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    Project 2025: the Trump picks with ties to ultra-rightwing policy manifesto

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    On the campaign trail, Donald Trump repeatedly disavowed Project 2025, saying he had “nothing to do” with the blueprint for a conservative presidency and didn’t know the people behind it. But as he starts to assemble his cabinet and White House staff, it seems likely he’ll get to know the people involved very well soon.Trump’s attempts to disavow the project before winning re-election seemed improbable, given that it was written by various members of his first administration and aligned on policy goals with his own proposed second term agenda.His transition team claimed it would not hire any people associated with Project 2025 because it was “radioactive”.But, in his selections for key roles, he has already tapped people with direct ties to the rightwing manifesto.Brendan CarrView image in fullscreenTrump’s nominee to chair the Federal Communications Commission wrote the chapter on the FCC in Project 2025. In the chapter, Carr advocates for “reining in big tech”, in part by limiting the immunity tech platforms have from content posted by third parties. He specifically mentions abuses by Google, Meta and YouTube as examples of platforms requiring such reining in.Tom HomanView image in fullscreenHoman, chosen as Trump’s “border czar”, is listed as a contributor to Project 2025, though his name is not listed on any specific chapter or policy ideas.He also worked as a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation. He penned op-eds, promoted by Heritage, that attacked the Biden administration over immigration and panned the bipartisan immigration deal. He wrote in one op-ed that “race-baiting Democrats” had called him names when he led Ice.Mike HuckabeeView image in fullscreenMike Huckabee, named by Trump to be his ambassador to Israel, interviewed the Heritage president and Project 2025 architect, Kevin Roberts, on his show in October 2024 as part of an effort to counter the negative press about the project.Karoline Leavitt View image in fullscreenThe incoming White House press secretary, Karoline Leavitt, appeared in training videos for Project 2025. In addition to the policy manifesto, the project’s four pillars involved amassing a database of potential employees and creating a training program for conservatives who wanted positions in a rightwing presidency. In a video called “The Art of Professionalism”, obtained by ProPublica and Documented, Leavitt talks about her advice for people who would serve as staff. While she was the national press secretary for Trump’s campaign, she claimed the project had nothing to do with Trump. She also appears in a promotional video for the project.Stephen MillerView image in fullscreenStephen Miller will be back in the White House, this time as deputy chief of staff for policy. He is the president of the America First Legal Foundation, a legal attack dog non-profit for rightwing causes.America First Legal was listed as a supporter of Project 2025 and appeared as a member of the project’s advisory board, though the group then asked to be removed from it. Miller also appeared in a promotional video for the project, which is still posted on the project’s website.John RatcliffeView image in fullscreenRatcliffe, offered the role of CIA director by Trump, was a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation, where he was tasked with chairing a project to hold China accountable for Covid-19 and “helping Project 2025 build out policy recommendations for intelligence reform in the next presidential administration”, according to the Heritage website.Ratcliffe is listed as a contributor to Project 2025. He also is interviewed for the project, and excerpts of the interview went into a chapter on the intelligence community. In the chapter, Ratcliffe is quoted multiple times, on issues such as making sure the intelligence community is accountable to the director of national intelligence and on countering China.“I had an $85bn combined annual budget for both the national intelligence program and military intelligence program,” he is quoted in Project 2025. “My perspective was, ‘Whatever we’re spending on countering China, it isn’t enough.’”JD VanceView image in fullscreenTrump’s vice-president has close ties with Roberts, the Heritage president. Vance wrote the foreword for Roberts’ book, which was released after the election.Roberts “is somebody I rely on a lot who has very good advice, very good political instincts”, Vance told news outlet Notus in January 2024. In the foreword, Vance praises Roberts’ ideas and boldness, saying the book advances a “fundamentally Christian view of culture and economics” and a “surprising – even jarring” path forward for conservatives. More

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      With these outrageous appointments, Trump is showing us exactly how he intends to rule | Jonathan Freedland

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      He wasn’t kidding. Donald Trump really does want to rule as an extremist strongman, with contempt for the planet, for America’s allies and for the rule of law. He’s made that crystal clear this week, announcing one bombshell appointment after another, each one a declaration of intent. Few things tell you more about a president than their hires – personnel is policy, as they used to say in Ronald Reagan’s White House – and Trump is telling us exactly who he is.The latest name added to the roster is a storied one: Robert F Kennedy Jr, now lined up for the role of health secretary. You may have known of Bobby Kennedy. Bobby Kennedy may be a hero of yours. But, boy, his son is no Bobby Kennedy. Once an admired environmental campaigner, now he is an anti-vaxxer conspiracy theorist who promotes treatments that don’t work – such as hydroxychloroquine for Covid – and rails against those that do, spreading the long-debunked claim that childhood vaccines are linked to autism and opposing fluoridation of water to prevent tooth decay. Apparently unchastened by the pandemic, Kennedy believes US public health officials have been too focused on infectious diseases. Or as he memorably put it: “We’re going to give infectious disease a break for about eight years.” If deadly pathogens could lick their lips, they would.At least the RFK nod was not a surprise: Trump had long said he wanted to let Kennedy “go wild” with the nation’s health. More of a jawdropper is the new president’s choice for attorney general, the most senior law enforcement officer in the land: Matt Gaetz. For two years, Gaetz was under federal investigation for child sex trafficking and statutory rape. (No charges were brought.) Until this week, his fellow members of the House of Representatives were running their own ethics committee inquiry into Gaetz – handily halted, thanks to his resignation just days before they were about to report – examining, besides the allegations of underage sexual abuse, accusations that he engaged in illicit drug use, displayed to colleagues, on the floor of the House, nude photos and videos of previous sexual partners, converted campaign funds for personal use and accepted gifts banned under congressional rules.Some wonder if naming such a man as head of the US justice department is a diversionary tactic, designed to distract attention from the clutch of other nominations that are scarcely less outrageous, in the hope that those will look reasonable by comparison. In this view, Trump knows that Gaetz will never be attorney general, that his nomination will be blocked in the Senate where, even though the Republicans have a majority, too many will balk. Gaetz is chum, thrown into the water to satisfy the piranhas, so that Trump can quietly ensure his other nominees get through. And what a rum bunch they are.As director of national intelligence, overseeing 18 separate intelligence agencies including the CIA and NSA, Trump has turned to Tulsi Gabbard, a fringe Democratic congresswoman before she defected to the Republicans, best known for meeting Bashar al-Assad while the Syrian dictator was busy slaughtering hundreds of thousands of his own people, and for parroting Kremlin talking points.When Russia invaded Ukraine, Gabbard was swift to blame the west, even repeating the Moscow propaganda line that the US had stationed secret biolabs across Ukraine. One of Vladimir Putin’s mouthpiece TV channels took to referring to Gabbard as Russia’s “girlfriend”. When asked if she was, in fact, a Russian agent, the talking head on the Kremlin-backed network replied: “Yes.” Now consider that at the core of the US relationship with its allies – including Britain – is intelligence-sharing and ask yourself whether the likes of MI6 could in all conscience share what they know with such a person.Her proposed counterpart over at the Pentagon, set to be in charge of the mightiest, richest military in human history, is the weekend host of Fox News’s breakfast show, Pete Hegseth. Admittedly, he served in Iraq and Afghanistan – and as a prison guard in Guantánamo Bay – but Hegseth has never run a whelk stall, let alone one of the world’s biggest organisations, employing close to 3 million people. His rank inexperience would be worrying enough, until you become familiar with what he believes.He’s covered in tattoos, including symbols favoured by the Christian nationalist far right, among them the slogan Deus Vult and the Jerusalem cross, which celebrates the medieval Crusades when Christians earned their spurs slaughtering infidel Muslims and Jews. These days, he backs the ultra-right Jewish fundamentalists who seek to rebuild the ancient temple on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount, the site revered by Muslims as al-Haram al-Sharif, a move so incendiary it’s a byword for triggering holy war.Hegseth will find company in Trump’s choice of ambassador to Israel, former Arkansas governor and evangelical Christian Mike Huckabee. Like Hegseth, Huckabee is against a two-state solution, insists on calling the West Bank by its biblical Hebrew name – Judea and Samaria – and is adamant that “There’s no such thing as an occupation.” In 2008 he said, “there’s really no such thing as a Palestinian”.All of which makes you wonder how those many Arab and Muslim American voters in Michigan and elsewhere, persuaded that Trump had to be a better option for the Palestinians than Kamala Harris, feel now.We’ve barely got to Lee Zeldin, Trump’s choice to head the Environmental Protection Agency, despite having repeatedly voted against clean water and clean air legislation, and having expressed doubts over whether climate breakdown is “as serious a problem” as people say it is. Or to the self-confessed puppy killer who will head the Department of Homeland Security. Or indeed the man who will lead the new department reviewing government contracts, including, in an arrangement open to spectacular corruption, contracts with his own companies: namely, Elon Musk.Still, you get the picture. How, then, to make sense of these choices? Some hope it’s no more than an opening bid by Trump, the arch-negotiator: offer the Senate something obviously unacceptable, then haggle from there. Others wonder if it’s part of a dark, deliberate strategy, by which Trump, the agent of chaos, appoints those who are not so much disruptors as wreckers, men and women who can be relied on to make the agencies they lead collapse in failure. When the federal government is a smoking ruin, then all power will have to reside in the single man at the top.My own view is simpler. At the heart of it is the quality all would-be strongmen value most: loyalty. Trump knows that a character as tawdry as Gaetz, despised by his own colleagues, would owe everything to him. As attorney general, he would do whatever Trump asked, working his way through Trump’s enemies list, prosecuting whoever had crossed his boss, delivering the retribution Trump yearns for.What’s more, Gaetz and the rest are a kind of test, one that Putin deploys often. You push your allies to defend what they know cannot be defended, to make concessions they would once have considered unpalatable. As the analyst Ron Brownstein put it this week, “Each surrender paves the way for the next.” It is, he says, “a cardinal rule of strongman dominance”.So now it is up to the Republicans in the Senate. Will they abase themselves yet further, and nod through this parade of ghouls and charlatans? Or will they at last find their backbone and say no to the would-be autocrat who has taken over their party and now looms over all three branches of the US government? After all we’ve seen these last eight years, what do you think is the answer?

      Jonathan Freedland is a Guardian columnist More

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      Trump’s early second-term choices fuel fears of extremist agenda

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      Donald Trump may have won a second term in the White House just last week, but his recent administration appointments have already heightened fears among some who believe his return to the White House will lead to an extremist agenda.On immigration, Trump has chosen loyalists and hardliners: Stephen Miller will serve as deputy chief of staff for policy and Department of Homeland Security adviser; Tom Homan as “border czar”, and Kristi Noem, the South Dakota governor, will lead the Department of Homeland Security.Miller, previously a Trump adviser, played a significant role in crafting Trump’s immigration policies in his first administration, including the Muslim ban. Homan was the former acting director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) under Trump’s first administration and a supporter of the family separation policy. Noem has been a vocal and strong Trump ally for the better part of a decade.This trio is likely to help bring to fruition Trump’s campaign promise of the mass deportation of millions of undocumented migrants living in the US.On Wednesday, Trump stunned many by announcing that he would be nominatingRepublican congressman Matt Gaetz of Florida, one of his most prominent defenders, to serve as attorney general. Gaetz represents a conservative district in the Florida Panhandle, and became known nationally last year when he was a key player in the putsch that ousted Kevin McCarthy as speaker of the House.Gaetz was also the subject of a federal sex-trafficking investigation that ended in 2023 when the Biden justice department declined to bring charges. Gaetz had insisted throughout he was innocent of any wrongdoing.Trump also nominated former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard to serve as director of national intelligence.Gabbard, who served in the US military in Iraq, spent four terms as a Democratic congresswoman representing Hawaii, and ran for president in the Democratic primary in 2020, before quitting the party in 2022, and becoming a supporter of Trump.On Tuesday, Trump shocked the Pentagon and the wider defense world by appointing the army veteran and Fox News host Pete Hegseth as the new defense secretary.A staunch conservative, Hegseth opposes what he calls “woke” military programs aimed at promoting equity and inclusion and has questioned the role of women in combat. He has also advocated for pardoning service members accused of war crimes.He reportedly formed a friendship with Trump during his appearances on Fox & Friends.Speaking with Politico, Eric Edelman, who served as the Pentagon’s top policy official during the Bush administration, said that Trump’s choices so far revealed that he “puts his highest value on loyalty” adding that one of the main criteria appeared to be “how well do people defend Donald Trump on television?”Paul Rieckhoff, founder of Independent Veterans of America, criticized Hegseth’s appointment on X, describing the Fox News host as “undoubtedly the least qualified nominee for SecDef in American history” and “the most overtly political”.“Brace yourself, America,” he added.Mike Huckabee, the former Arkansas governor who previously claimed “there is no such thing as a West Bank”, was chosen as the next US ambassador to Israel, indicating a return to an explicitly pro-Israel administration reminiscent of Trump’s first.The Jewish Democratic Council of America criticized Huckabee’s nomination, stating that his “extremist views” on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict would not advance US national security or prospects for peace.Signaling a more combative US position toward the United Nations, the New York representative Elise Stefanik has been chosen to be the next ambassador. Stefanik has called to defund the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees.Stefanik gained attention last year after her aggressive questioning of three university presidents over antisemitism on campuses.Gerry Connolly, a Democratic representative, criticized the appointment of Stefanik, telling the Hill it was a “gift to Vladimir Putin” and adding that “she abandoned Ukrainians in April” and “this further signals Donald Trump and Maga’s retreat from the global stage”.On Saturday, Trump announced that Michael Pompeo, the former secretary of state who has criticized the former president and his policies over the years, and Nikki Haley, the former UN ambassador who challenged Trump in the Republican primary, would not be part of his second administration.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionThe rejection of Haley and Pompeo may also be viewed as the rejection of two individuals who have backed US support for Ukraine.John Ratcliffe, a close ally of Trump and former director of national intelligence, has been appointed as director of the Central Intelligence Agency.Ratcliffe served as director of national intelligence at the end of Trump’s first term, during which he faced accusations from Democrats and former officials of declassifying intelligence to aid Trump and attack political opponents such as Joe Biden, a claim his office has denied.Lee Zeldin, the former New York congressman, has been chosen to serve as administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, leading to criticism from environmental groups.As a representative, Zeldin voted against the Inflation Reduction Act, which directed billions of dollars to expand clean energy and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and also opposed climate-related legislation, according to the environmental advocacy group League of Conservation Voters.Ben Jealous, Sierra Club’s executive director, called Zeldin an “unqualified, anti-American worker who opposes efforts to safeguard our clean air and water”, adding that his appointment “lays bare Donald Trump’s intentions to, once again, sell our health, our communities, our jobs, and our future out to corporate polluters”.Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, along with Vivek Ramaswamy, a former Republican presidential candidate, will lead the Department of Government Efficiency, Trump said, which aims to cut federal bureaucracy by roughly a third.Although not a government agency, it will operate externally to drive significant reforms and introduce an entrepreneurial approach to government.Musk’s appointment drew criticism from Public Citizen, a progressive consumer rights non-profit.“Musk not only knows nothing about government efficiency and regulation, his own businesses have regularly run afoul of the very rules he will be in position to attack,” co-president Lisa Gilbert said in a statement.Marco Rubio, the Florida senator known for his hardline policies on China, Iran and Venezuela, is expected to be appointed as Trump’s secretary of state, and Trump has asked Mike Waltz, a congressman, retired Green Beret and a longtime ally known for his tough stance on China, to become his national security adviser.Notably, Rubio has received support from John Fetterman, the Democratic senator who stated on Tuesday that despite their political differences, he believes Rubio is a strong choice and looks forward to voting for his confirmation.Other appointments have included Susie Wiles, Trump’s 2024 campaign manager, as chief of staff; the real estate investor and longtime friend and Trump donor Steve Witkoff to be his special envoy to the Middle East; and William Joseph McGinley, who served as cabinet secretary in the first term, as White House counsel, among others.In his announcement, Trump said McGinley would help him “advance our America First agenda” while “fighting for election integrity and against the weaponization of law enforcement”. 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      ‘It’s a live audition’: Trump surrogates swarm Iowa before caucuses

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      Outside, traders were braving the bitter cold to sell Trump hats, T-shirts and other merchandise. Inside, hundreds of Trump supporters were proudly sporting “Make America great again” (Maga) regalia. They were surrounded by big screens, loudspeakers, TV cameras, patriotic flags and “Team Trump” logos.It had all the trappings of a Donald Trump campaign rally but one thing was missing: Donald Trump.The former US president was content to let South Dakota’s governor, Kristi Noem, speak on his behalf at the convention centre in Sioux City, Iowa, on Wednesday night. “We would never have the situation going on like we see in the Middle East right now,” Noem said. “If he had been in the White House, we would never see what was going on with Russia and Ukraine.”It was not the first time that Trump has delegated his campaign to a proxy ahead of the Iowa caucuses on 15 January, the first of the state-by-state contests in which Republicans choose a presidential nominee to take on Democrat Joe Biden in November’s election.While rivals Ron DeSantis and Nikki Haley have crisscrossed Iowa in search of votes, the frontrunner has been content to stay at home and let allies do much of the legwork for him. For these campaign surrogates, it is a very public opportunity to stake their claim to a job in a future Trump cabinet – or even as his vice-president.This week’s lineup included Ben Carson, a former housing secretary seeking to rally Iowa’s Christian evangelical voters; Marjorie Taylor Greene, a far-right firebrand and prominent ally of Trump in Congress; and Eric Trump, a son of the former president who followed him into business.On Monday two “Team Trump Iowa Faith Events” will feature ex-White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, now governor of Arkansas, and her father, Mike Huckabee, a former governor of the same state.Other prominent proxies include Florida congressmen Byron Donalds and Matt Gaetz; Kari Lake, a former candidate for Arizona governor who has roots in Iowa; Iowa’s attorney general, Brenna Bird, whose endorsement of Trump put her at odds with the state’s governor, Kim Reynolds, a backer of DeSantis; and actor Roseanne Barr, who five years ago was fired from her sitcom, Roseanne, after posting a racist tweet.For the Trump campaign, these events are useful to scoop up personal information that allows for follow-up calls and texts to remind supporters to show up at the caucuses. For the surrogates, they represent a chance to enhance political careers or boost their profile in the “Maga universe”, which might lead to work as a host or pundit in rightwing media.Kurt Bardella, a Democratic strategist, said: “It’s a live audition, using the campaign trail as a substitute for the boardroom set that he had on The Apprentice. All of these people are jockeying and trying to curry favour with Trump so that they are considered to be on the shortlist for some of the high-visibility positions that might become available if he were to win.”Since 2016, Trump campaigns have also been a family affair. His eldest son, Don Jr, attended the first Republican primary debate in Milwaukee along his girlfriend, Kimberly Guilfoyle, but they were denied access to the official “spin room” so talked to reporters on the sidelines. Trump’s daughter Ivanka, a former senior adviser at the White House, is sitting this one out.Eric Trump, who turns 40 on Saturday , has long been mocked by comedians and satirists as the poor relation but seems to be working doubly hard to impress his dad. He told an audience in Ankeny, Iowa, on Thursday: “The greatest fighter in the world is my father. In fact, it’s kind of sometimes what he’s actually criticised for.”Bardella, a former senior adviser for Republicans on the House oversight committee, added: “It’s ‘I’m trying to win your approval’, whether it’s politically in terms of someone like Kristi Noem particularly or the lifelong pursuit of Eric Trump and Donald Trump Jr to live up to the last name, to the outsized shadow that their father cast over their lives.”Such ostentatious displays of fealty could prove valuable to Trump in a year in which he faces the distraction of four criminal cases that threaten to strand him in a courtroom instead of the campaign trail. He is expected to appear at a federal appeals court hearing next week regarding the scope of his presidential immunity while in office.He must also choose a running mate. It is safe to assume that it will not be Mike Pence, his former vice-president, who alienated Trump by certifying the 2020 election results and ran an abortive campaign against him last year. Potential contenders include Haley, Lake and Noem as well as Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina, Representative Elise Stefanik of New York, entrepreneur and 2024 candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson.skip past newsletter promotionafter newsletter promotionNoem’s event on Wednesday was far bigger than two DeSantis events in western Iowa on Wednesday, one of which was right down the road. Asked by CBS News what she would do if offered the vice-presidential slot, the South Dakota governor said: “I think anybody in this country, if they were offered it, needs to consider it.”Rick Wilson, a cofounder of the Lincoln Project, an anti-Trump group, commented: “Noem is auditioning for vice-president, absolutely, which is why I think you’ll also see Elise Stefanik out there in the next couple of weeks also, because she is definitely trying to be vice-president. She’s not being shy about it at all; she’s telling people: ‘I want this gig.’”Wilson added: “Trump responds to people who are not just loyal. It’s subservience and a willingness to do whatever Trump wants you to do and so they’re checking a box. This is probably the minimum they can do to stay in his good graces. We’ll see more ‘respectable’ Republicans in the coming months also out there checking the box.”The former president’s absence from the campaign trail also reflects his dominance. Last month a Fox News poll put him at 52% among likely Republican caucus goers in Iowa, far ahead of DeSantis, at 18%, and Haley, at 16%. DeSantis has visited all 99 counties in the state but has made little headway.Trump is scheduled to host eight events in person before the caucuses, a small number compared with other candidates. He will skip a Republican primary debate hosted by CNN in Des Moines on Wednesday in favour of a town hall hosted by Fox News in the same city at the same time. He will hold his final rally in Cherokee on the eve of the caucuses and remain in the state on caucus night.His opponents have struggled to attract surrogates with star power. Haley’s backers include Will Hurd, a former congressman who dropped out of the race, and Chris Sununu, an ex-governor of New Hampshire, which holds the second nominating contest later this month. DeSantis has the support of Reynolds and Bob Vander Plaats, an influential Republican operative in Iowa and the chief executive of the Family Leader, a social conservative organisation.None is able to fire up the Republican base like Trump allies such as Greene, who was greeted by cheers in Keokuk, Iowa, on Thursday and proudly declared: “I’m a Maga extremist.”Sam Nunberg, a DeSantis supporter who was an adviser to Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign, acknowledged her influence: “Marjorie Taylor Greene, whatever the majority of Americans think of her, is very strong within the Republican primary so she’s a good surrogate to have, specifically for the people that [Trump] needs.“The strongest, most enthusiastic voters … would like the message of a Marjorie Taylor Greene and are on the same page as him, particularly about the 2020 election and issues with Biden. But in general a surrogate operation can only do so much. I’m not saying that he’s going to lose the caucus; I hope he does.” More