Vice President Kamala Harris has spent considerable time and energy in recent months attacking Project 2025, the conservative movement’s plan to shrink the administrative state and return Washington to the American people.
When asked about former President Donald Trump’s second assassination attempt in a recent interview, the vice president responded by even saying that our work is a threat to the safety of the American people.
This attempt to equate policy ideas to assassination attempts, rather than honestly discussing the issues, is disingenuous and dangerous. So before the Vice President raises the temperature even further, let me set the record straight.
Project 2025 is not about Donald Trump
Our policy work is not, and never has been, about any particular presidential candidate. We began our work in the spring of 2022, before President Trump announced he was running for a second term and well before the primaries.
Our work is not special either. Many other think tanks on both sides of the aisle, including the far-left Center for American Progress, are making similar efforts to advance their priorities.
Finally, our work is not new. The Heritage Foundation has developed conservative policy strategies every election cycle since Ronald Reagan’s presidential victories in 1980 and 1984.
These policies were, and continue to be, focused on empowering Americans to achieve the American Dream, which is increasingly out of reach for many Americans. I feel that there is.
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That means our policies are focused on protecting Americans’ freedom to work hard in stable jobs. The freedom for Americans to put dinner on the table for their families. And Americans have the freedom to live in their own homes in safe neighborhoods.
Unfortunately, nearly every objective measure shows that it is much harder for Americans to do that now than it was when the Biden-Harris administration entered the White House.
Americans are struggling to pay their bills
The highest inflation rate in 40 years means average weekly wages are $160 higher than when President Joe Biden and Harris took office, but the amount is $35 less.
Last year, the typical American household paid $709 more each month for necessities like food, clothing, shelter, and transportation than just two years ago.
Additionally, the average monthly mortgage payment has nearly doubled over the past four years, according to several metrics, and the affordability of homeownership remains at record lows.
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The White House knows these facts and figures, and millions of Americans know the consequences of this administration’s failures. That’s why so many of our policies are popular with the public, outside of the influence of Washington, D.C., and the mainstream news media.
Most people support sending U.S. troops to the southern border to thwart drug cartels. They are in favor of allowing parents to send their children to the school of their choice. And our polling shows they agree that major regulations must be approved by Congress before they can go into effect.
Other policies we promote, such as dismantling the Department of Education and fighting the porn industry, are less popular, but we believe they are equally essential to restoring the health of our republic.
Popular or not, the fact that a group of conservative organizations is offering conservative policy solutions should not be scandalous. Of course, no one should feel unsafe.
What should be a scandal is that after four years of failure and months of attacking us, this White House continues to deploy the same tired ideas that have been detrimental to the American Dream.
What should be a scandal is that the vice president tried to avoid discussing substantive policy issues. Americans want and deserve real debate, not atmosphere.
Kevin Roberts is chairman of Heritage Action and the Heritage Foundation.
