Project 2025 March 19th Update

Five hundred tons of alfalfa lay stacked in Montana fields — a stranded investment as the farmer’s bills grow more urgent by the day. In Massachusetts, an orchard owner watches her reliable weekly sales teeter on the brink of collapse. These two agricultural snapshots illustrate the ripple effects of the Trump administration’s abrupt termination of two Biden-era programs that provided some $1 billion to connect local farms with schools and food banks.

Behind the USDA’s sanitized rhetoric about efficiency and “fiscally responsible initiatives” lies a strategy that mirrors — with eerie precision — the agricultural vision outlined in the Heritage Foundation’s controversial Project 2025. That agricultural chapter, written by deregulation advocate and former Heritage Foundation fellow Daren Bakst, explicitly rejects the government’s role in direct market intervention, arguing that “farmers should not be paid in such a sweeping way not to farm their land.”

The policy whiplash has been particularly jarring given Trump’s first term, when farmers received an unprecedented $217 billion in government support. Now, those same rural communities that fortified his electoral map face a starkly different relationship with Washington. “In farming, your word means something. If you sign a contract, that means something,” laments Iowa farmer Dave Walton, whose $6,000 in climate-friendly farming support hangs in limbo. Some producers hover just “weeks away from being forced to file for bankruptcy.” In Wisconsin, where 289 farmers distributed $4 million in local food products, Governor Tony Evers condemned the administration for “trying to walk back promises to Wisconsin’s farmers” at a time when “Trump’s 25 percent tariff taxes” threaten to compound rural economic pressures.

The programs’ diversity components have fueled speculation about ideological targeting. Under Biden, applicants detailed how funding would assist disadvantaged farmers, often supporting Native American communities and farmers of color growing “specific types of corn for Latino families or specific squash varieties for Asian communities.”

For Arizona school nutrition director Patti Bilbrey, the $100,000 funding void represents more than budget math. “It wasn’t just about keeping food costs low — it meant supporting your community and your local farmers,” she explains. California vegetable farmer Matthew Martin describes the aftermath as “chaos and panic,” with producers paralyzed by uncertainty.

The administrative mechanism at play here is the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiative led by Elon Musk, with additional programs now “under review,” including climate-friendly farming incentives. This expanding review has stranded approximately 100 grantees. The real-time effect of following Project 2025’s roadmap represents moving away from diversified, community-oriented farming toward traditional market mechanisms that favor larger, established agribusinesses. Small farmers caught in this transition stand as a silent testament to an agricultural vision plowed under by the dismantling of America’s farm-to-community pipeline.

Charlie in Charge: Trump Chooses Kirk to Oversee the Air Force Academy

President Trump’s Monday appointments to the nation’s military academy boards are more significant than routine administrative housekeeping; they symbolize throwing a bone to Trump loyalists who have stuck with their leader. These selections — particularly naming Charlie Kirk to the Air Force Academy Board of Visitors — reveal an administration intent on embedding ideological allies in institutions responsible for shaping future military leadership.

Kirk, the 31-year-old founder of Turning Point USA and staunch Project 2025 supporter who has called Martin Luther King Jr. “awful” and “not a good person,” and described the Civil Rights Act as “a huge mistake,” now holds authority over an institution training tomorrow’s Air Force and Space Force officers. His documented skepticism about Black pilots’ qualifications creates an alarming contradiction: a board member questioning the very diversity the Academy has worked to foster.

The Air Force Academy Board influences curriculum, teaching practices, and institutional priorities, so this is not merely a ceremonial position. Kirk will share this power with anti-LGBTQ+ Senator Tommy Tuberville (R-AL), and former Trump advisor Dina Powell.

Kirk’s elevation fits into a broader pattern of appointments rewarding personal loyalty over actual skills or qualifications. Former national security adviser Michael Flynn — a Christian nationalist pardoned by Trump after pleading guilty to lying to the FBI about Russian contacts — will join West Point’s board alongside Maureen Bannon, daughter of former Trump strategist Steve Bannon.

The Naval Academy board appointments further illustrate this pattern of problematic appointees: Trump’s valet Walt Nauta (previously indicted in the classified documents case), former press secretary Sean Spicer, and Rep. Ronny Jackson, the former White House physician who faced allegations of misconduct during his service and was investigated by the Pentagon Inspector General who found that he “disparaged, belittled, bullied and humiliated” subordinates, drank alcohol while on duty during presidential trips, took Ambien while responsible for the president’s health, and sexually harassed a female medical professional. 

Since taking office, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth and Trump have already banned transgender service members and dismantled diversity programs throughout the military. These board appointments provide another mechanism for ideological transformation of military institutions.

Kirk, despite never completing college, holding government office or campaign staff positions, has become extraordinarily influential in Trump’s circle. The New York Times recently reported that Kirk participated in vetting administration appointees and visited the White House “a hundred-plus” times during Trump’s first term. After the 2024 election, he was “in the room with the president-elect to discuss potential cabinet nominees.”

Through Turning Point USA, Kirk has built a conservative youth movement that has grown from $4.3 million in revenue in 2016 to $91.4 million in 2023. During a December donor meeting in Palm Beach, Kirk boldly claimed credit for delivering the youth vote to Trump in the 2024 election, declaring that “the bad guys are finally on defense.”

This appointment transforms Kirk from an external advocate to an internal authority figure with direct influence over how future military officers are educated. For an individual who has called the Civil Rights Act a mistake that created a “permanent DEI-type bureaucracy,” this position offers unprecedented power to reshape military education according to his ideology.

America’s Retreat From Press Freedom: The Global Implications

The inevitable news came at 9:43 am on March 15. Crystal G. Thomas, Director of Human Resources at the U.S. Agency for Global Media, delivered the administration’s verdict to Voice of America employees in an email: all personnel were being placed on administrative leave, effectively silencing America’s oldest international broadcasting network. Elon Musk, a fan of eliminating what can’t be controlled, has been demanding its demise since at least February 9, 2025, and the authors and supporters of Project 2025 also wanted to put an end to the free flow of information at the VOA, which the U.S. has championed for 80 years.

President Trump’s executive order from the previous day had a clear purpose: ensuring “taxpayers are no longer on the hook for radical propaganda.” The consequences were immediate and severe, making it “impossible for the organization to carry out its vital mission… especially critical today, when America’s adversaries, like Iran, China, and Russia, are sinking billions of dollars into creating false narratives to discredit the United States.” China cheered.

The network born in 1942 to counter Nazi disinformation now sits dormant, its 1,300 employees in limbo while ten of its journalists remain detained in prisons abroad for practicing journalism, their support system suddenly evaporated.

This dismantling of America’s primary international broadcasting apparatus occurs alongside a radical restructuring of the domestic press landscape. The traditional White House press pool system — designed as a check on power, independent of presidential whims — has been methodically disassembled. April Ryan, one of the White House press corps’ longest-serving members, describes the transformation with stark clarity: “This presidential press pool change is not a minor issue. It is akin to state-run media in Russia and China where the leader expects the press to deliver favorable news on and about him and reporters ask questions that will not raise his ire.” 

The administration’s new approach has already produced revelatory moments. In a meeting between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, a reporter from Russian state media outlet TASS was discovered among the press pool in the Oval Office, only to be hastily removed following complaints. Ryan’s observation cuts to the heart of the matter: “The White House essentially replaced the Associated Press with a Russian state TV reporter from TASS.”

Standing at the Department of Justice on March 14, Trump articulated his vision of press “freedom” with unsettling directness. He specifically named major media organizations — ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, MSNBC, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and The Washington Post—declaring them “corrupt” and “illegal,” mere “political arms of the Democrat Party.” More pointedly, he added: “It has to stop. It has to be illegal. It’s influencing judges and it’s entered — it’s really changing law, and it just cannot be legal. I don’t believe it’s legal.” 

The symbolism was unmistakable: a president at the Department of Justice — the custodian of constitutional protections — suggesting critical press coverage “has to be illegal” represents an elevation of rhetoric into potential policy.

Internationally, the consequences ripple outward. In the global information ecosystem, VOA has functioned as a counterweight to authoritarian narratives for eight decades. “For Russia — and other American adversaries—the silencing of the U.S. state media network really is golden,” writes Leon Krauze. “Without the counterweight of institutions like VOA, Russia’s disinformation apparatus will face even fewer obstacles. The tentacles of Russia Today (RT) and its subsidiaries already extend across much of the world, particularly in Latin America, where their influence is substantial.” 

Thibaut Bruttin, General Director of Reporters Without Borders, characterizes the shutdown as a move that “threatens press freedom worldwide and negates 80 years of American history in supporting a free flow of information.” The historical echoes are difficult to ignore. As Krauze observes, “Just as Nazi propagandists understood that narratives shape wars, Moscow’s messengers today recognize that controlling the flow of information is key to power. The difference is that this time, it is the United States — not its adversaries — that has chosen to retreat.” 

For Geoffrey Cowan, who directed VOA from 1992 to 1996, the principal beneficiaries are unambiguous: “The biggest winner will be people whose interest is in spreading propaganda,” he told The Daily Beast. 

The administration has framed its decision in terms of cost-cutting and ideological correction. The White House statement cites criticisms from Dan Robinson, a 34-year veteran of Voice of America, who wrote that the agency “has essentially become a hubris-filled rogue operation often reflecting a leftist bias aligned with partisan national media.” 

Meanwhile, in the White House briefing room, the transformation of access has concrete manifestations. The administration has instituted a system where the president hand-picks the group of reporters who go into the Oval Office, the Cabinet Room, or travel with him at home and abroad. The administration’s coordinated approach to restructuring the media landscape — both internationally and from the White House itself —suggests a comprehensive strategy of controlling the message. At stake is not just the fate of particular institutions, but America’s historical position as a global defender of press freedom and the free flow of information.