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Project 2025 Is Here.
With Trump’s return to the presidency, Project 2025, a 920-page blueprint for authoritarianism in the U.S., spearheaded by the powerful and extreme far-right Heritage Foundation, is becoming a reality, affecting all Americans and people around the globe.
More than 100 far-right organizations support this plan for autocracy, which is proving to be the source for Trump’s anti-democratic policies, despite his repeated disavowal of Project 2025 during his campaign. Dozens of members of the new administration have direct ties to the effort.
Project 2025’s stated goal is to create an “ideal” America that would see women, LGBTQ+ people, immigrants, people of color, and others deprived of their hard-won constitutional rights and the erosion of environmental and education protections. It also advocates for a frightening centralization of power in the executive branch, something Trump is keen to achieve. Read GPAHE’s full analysis of Project 2025 and the groups behind it.
GPAHE monitors how Project 2025 is becoming a reality and reports on the ties between the project and the administration, and its impact on the American people and democracy. We track Project 2025 activities at the federal, state, and local levels, and their plans for an authoritarian and Christian Nationalist America.
This week, we look at the latest Project 2025 co-author to be welcomed to the Trump administration, a tense battle for DEI at a Fort Worth city council meeting that reveals the growing grassroots pushback against authoritarian policies, and how Kari Lake wants to see reporters she fired from the VOA be deported.
The Project 2025 Pipeline to The White House Continues
E.J. Antoni’s nomination to lead the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) is the latest move in Project 2025’s calculated takeover of the American government — one agency at a time.
The Global Project Against Hate and Extremism documented at least 40 direct connections between Project 2025’s network and the Trump Administration, revealing the installation of a philosophy that explicitly calls for politicizing independent institutions by replacing the federal bureaucracy with Trump loyalists.
Other Project 2025 veterans occupy key positions throughout government. Project 2025 co-author Peter Navarro returned to the White House despite serving prison time for contempt of Congress. Russell Vought, a key mastermind behind Project 2025, commands the OMB. Adam Candeub authored Project 2025’s FTC chapter before becoming FCC general counsel. Lindsey Burke wrote the Department of Education chapter, then secured an appointment within the agency she designated for destruction. Paul Atkins contributed to Project 2025’s SEC chapter before leading that commission, to name just a few who have parlayed Project 2025 into political power.
Antoni’s selection follows this pattern. After July’s disastrous jobs report sent Trump spiraling, the president enlisted Project 2025 co-author Stephen Moore to present special posterboard data that “no one else” has that aligned more with the president’s rhetoric. The July jobs report showed U.S. employers added far fewer jobs than expected, with May and June figures revised downward by a sharp 258,000.
Trump fired Dr. Erika McEntarfer, the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) commissioner, on August 1st — only hours after Antoni publicly bashed her on Steve Bannon’s War Room as “incompetent” and demanded new leadership at the agency. He and Bannon agreed that Trump’s weak jobs reports have “data problems” precisely because a Trump loyalist wasn’t running the BLS.
McEntarfer’s dismissal drew sharp criticism from economists and even some Trump supporters. Former BLS Commissioner William Beach, whom Trump appointed in his first term, denounced the firing as “damaging” and noted that periodic revisions of numbers are standard practice. The rapid-fire sequence — Antoni’s public attack followed by immediate termination — reveals a strategy to justify ideological capture of statistical agencies.
Antoni, who was among the crowd gathered at the Capitol during the January 6 insurrection, has repeatedly distorted economic reality. He argued inflation was cooling under Trump despite core inflation rising above three percent. He claimed tariffs impose no consumer cost, while economists warn Americans could shoulder up to 67 percent of tariff-related expenses.
Economists have warned that politicizing the agency could erode trust in U.S. economic statistics and mark a dangerous encroachment on democratic norms and data integrity. The agency’s data influences Federal Reserve decisions, business strategies, and government planning. Reliable statistics form the foundation of rational economic decision-making.
University of Michigan economist Justin Wolfers called Antoni “disastrously terrible” with “few credentials beyond a long history of misrepresenting basic economic statistics.” Jessica Reidl, senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, said, “The articles and tweets I’ve seen him publish are probably the most error-filled of any think tank economist right now.”
As Antoni awaits confirmation by the Republican-controlled Senate, America’s statistical infrastructure becomes another ideological battleground where objective data collection yields to partisan manipulation.
Fort Worth’s DEI Battle: Grassroots Resistance Meets Project 2025 Reality
The Fort Worth City Council chambers roiled with tension on August 5th as more than 100 residents gathered for what would become a five-hour battle over the city’s future. The meeting stretched past 11 PM and marked an extraordinary example of growing local resistance to the Trump administration’s adoption of Project 2025’s policies, including efforts to dismantle diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs across American institutions.
Federal authorities ordered the city of Fort Worth to suspend DEI initiatives, or forfeit $277 million in multi-year grants and $40.6 million in annual funding. Fort Worth’s elected officials found themselves trapped between community values and fiscal survival.
Faith leaders joined business owners. Activists sat alongside retirees. Young parents shared concerns with elderly residents. This coalition transcended traditional political boundaries, united by a shared commitment to inclusive governance. Despite Trump winning Tarrant County by 52 percent in 2024, nearly every speaker opposed the suspension.
After much deliberation, Eddie Delgado brought his son to the meeting so he could witness democracy under pressure. “I wanted him to see what it looks like when people in power cave to bullies and sell out their communities and betray their own dignity, so he knows what not to become. We teach our son that we don’t bow to tyrants. We stand our ground. That’s supposed to be a Texas value, right? So why are some of you guys bending the knee to a narcissistic, misogynistic, racist, fascist, pedophilic, convicted felon?”
Moral clarity rang through Reverend Kyle Powell’s challenge: “What is 46 million to you if you lose the trust of your city, your constituents and your neighbor to pacify a tyrant?”
Scripture-guided Pastor Edward Spears: “What shall it profit the council if we gain federal dollars and lose Fort Worth’s soul?”
Catherine Godby cut to the heart of federal motivations: “So don’t fall for the national leadership trying to bully you into their white supremacist policies.”
Young activist Emery Callaway delivered a reminder about democratic accountability: “Fort Worth doesn’t answer to Donald Trump, but you council members answer to us, the people who elected you to serve us.”
Sabrina Ball brought East Texas wisdom: “My mama would’ve said, that’s Donald, that Donald is a bad dude standing there with a pedophile.”
Jeffrey Heider captured the historical weight: “Tonight, you’ll be remembered not for your private opinions or your personal hesitations, but only for how you vote. The entire city is watching.”
Reverend Jeremy Pope made the political context explicit: “I urge each of you to vote to hold the line and fight back against Donald Trump and the outrageous Christian nationalist attempt at a power grab.”
Former council member Ann Zeta crystallized the resistance in four words: “Don’t bend the knee.”
From the dais itself, Council Member Chris Nettles exploded with fury: “I’ll be damned if the same folks that we worked so hard to get you on this dais that you fold under the pressure.”
After hours of heart wrenching testimony, Fort Worth did indeed bend the knee.
Critical infrastructure depended on the threatened funding. Police and fire departments relied on federal dollars. So did aviation facilities, parks, and emergency management. The grants supported 120 city employee salaries across multiple departments. Fort Worth’s DEI office employed 16 people with a $3 million annual budget from local sources.
Mayor Mattie Parker articulated the council’s dilemma: “While I am so proud that we’ve had over 90 people come here tonight to speak or submit comment cards, there are one million people that this dais has to be responsible for. The very people we are all concerned about protecting are the very first to be impacted by these grants and federal grants across the city of Fort Worth.”
Public opposition couldn’t overcome fiscal reality.
The final vote: 7-4 to suspend DEI programs. Council members Mia Hall, Chris Nettles, Deborah Peoples, and Elizabeth Beck provided the dissenting votes. A subsequent 10-1 approval created a small business development program — the council’s attempt at maintaining some support for minority and women-owned enterprises.
Job losses were avoided through reassignment. City Manager Jay Chapa confirmed that affected staff would find new roles within city government. However, five positions would be eliminated from the DEI structure.
Local democracy faced its stress test in Fort Worth’s chambers. The evening exposed how institutional warfare gets personalized. Families were forced to witness their values being commodified and bartered.
But it also showed that communities continue to organize against Project 2025’s authoritarian policies. Pushback is rising. Local voices now carry beyond Texas borders, proving that Project 2025’s implementation faces determined community resistance.
Whether organized resistance can ultimately prevail against coordinated federal coercion will define democracy’s future at the municipal level.
How VOA’s New Boss Became Its Chief Deportation Officer
“If you are no longer welcome in America, if your visa has run out, it’s time to take your things and exit the country. That’s how it works here.”
This is not border czar Tom Homan discussing deportation operations along the southern border. Instead, it’s Kari Lake on a recent conservative podcast describing her approach to foreign journalists whom she fired from the agency she now leads.
Lake’s job description says nothing about immigration enforcement. She was appointed to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media, which oversees Voice of America (VOA), the government’s premier international broadcasting service tasked with projecting American values worldwide, but her primary mission is to destroy it. Her assault on VOA follows a blueprint laid out in Project 2025, which criticized the agency for “joining the mainstream media’s anti-U.S. chorus and denigrating the American story.”
Lake’s contempt for journalism was explicit during her 2022 Arizona gubernatorial campaign, when she promised to take “a sledgehammer” to the “corrupt” media, literally smashing a television in a campaign ad while calling journalists propagandists who use a “communist playbook” to “manipulate the masses.” Now she applies that same destructive impulse to America’s international broadcasting mission.
In March, Trump effectively shut down the network through executive order, placing over 1,000 employees on leave. Instead of broadcasting America’s voice to the world, Lake has chosen to silence it — and deport those who carried it. She has reinvented herself as a deportation enforcer, warping personnel decisions into headline-grabbing immigration crackdowns while displaying cruel indifference toward journalists who spent years dutifully reporting American values to hostile regimes.
On March 6, the Atlantic reported, security guards escorted Sabir Mustafa from the building after Lake handed him a termination letter. His position as managing editor for VOA Bangla was “not a national security or mission critical position,” the letter declared. He had 30 days to leave the country.
Rio Tuasikal faced the same ultimatum. The Indonesian journalist had been applying for a green card when VOA axed his employment. His immigration lawyer asked if he had grounds for asylum. “Well, I’m gay, and homosexuality is criminalized in Indonesia,” he told her. Rather than fight, he fled to Jakarta.
During a subsequent media appearance, Lake declared: “If I have to get on a flight with them and make sure that they get back to their home country, I will do that.” Lake rationalizes her deportation theatrics with sweeping accusations about foreign journalists given what she sees as preferential hiring over Americans “Who better to do that than Americans who understand the language, the culture, the history,” she said, dismissing the value of multilingual, multicultural reporters entirely.
Since taking office, Lake has terminated over 1,300 people at VOA. Her hunt for J-1 visa holders goes beyond standard workforce reductions, transforming routine terminations into a deportation spectacle despite having no authority over visa enforcement. Lake decimated VOA’s language services from 49 to four, the statutory minimum. “This entire agency is rotten and it needs to be eliminated,” she proclaimed.
Lake’s delight in upending lives and destroying a pillar of American news and culture worldwide became clear during congressional testimony in June. Arizona Rep. Greg Stanton called her “an adjudicated liar and a two-time loser,” citing her false claims about her 2022 gubernatorial loss. Lake struck back by claiming VOA could spread lies without oversight. “They could literally put out a lie about anybody here, and I know you’ve been the victim of that,” she told Stanton. “I remember the stories about you where they said you had a gay lover,” a rumor she created out of whole cloth.
The consequences of Lake’s leadership have been swift and damaging. VOA went dark in March for the first time since its 1942 founding to counter Nazi propaganda. During the escalating conflict between Israel and Iran in June, VOA had to beg terminated staffers to return temporarily and restart Persian-language broadcasts. Former VOA director Chase Untermeyer warned that banishing multilingual professionals creates information vacuums that hostile nations exploit. “In many ways, they’re exactly the people you want,” he said. By expelling them, the U.S. surrenders ground to China, North Korea, and Iran on the global information battlefield.
Some terminated journalists have filed asylum claims. Others married hastily or enrolled in school. WhatsApp and Signal groups formed to help J-1 visa holders navigate their options, while Lake grabbed headlines with deportation threats. Several foreign reporters face imprisonment if returned to their home countries after working for U.S.-funded outlets. Rather than consider these human consequences, Lake appears to relish their predicament, manufacturing immigration controversies for political gain.
For years, these journalists broadcast American democratic values to authoritarian regimes, accepting personal risk as the cost of their mission. The human cost of turning public service into political theater — treating people’s lives as props in a deportation drama that has nothing to do with the job Lake was hired to perform — reveals the cruelty at the heart of her approach.
