What is the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 and which of its proposals have been adopted by the federal government?
Executive summary
Project 2025 is a nearly 1,000‑page policy blueprint produced by The Heritage Foundation and more than 100 allied conservative groups that lays out a wide-ranging plan to reshape the federal government, concentrate power in the presidency, change personnel rules, and roll back civil‑rights, climate, immigration and reproductive‑health policies [1] [2] [3]. Since the 2024–25 transition and the start of the subsequent administration, dozens of executive actions, nominations and agency directives have reflected Project 2025 language or priorities, though quantifying exact adoption is contested and monitored by multiple trackers and news outlets [4] [5] [6].
1. What Project 2025 is and how it was produced
Project 2025 — published in April 2023 as the “Mandate for Leadership” by The Heritage Foundation — is a department‑by‑department manual of policy recommendations, draft executive orders and a personnel database intended to provide a ready plan for a conservative administration to implement sweeping change across the federal bureaucracy [1] [7] [5]. The project was created with input from over 100 conservative organizations and former administration officials and has been described by critics as aiming to institutionalize a right‑wing, Christian‑nationalist governing vision; Heritage and some contributors portray it as a practical transition playbook rather than a radical takeover plan [8] [3] [9].
2. Core policy aims in the blueprint
The blueprint advocates consolidating executive power under a strong unitary‑executive model, rewiring civil‑service rules to favor politically aligned hires, curtailing environmental and climate regulation (including reversing the EPA’s endangerment finding), restricting abortion‑related access and enforcement, limiting LGBTQ protections and reshaping civil‑rights enforcement, and shrinking or repurposing agencies seen as “activist” — recommendations that span hundreds of specific proposals [5] [7] [3] [9]. Advocacy groups characterize these measures as attempts to politicize independent enforcement tools, eliminate disparate‑impact standards, and prioritize religiously framed family policies; Heritage frames many proposals as restoring accountability and limiting regulatory overreach [3] [8].
3. Personnel strategy and the “personnel is policy” idea
A central plank of Project 2025 is a personnel playbook: building rosters of vetted candidates, loosening merit protections, and placing ideologically aligned officials in agencies to carry out the agenda — an approach summed up by the aphorism “personnel is policy” and reflected by Heritage’s database and recruitment efforts [2] [1]. The project’s director resigned after public pushback and the plan became a campaign flashpoint, but many Project contributors were later nominated or installed in the administration, reinforcing the personnel pipeline the blueprint envisioned [2] [10].
4. Which proposals have been adopted or mirrored by the federal government
Multiple outlets and trackers report substantial overlap between Project 2025 proposals and the administration’s early executive actions: Time and Newsweek analyses found that a large share — described as nearly two‑thirds in one Time analysis — of early executive steps mirrored or partially mirrored Project 2025 recommendations, and PBS and other outlets counted “dozens” of executive orders that echo the blueprint [5] [11] [4]. Specific examples reported in the press include agency directives and webpages that align with Project aims on civil‑rights data collection and family policy language, nomination of Project authors to key posts (e.g., some cabinet and agency names cited by BBC), and rapid regulatory rollbacks or directives that curtail agency activities tied to climate, civil‑rights enforcement and gender‑affirming care funding — though some actions have been struck down or reversed by courts [10] [12] [13].
5. How observers are tracking implementation and contested claims
Progressive and watchdog groups such as the Center for Progressive Reform, Democracy Forward and others have built executive‑action trackers cataloguing agency moves that reflect Project 2025 proposals, while Heritage and allied conservatives contend the project is a legitimate policy manual and dispute some characterizations of intent [6] [1] [8]. Reporting notes both clear personnel overlaps — many Project contributors in government — and legally vulnerable actions: courts have already blocked or required reinstatement of some agency pages and orders tied to these policy shifts, underscoring that adoption is uneven and subject to litigation and congressional oversight [13] [12].
6. What remains uncertain and where reporting is limited
While multiple credible sources document substantial overlap between Project 2025 and administration policy and personnel, no single public source provides an exhaustive, legally vetted list of every adopted proposal; trackers and news analyses vary in scope and methodology, and some Heritage denials or legal outcomes limit straightforward attribution of intent or permanence [6] [11] [5]. Therefore, claims about “how much” has been implemented are best read as evolving tallies: significant influence is documented, but full, definitive adoption of the entire blueprint is not supported by a single authoritative public accounting in the sources reviewed [4] [6].