class action lawsuit alleging employment discrimination led
to a consent decree, Carter administration officials abolished the use of the exam
for hiring.
Judging prospective candidates for federal employment in ideological or
discriminatory ways is a dangerous way to govern. People across the U.S. depend on
federal employees every day, and replacing experts with partisan loyalists would bea tremendous disservice.

In their own words: Pillar II is a personnel database that allows
candidates to build their own professional profiles and our coalition
members to review and voice their recommendations. These
recommendations will then be collated and shared with the Presidentelect’s team, greatly streamlining the appointment process.”
Mandate for Leadership p.xiv

4

How they’d do it:

Meddle with national security by altering security
clearances. Project 2025 would remove civil
servants’ security clearances and politicize thegranting of clearances.

Security clearances are typically revoked according to a formal process that does
provide some due process rights for those whose clearances are revoked. Project2025, however, would encourage a future administration to “remove IC (intelligencecommunity) employees” under vague criteria that risk increased politicization.

The People’s Guide to Project 2025

46

Undermine Government’s Ability to Deliver for People

In addition to revoking clearances, Project 2025 would empower the Director of
National Intelligence and the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency to expedite
the issuance of security clearances to those deemed necessary to meet theadministration’s “mission needs.”
Expediting the issuance of security clearances paves way for more unqualified
and inept leaders to be charged with our nation’s most sensitive national security
matters. Take Jared Kushner: when two national expert security specialists refused
to issue him a clearance (due to concerns of foreign influence over him), the Trumpadministration overruled their expertise and gave him one anyway.

In their own words: The President should immediately revoke thesecurity clearances of any former Directors, Deputy Directors, or othersenior intelligence officials who discuss their work in the press or onsocial media without prior clearance from the current Director.”
Mandate for Leadership p.213

The threats from Project 2025 do not end here.
This People’s Guide only begins to catalog the people andcommunities who would be harmed if a future presidential
administration began to implement Project 2025’s proposals.
Businesses and industry across the country could be harmed notjust from the lack of data collection discussed above, but also fromproposals to politicize the Federal Reserve or to restrict free trade.
Our country’s national security itself, too, is threatened by proposals
to concentrate military decisionmaking, further undermine ourintelligence agencies, or promote isolationist policies.
We continue to analyze these policies and their harms to people,
and expect to release updated versions of the People’s Guide with
reports on the threats that would make it harder to run a business,put our security at risk, and more. Click here to sign up to receive theupdated reports directly in your inbox.

The People’s Guide to Project 202547

A project by Democracy Forward | June 2024

We cannot let
Project 2025 write
the next chapter of
our nation’s story.

To learn more about how we can confront the threats presented in this guide head-on and begin tobuild a bold, vibrant democracy for all people, visit democracyforward.org/action/join-2025.