I don't have the patience to dig through Project 2025. I was hoping a journalist I follow would do an opinion-free overview but I haven't seen one. So I asked Perplexity Deep Research to extract themes. I italicized the ones that I have not seen discussed very much. It does not seem to be an expression of a coherent ideology; rather it seems to be a political document collecting opinions of powerful individuals. A lot of it is about education and schools.
- Administrative state: Dissolve Education, EPA and Homeland Security.
- Defund Head Start.
- HHS gets education
- Dept of Education funds go to school vouchers
- Seed conservatives throughout the civil service
- Put the FBI and DOJ under presidential control. Use National Guard for immigration enforcement.
- Flat tax and corporate tax cut
- Eliminate overtime pay rules, weaken NRLB, relax OSHA rules.
- Promote fossil fuel industries by reducing environmental regulations. Reverse carbon emission regulations, promote Arctic drilling
- Reduce reliance on foreign manufacturing (PDB claims 2025 is internally inconsistent about tariffs vs free trade).
- Restrict abortion by banning medication mail and defund Planned Parenthood
- Rescind LGBTQ+ anti-discrimination rules in healthcare and foster care.
- End civil rights enforcement in schools
- End Title 1 funding (money for schools with high percentage of low income students)
- End Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IEPs, transition services, least restrictive environment etc). There is no federal replacement noted so presumably this all goes to the states.
- Defund NPR and PBS
- Pornography restrictions
- Ban TikTok, ban Confucius Institutes, block Chinese critical sector investments
- Defund climate science, downsize NOAA
- Privatize National Flood Insurance Program
- Reinstate border wall
The full perplexity report includes critiques of these measures. I hadn't wanted those but LLMs have a "mind of their own" as they say. Apparently LLMs think Project 2025 is kind of dumb.
As a certified squishy Lib I can see the logic of some of them. The weirdest parts are the trans and porn obsessions. The funniest part is the TikTok ban. The fossil fuel thing wins "most insane". The cruelest part of 2025 may be removing support for persons with cognitive disabilities.
Dramatic cuts to science research and the antivaxx movement don't seem to be coming from Project 2025, those may be a Musk/Trump thing. Greenland/Canada also seems to be a Musk/Trump obsession.
