The director of the conservative Heritage Foundation’s high-profile personnel building initiative for a second Trump administration is stepping aside after sustained attacks from Democrats and criticism from the former president’s campaign.
Project 2025 director Paul Dans is stepping down from his role and leaving the Heritage Foundation over two years after the initiative began, Heritage president Kevin Roberts said in a statement on Tuesday.
“When we began Project 2025 in April 2022, we set a timeline for the project to conclude its policy drafting after the two party conventions this year, and we are sticking to that timeline,” Roberts said.
“Paul, who built the project from scratch and bravely led this endeavor over the past two years, will be departing the team and moving up to the front where the fight remains.”
Over the past few years, Roberts has shifted Heritage in a more Trump-friendly direction, as exemplified by Project 2025 and its shifting foreign-policy stances. Trump and his supporters often lament the perceived disloyalty of the personnel Trump hired to run his administration, leading many to conclude that better personnel will be needed next time around.
“This tool was built for any administration dedicated to conservative ideals to utilize. The work of the project was due to wrap with the nominating conventions of the political parties. Our work is presently winding down, and I planned later in August to leave Heritage. Electoral season is upon us, and I want to direct all my efforts to winning bigly,” Dans said in an internal email, according to Politico.
Project 2025 will continue to build personnel on the federal, state, and local levels. The initiative combines a personnel database, training programs, and a 900-page conservative policy manifesto with prescriptions for a range of issues. Dozens of conservative organizations and policy experts came together to write the manifesto and develop the personnel database.
The Trump campaign celebrated Dans’s departure and suggested Project 2025 is misrepresenting its level of influence over a potential second Trump term.
“Reports of Project 2025’s demise would be greatly welcomed and should serve as notice to anyone or any group trying to misrepresent their influence with President Trump and his campaign — it will not end well for you,” said Trump campaign senior advisors Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita.
Although Dans and other former Trump administration officials have been involved with Project 2025, it is an entirely separate entity from the Trump campaign and the Republican party.
Trump distanced himself from Project 2025 earlier this month after Roberts suggested a second American revolution is underway to defeat the left. Since then, Trump has heightened his criticism of Project 2025, and, at one point, compared it to the “radical left” faction of the Democratic party.
Democrats frequently attack Project 2025 for its plans to overhaul the administrative state and its staunch social conservatism, especially on abortion. The relentless ad campaign Democrats have waged against Project 2025 often links Trump to its agenda and warns of the power Project 2025 would wield if Trump wins another term.