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revolving door project
Detailed Report Exposes Serious Threat of the Neoliberal, Trump-Lite 'Abundance' Agenda
"With the Trump administration, the Republican-led Congress, and right-wing Supreme Court advancing their attacks on bedrock environmental law, Abundance proponents are sounding more like their echo than their opposition."
Aug 27, 2025
The much-discussed 'Abundance Agenda' is not the solution its proponents claim it be, according to a devastating report published this week by a pair of progressive watchdogsdraw which argues the policy framework is more of a neoliberal Trojan Horse than anything else.
Journalists Ezra Klein and Derek Thompson's book Abundance, released earlier this year in the first months of President Donald Trump's second term, was described as a "once-in-a-generation, paradigm-shifting call" to change how the US thinks about problems like housing and the environmental impact of infrastructure projects, with the authors calling on the Democratic Party to fight the Trump agenda with "liberalism that builds."
Instead of getting bogged down in debates over wealth and income inequality or harnessing growing outrage over the hold that the superrich have on the US political system, Klein and Thompson advised the party to reach out to voters by pushing to end the "stifling bureaucratic requirements that killed private sector innovation."
Reining in "burdensome government processes" like environmental and tenant safety regulations—not fighting for programs that would benefit everyone in the US regardless of their wealth or income—was the key to securing "abundance for all," said the authors and their supporters in government, such as Reps. Ritchie Torres (D-N.Y.) and Josh Harder (D-Calif.).
But in addition to beginning their book with a "glaring error," said the authors of a new report by the government watchdogs Revolving Door Project (RDP) and Open Markets Institute on Tuesday—asserting that "supply is how much there is of something" without accounting for the fact that private corporations decide how much of a product they want to sell to make a profit—Klein and Thompson ignore the fact that long before they put pen to paper, right-wing politicians and think tanks were already pushing an "abundance" agenda.
"When abundance-supporting politicians are asked about it, Klein's name is often the first word out of their mouth," said Jeff Hauser, executive director of RDP. "But this obscures the powerful coalition of political pundits, politicians, and think tanks that have painstakingly constructed a national movement around 'abundance' for years before the publication of this book. These interested parties have taken on the more detail-oriented work of actually producing policy for abundance, and it is often far more conservative and destructive than implied in Klein and Thompson's superficial tract."
Klein and Thompson rely on a "dishonest or sloppy" interpretation of the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), which they equate with a permitting law and claim requires drawn-out environmental impact reviews, to make their argument that approvals for new infrastructure should be less cumbersome, said RDP.
The law requires the government to assess environmental impacts before developers can build major infrastructure, and has been heralded as a bedrock environmental statute—but it had been a target of the fossil fuel industry and the policymakers that do its bidding long before "abundance" proponents took aim at NEPA.
"When abundance-supporting politicians are asked about it, Klein's name is often the first word out of their mouth. But this obscures the powerful coalition of political pundits, politicians, and think tanks that have painstakingly constructed a national movement around 'abundance' for years before the publication of this book."
Proponents of "permitting reform"—a tenet of the abundance movement—claim that NEPA is a barrier to clean energy development, but the report finds that renewable energy projects are typically delayed for other reasons and that NEPA oppenents' frequently cited examples of "four- to ten-year timelines to complete a NEPA analysis are the exception, not the rule," as University of Utah law professor Jamie Pleune found in a 2023 Roosevelt Institute report.
Quoting Pleune, the report—titled Debunking the Abundance Agenda—notes that "most delays in the NEPA process are functional, not regulatory."
Pleune explained that most sources of delay are "insufficient staff, unstable budgets, vague or incomplete permit applications, waiting for information from a permit applicant, or poor coordination among permitting authorities." Such delays, however, "can be addressed without eliminating environmental standards, analytical rigor, or community engagement."
RDP's report recounts efforts by former right-wing Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia to pass permitting reform legislation in 2022-23, as the Biden administration fought to pass the Inflation Reduction Act, in the interest of getting approval of the controversial Mountain Valley Pipeline fast-tracked.
The Fiscal Responsibility Act, which raised the debt limit, expedited the MVP's approval, and codified a number of changes to NEPA—including arbitrary time limits on environmental impact assessments—came out of Manchin's efforts.
NEPA has been credited with protecting crucial wetlands near an industrial facility that was built with with American Recovery and Reinvestment Act funds; providing a process to explain to the public in Stephentown, New York the greenhouse gas savings that could be achieved if the area's new electrical grid shifted away from fossil fuels-based frequency regulation technology; and ensuring soil and groundwater contamination would be remediated ahead of the construction of a senior living facility in Kansas City, Missouri.
But as RDP noted, throughout Manchin's efforts to roll back environmental assessment requirements and pave the way for the MVP, "abundance proponents... criticized progressive skeptics who warned that weakening environmental review procedures would likely benefit the fossil fuel industry most of all."
Klein argued that “stream-lined permitting will do more to accelerate clean energy than it will to encourage the use of fossil fuels,” because "a simpler, swifter path to construction means more for the clean energy side of the ledger."
He claimed that Democratic opponents to right-wing "permitting reform" legislation lacked their own solutions for expediting the construction of clean energy projects—but soon after he made those claims, lawmakers including Reps. Mike Levin (D-Calif.) and
Sean Casten (D-Ill.) introduced a bill "that would expedite the green transition by facilitating quicker construction of interregional transmission lines, incentivizing renewable energy production on public lands and in federal waters, and increasing grid reliability—all while enhancing community engagement and without giveaways to the fossil fuel industry."
As RDP senior researcher and report co-author Kenny Stancil said, "Abundance advocates erroneously blame environmental review for hindering the clean energy transition, for example, but they have little to say about the real causes of delay, including privately owned utilities' profit-driven opposition to building interstate transmission lines, investors' prioritization of short-term oil and gas profits, and interference from fossil fuel-backed politicians."
The RDP report also points to Klein and Thompson's "indiscriminate anti-regulatory ethos" in regards to their arguments about housing supply, which they argue should be increased by reforming land use policy and loosening zoning rules.
"We agree that it’s a good idea to increase housing supply, and that liberalizing zoning rules is necessary in many places (especially in affluent, low-density suburbs, important locations the book ignores almost entirely)," reads the report. "However, abundance advocates seem to lose their way when they begin to veer away from arbitrary restrictions on housing construction... towards regulations that—in their mind—impede housing development. For instance, zoning can keep polluting industrial activities away from residential areas and ensure adequate infrastructural capacity like water, sewers, schools, and hospital beds for a community."
Klein and Thompson claim that requirements for air filtration systems in housing next to highways raise construction costs and contribute to homelessness, and suggest tenant protections could contribute to housing shortages by making "landlordism less profitable."
"In both cases, abundance proponents prioritize aggregate housing supply above all else, spending little time examining the real
world impact of their policy prescriptions," writes RDP. "What percentage of overall construction cost is the addition of a HEPA air filtration system? Will this requirement truly result in increased homelessness? How much? What are the potential long-term health
benefits and financial savings from having these residents breathe cleaner air? Will this requirement begin to alleviate the dire
racial disparities seen in asthma rates? These questions go unanswered in Klein and Thompson's book."
The Abundance authors also support eliminating land-use regulations in disaster-prone areas, even as hurricane and wildfire threats intensify—a policy that would "not only imperil human life, but it will result in post-disaster housing crises and could threaten the stability of crucial financial institutions."
The real estate investors the abundance movement focuses on maximize profits, which do not always correlate with construction output, said RDP—and centering the interests of landlords and developers who aim to cut construction costs distracts from what RDP calls the only solution that would provide affordable housing for all: social housing, or community-owned housing that exists outside of the private real estate market.
The report details how—although Thompson and Klein may identify themselves as liberals—their abundance worldview mirrors that of commentators and policymakers on the right, from the libertarian Niskanen Center to Trump's own appointees.
The stated mission of Trump's National Energy Dominance Council, chaired by Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Interior Secretary Doug Burgum, couches its mission in the language favored by the Abundance authors, calling for "improving the processes for permitting, production, generation, distribution, regulation, and transportation across all forms of American energy"—and has been praised by abundance enthusiasts like author Matt Yglesias.
The administration has also expedited permitting for liquefied natural gas exports while undertaking permitting reforms against clean energy.
"As the report explores, abundance talking points have already been adopted by Trump's energy appointees to justify new fossil fuel projects, while circumventing public participation and transparency in the environmental review process," said Hannah Story Brown, RDP research director and co-author of the report. "With the Trump administration, the Republican-led Congress, and right-wing Supreme Court advancing their attacks on bedrock environmental law, Abundance proponents are sounding more like their echo than their opposition."
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'Matter of Life and Death': New Tracker Exposes Trump Regime's Attack on Disaster Preparedness
"It's only a matter of time before Trump and Musk's reckless assault on disaster response and preparedness kills people in the United States," said a researcher with government watchdog The Revolving Door Project.
Jul 02, 2025
President Donald Trump has openly stated his desire to dismantle the Federal Emergency Management Agency—a move that has left some experts fearful about how the United States will handle natural disasters such as hurricanes in the coming months.
The Revolving Door Project, a government watchdog group, has now put together a tracking tool to keep tabs on how much the administration's attacks on both FEMA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have worsened the nation's disaster preparedness.
The tool has two components: An interactive map showing all of the state disaster aid requests that the Trump administration has outright denied or only partially approved and an interactive timeline documenting all of the times that the administration has undermined the functionality of America's disaster preparedness agencies through actions such as placing agency employees on administrative leave and disbanding key bodies such as FEMA's National Advisory Council and its National Dam Safety Review Board.
All of these disruptions and cuts, argued Revolving Door Project senior researcher Kenny Stancil, are likely to come back to bite America in a big way when another natural disaster strikes.
"It's only a matter of time before Trump and Musk's reckless assault on disaster response and preparedness kills people in the United States," he said in explaining the need for the initiative. "It nearly happened in mid-May in Kentucky, where a DOGE-damaged NWS forecast office had to scramble for staff before a tornado. Amid last week's heatwave, low-income households across the country were missing the federal support they need to keep the air conditioning on. And when a major hurricane arrives, Trump, Musk, OMB Director Russell Vought, Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, and DHS Secretary Kristi Noem will almost certainly have blood on their hands."
Revolving Door Project executive director Jeff Hauser issued a similarly dire warning about the administration's actions on U.S. disaster preparedness and he described the actions being taken by the administration as "a matter of life-and-death." He also accused the administration of "preventing forecasters and emergency managers at all levels from doing what is necessary to prepare for and respond to disasters."
Trump in the past has tried to use federal disaster relief money as a cudgel against his political opponents, such as when he threatened to withhold funding from California during catastrophic wildfires unless the state did a better job of "raking" its forests.
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Musk Might Be Gone, But Watchdogs Warn Trump/DOGE Carnage Will Continue
"Musk's departure obscures but does not actually change the continuity of DOGE's staff and mission to destroy everything that protects the public from the depredations of the most rapacious oligarchs," said one critic.
May 30, 2025
Critics of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency cautioned Friday against undue elation or complacency over Elon Musk stepping down as de facto DOGE chief, warning that officials at the contentious agency are pressing ahead with U.S. President Donald Trump's mission of eviscerating key agencies and the ability of the federal government to properly function.
With Musk's official departure from DOGE this week—returning to the private sector to run his beleaguered business empire—most of the agency's leadership and rank-and-file staff remain in place. As the Revolving Door Project (RDP) noted Friday, key DOGE officials "maintain extensive ties to Musk's corporate empire, with many of them having come to DOGE directly from one of Musk's companies."
According to RDP research, "at least 46 former or current DOGE members have substantial and direct ties to Elon Musk."
"DOGE isn't going anywhere, according to the Trump administration's own officials," RDP said. The watchdog group warned specifically about Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell Vought, who they said "seems to be the new boss in town."
The visions of the two men, said RDP, "have been aligned from the start. Musk endorsed Vought's view of the unconstitutionality of the Impoundment Control Act and said that DOGE would work 'closely with [OMB].'"
Yesterday, Elon Musk claimed once again to be stepping back from DOGE. But does that mean that his lackeys are too? If Musk leaves government but his loyalists stay behind, what difference does that really make? 🧵
[image or embed]
— Revolving Door Project (@revolvingdoordc.bsky.social) May 29, 2025 at 6:28 AM
Vought co-authored the policy portion of Project 2025, a far-right blueprint for gutting the government and expanding executive power.
"There is no daylight between Elon Musk and Russ Vought on the aim of greenlighting corporate abuse, as anyone can see from their joint destruction of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau," RDP executive director Jeff Hauser said Friday. "DOGE's Musk-tied staffers have already burrowed into the government, and having a new boss who has coordinated extensively with Musk isn't likely to change their actual actions much at all."
"Musk's departure obscures but does not actually change the continuity of DOGE's staff and mission to destroy everything that protects the public from the depredations of the most rapacious oligarchs," Hauser added.
Another watchdog, Accountable.US, noted Friday that Vought "has a nearly 20-year record working on Republican efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare—including overseeing numerous Trump budget proposals."
"It's proof that DOGE's extreme agenda, which is causing ordinary families to fall behind, is full steam ahead as Trump and his allies in Congress push forward deep cuts to Americans' essential benefits," the group continued. "Last week, congressional Republicans advanced the largest cuts to Medicaid and [Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program] in history, which would result in 14 million Americans losing health coverage, 3 million households without food assistance, and an increased burden for millions with higher education and energy costs. All while adding over $4 trillion to the deficit."
"Americans deserve real government reforms to cut red tape, eliminate waste, and ensure taxpayers are able to access the services they pay for," Accountable.US added. "That was never DOGE's goal. Instead Trump and Musk tried to gut Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security, to line their own pockets and those of their billionaire friends with tax cuts, and the administration is only just getting started."
As one staffer at the DOGE-beset National Institutes of Health told Politico, "DOGE is still hungry. We've still got to feed the fucking dog."
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