If someone were to ask me what I considered to be the most important issue of our times, I would say it is the rise of authoritarian movements – the efforts of the few to control the thoughts, aspirations, freedom and bodily autonomy of the masses through intimidation, fear and violence. These movements are destructive and dangerous! They are harmful to individuals, societies, and the planet!  The authoritarian wins, while everyone and everything else loses! It is not a path a civilized, prosperous or spiritually mature country or culture chooses! 

Democracies take a lot of work, and are not easy to manage because they require conversations, compromise and negotiation, and not everyone gets everything they want out of that process.  But within democracies, there is always a means for achieving change, having your voice and ideas heard, and to do so without violence.  However, when a democracy is lost to an authoritarian movement (where absolute power and control belongs to the leader alone), it is almost impossible to get it back, because a variety of ideas is no longer welcome and any attempts to change at that point are met with violence from the authoritarian regime.

The 2024 election is about one thing, and one thing only:  What kind of country do we want to live in?  Will it be a democracy, or an authoritarian state? 

The issue for this election is not about which party a person belongs to, or whether a candidate is too old or too young, or supports wealth or not, or whether they are male or female, or gay or straight, white or not, or Christian or not.  It is about what country we are deciding we want to live in – what kind of country we are willing to live in and can tolerate – because the choice we make regarding that question this year, will determine our future as a people from this point forward.  And while we currently have 2 choices to consider – democracy or authoritarianism – the selection of the latter choice will fundamentally change our options for the remainder of our lifetimes, because there will be no further negotiation or turning back or changing our minds if that choice is made. Why do I say that?  Because of Project 2025.

What is Project 2025?  It is a 900-page plan, published by the Heritage Foundation, written primarily by current and former Trump officials and advisors, and supported by over 100 organizations primarily funded by the Koch network and Leonard Leo, which would go into effect on day 1 of a Trump presidency (Remember how Trump promised to be a dictator on Day 1?).  Although Trump has recently been trying to distance himself from Project 2025, his own “Agenda 47” basically mirrors the wording in Project 2025.  The Project 2025 manual methodically explains how to deconstruct the democracy we currently live in by dismantling our system of checks and balances and consolidating complete power in the Presidency and Executive Branch. Recent Supreme Court decisions, incidentally (yes, this same Supreme Court majority which has close ties to Leonard Leo and the Heritage Foundation), have been paving the way for the implementation of this Plan! Project 2025 would also require the federal workforce to provide and ensure complete loyalty to Donald Trump – not to the Constitution, but to Donald Trump.  If you don’t believe me, please check this out for yourself.  It is posted here:  https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf  and here (Internet Archive) if the original site removes the posting of its plan:  https://archive.org/details/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL

Briefly, Project 2025 imposes a radical social and religious order on all citizens, and utilizes authoritarian measures to maintain control of US citizens and non-citizens, such as domestic military deployments, detention camps, mass deportations, political purging of the federal workforce, and political weaponization of federal law enforcement. Some of its goals are to impose restrictions on the rights and freedoms for certain defined groups, increase control over women’s reproductive health, end secular public education and provide public funding for religious schools, rollback climate action measures, remove safety nets (such as Social Security and Medicare), and engage in numerous privatization schemes.  Additionally, it would raise the retirement age, eliminate unions and all worker protections, eliminate no-fault divorce, ban all contraceptives and implement a total ban on abortions, condemn single mothers and only recognize “traditional” families, eliminate regulations on big business and oil, encourage arctic drilling, use the military to break up protests, dismantle the FBI, Homeland Security, FDA, EPA, NOAA and more. It uses all the right “buzzwords” in its “Conservative Promise”, which it lists as: 

1. Restore the family as the centerpiece of American life and protect our children.

2. Dismantle the administrative state and return self-governance to the American people.

3. Defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats.

4. Secure our God-given individual rights to live freely—what our Constitution calls “the Blessings of Liberty.”

But these cover a darker agenda which decides:  (a) whose families are the centerpiece of American life, (b) whose definition of American life is considered acceptable, (c) who decides which parts of the administrative state needs dismantling, (d) who has an actual right to self-governance, (e) whose individual rights are deemed to be God-given, and (f) who is actually entitled to live freely!

Kevin Roberts, the head of the Heritage Foundation and architect of Project 2025, stated that “Project 2025 will not be stopped”, and in an obvious threat of violence towards those who disagree, stated: “We are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”  Kevin Roberts would have us believe that his “second American Revolution” is legitimately American and patriotic, and that “the left” does not represent real American values.  I believe that the majority of people on the right, left and center do not view this country in the same way that he defines it.  His “second American Revolution” involves overthrowing the form of democracy that our Founders envisioned (including its system of checks and balances), and returning to the installation of an unaccountable King – which was exactly what the original American Revolution was eliminating so that people could truly be free!  His view, and the focus of Project 2025 is not American, and it is not “patriotic”!  It is authoritarian and anti-democratic! 

Here are some sources which describe Project 2025 in more detail (I will add to this list as I find other sources):

*The People’s Guide to Project 2025 – Created by Democracy Forward

*Project 2025:  Exposing the Far-Right Assault on America – Created by The Center for American Progress

*The Project 2025 Song! – Very well done animated description of Project 2025 in a song that you will easily understand and remember!

*Stop the Coup 2025

*Project 2025 Explained – Created by Red Wine and Blue

*Heather Cox Richardson Talks Project 2025 – This is a 54-minute discussion with a wonderful historian, Heather Cox Richardson, that is definitely worth listening to!

*Project 2025 Admin – Created by Court Accountability Action, American Oversight and State Democracy Defenders Action

*Gen Z’s Guide to Project 2025 – Created by Voters of Tomorrow

The Presidential election in November is unlike any other we have experienced in our almost 250-year history as a country, because, for the first time in our American experiment, one candidate (Donald Trump) is running on a promise to replace our democracy with an authoritarian regime, and has an actual written playbook from which to implement those ideals.  This is an extension of a movement that has been occurring all over the world, which thankfully, has been pushed back by many countries (the most recent being France and the UK). 

Whatever your political leanings, please consider for a moment what it would look like in the US without many of the freedoms you currently take for granted. Under an authoritarian, their way is the ONLY way.  They might sound great for the moment if you are not one of the “targets”, but at some point, everyone becomes a target of an authoritarian, no matter how loyal they are or have been. There are plenty of examples of this all around the world!

Please think about the enormous impact of the vote you cast in November, because it will affect not only you, but your family, your children, your friends, your neighbors, and the generations to come.  Is freedom important to you now?  If it disappears, it’s gone forever! Freedom never truly exists in an authoritarian state!

Please take a look at Project 2025, please ensure our country remains a democracy and constitutional republic, and with this in mind, please vote in November!