OPINION:
Democrats and their media allies turned Heritage Foundation policy prescriptions into a wild attack on Donald Trump. The term Project 2025 became a label that progressives use to attribute just about any policy proposal under the sun to the GOP presidential nominee — whether Mr. Trump actually backs the idea or not.
“And look, as we move our nation forward, Donald Trump intends to take our nation backward. Just look at his Project 2025 agenda — Project 2025,” Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, said last month.
Media outlets such as The New York Times gave space to dozens of opinion essays and news stories about Mr. Trump and the Heritage plan, with headlines including “How Project 2025 Would Change the Country” and “Trump Wants to Distance Himself From Project 2025. Democrats Are Trying Not to Let Him.”
Growing weary of the baseless attack, Mr. Trump decided Friday to offer Democrats a taste of their own medicine. He posted “Kamala’s Project 2025” on Instagram, outlining how Ms. Harris intends to abolish Immigration and Customs Enforcement, open the border, defund the police, release violent criminals, ban fracking, confiscate guns and give illegal alien men the appearance of illegal alien women through surgery performed at taxpayer expense.
These items aren’t on the Democratic candidate’s formal platform; she isn’t running on any policy plans at all. Instead, they are ideas Ms. Harris has either advocated in the past or the Biden-Harris administration is implementing in the present.
To maximize her chance of victory, Ms. Harris is running an idea-free campaign. The less she speaks, the less likely potential voters will notice she’s a far-left extremist. She was the most out-there member of the Senate — to the left of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren.
Mr. Trump, on the other hand, has no shortage of ideas with his “make America great again” platform featuring 20 policy objectives that would be the focus of a second term in the Oval Office. The highlights are seal the border against illegal immigration, restore America’s energy dominance, replace outsourcing with domestic manufacturing, no tax on tips, lock up criminals and end the weaponization of the justice system.
Those are all things he would have the power to accomplish. They’re also popular ideas, which is why Democrats refuse to run against what the former president is saying he’ll do. Instead, they’re selectively citing items from The Heritage Foundation’s 922-page collection of policy ideas and forcing Mr. Trump to take responsibility for the work of others.
That’s not a legitimate thing to do. “I know nothing about Project 2025,” the former president wrote on Truth Social in July. “I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal.”
The Heritage plan is the wish list of a conservative think tank, which is not so different from casual bar talk. For instance, many Republicans talk big about shutting down useless and counterproductive government agencies such as the Department of Education. Nice idea, but it’s not going to happen when the Senate is split 51-49 against Republicans and the GOP has a four-vote majority in the House.
The journalists who continue to give Ms. Harris a free pass for running a campaign unburdened by ideas are not likely to pay attention to “Kamala’s Project 2025,” either. But the public deserves to know more about anyone who seeks to hold the nation’s highest office.
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