Democrats are using Project 2025, the conservative policy agenda that has plagued former President Donald Trump’s campaign, to also target down-ballot Republicans as they look to flip the closely divided House in November.
The proposed governing plan’s emergence on the congressional map is another testament to its remarkable political transformation this year, evolving from a conservative think tank’s little-known policy agenda to a prominent issue on the campaign trail. Republicans up and down the ballot, including Trump, are now trying to minimize the political fallout.
Already, at least four House Democratic candidates have used paid media to elevate the issue in their battleground contests this month. In at least two cases, they released ads focused solely on the GOP candidates’ supposed support of Project 2025, using it to attack them as extremists bent on reducing abortion rights and harming the social safety net.
“Zach Nunn’s voting record is the blueprint for a controversial plan called Project 2025,” said the narrator in one ad targeting GOP Rep. Zach Nunn in Iowa’s 3rd Congressional District, where Democratic nominee Lanon Baccam is running against him.
Nunn’s campaign responded to the ad, saying in a statement he had never endorsed it. And other Republicans argue these attacks are baseless and desperate, but they may be picking up steam. Democratic candidates have also mentioned the agenda in ads for battleground House races in Virginia, Nevada and New Hampshire. A super PAC backing their efforts, House Majority PAC, has also mentioned it in mail sent to voters.
The ads remain rare during a campaign cycle in which dozens of new ads are released every week. But Democratic strategists say their candidates could feature the agenda even more frequently in their ads, citing the public’s growing awareness and dislike of it.
“Where you will see this used the most is in seats held by Republicans that Biden won in 2020,” a Democratic strategist said.
Progressive pollsters say the way a policy blueprint like Project 2025 has emerged as a key issue this year is without precedent, at least in recent political history.
“I cannot think of a single parallel that comes even close,” said Maryann Cousens, polling and analytics manager for the Navigator poll, which has polled on the public’s views of Project 2025 since early summer.
A recent poll from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee of battleground House districts found 56% of registered voters have an unfavorable view of Project 2025, including 62% of independents. Those numbers broadly align with other surveys.
Meanwhile, Republicans have repeatedly denied having any involvement and criticized Democrats for trying to change the subject from an economy and safety record that voters disapprove of.
“When Democrats recognized their own open-border, pro-crime and pro-inflation policies were hated by Americans, they fabricated a false attack based on something House Republicans had never even read,” said Will Reinert, spokesperson for the National Republican Congressional Committee. “This desperate lie is the clearest sign yet that House Democrats see their chances of regaining the majority dwindling.”
Project 2025 was an outgrowth of the “Mandate for Leadership,” a policy guidebook first issued by The Heritage Foundation, a major conservative think tank, during the Reagan administration. The latest edition, authored in part by former Trump officials, includes proposals that would expand the power of the executive branch over federal agencies and restrict access to abortion.
House Democrats have pushed Project 2025 for months, including it in press releases, interviews and microsites dedicated to tying Republicans to it, and that hasn’t just been on the campaign trail. During the most recent House funding fight, Rep. Rosa DeLauro, ranking member of the Appropriations Committee, called Republican spending proposals “extreme funding bills based on Trump’s Project 2025” from the chamber floor.
In response to Rep. Clay Higgins’ racist social media post, Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called the GOP “the party of Donald Trump, Mark Robinson, Marjorie Taylor Greene, Clay Higgins and Project 2025.”
The Democratic Steering and Policy Committee held a shadow hearing last week about the project, which Jeffries attended and where no Republicans participated. There, Democrats tied two of their most politically potent issues together: Project 2025 and abortion.
“While Americans are looking for real solutions, these Democratic leaders offer nothing but empty rhetoric and distractions,” said Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts in a statement after the hearing.
Massachusetts Rep. Ayanna Pressley told NOTUS Democrats would continue to pair those issues together on the campaign trail.
“Project 2025 is more than a blueprint. It’s a playbook,” Pressley said.
It has already been a key theme of Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign all summer, a permanent fixture in ads, emails and speeches, along with a prime-time presence at the Democratic National Convention, but all signs point to Democrats looking for even more ways to bring up Project 2025 on the campaign trail.
Though Trump and his campaign have repeatedly denied having anything to do with the project — “Reports of Project 2025’s demise would be greatly welcomed,” his campaign managers said in one statement — polling showed continued Democratic attacks tying Trump to the project resonated with potential voters.
It remains an open question how much Project 2025 will ultimately affect Trump’s final vote total, much less House Republicans. While many down-ballot Republicans have long-standing support for some policies included in Project 2025 and have ties to Heritage, they have less of a direct tie to the project branding itself.
“When you’re fighting for inches on the electoral map, both sides will look for anything for leverage,” one strategist, who previously worked for Heritage, told NOTUS. “They’re looking for an edge, and Project 2025 is what they’re hoping will be their extreme straw man.”
“The Democrats definitely think it’s a weapon for them,” he added. “We’re not seeing it as strong a weapon as they think it is at this juncture.”
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Ben T.N. Mause is a NOTUS reporter and an Allbritton Journalism Institute fellow. Alex Roarty is a reporter at NOTUS.
Update: This story has been updated to reflect Maryann Cousens’ title.