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Project 2025 and the Year It Made
Over the past year, Trump has followed the plans laid out by Project 2025 almost to the letter, leaving the rest of the world reeling.
Jan 03, 2026
The year 2025 was marked by the Trump shock: an unprecedented wave of extreme brutality, unapologetic nationalism, and unrestrained extractivism that shook the world as never before since 1945.
To better understand what made it all possible, and how to confront it in the future, we must turn to its roots. Namely, to Project 2025, the 920-page report published by the Heritage Foundation, Washington’s most influential conservative think tank, in 2023. From one state department to another (security, immigration, education, energy, trade, etc.), the report outlines the strategy to follow after taking office, targeted for January 2025. It even specifies the content and timetable for executive orders, the presidential decrees signed publicly and in rapid succession by Donald Trump since his inauguration.
The report drew on the work of hundreds of conservative experts—as they call themselves—brought together by the foundation, which is lavishly funded by corporations and billionaires. What stands out most when reading the report today is the degree of technical, political, and ideological preparation behind the Trump administration. Over the past year, Trump has followed the plans laid out by Project 2025 almost to the letter. The new National Security Strategy published by the White House on December 5 reads almost like a copy-and-paste of the project.
Revealingly, Project 2025 identifies several political and ideological enemies. First, there are the globalist liberals, staunch advocates of absolute free trade and unfettered globalization, who are portrayed as useful idiots. Easy to defeat and despise, these liberal elites care little for deindustrialization, job losses, and the destruction of local communities and family ties. In contrast, the proud conservatives behind Project 2025 claim to protect these communities. They do so first by asserting US power in the world, relying heavily on tariffs and all-out extractivism: outright asset seizures (Ukraine, Panama, Greenland), imposing military tribute on Europe, and doubling down on fossil fuels. Next, they champion hard work, family values, and respect for natural and cultural hierarchies. The scourge of « fatherlessness » (growing up without a father, a situation that particularly affects ethnic minorities) is repeatedly condemned and blamed on liberal narratives that deny traditional gender roles and undermine the traditional family.
In reality, the true enemy of the nationalist and extractivist right embodied by Trumpists is the global social-democratic left. That left can win, provided it learns to organize and move beyond the liberal ruts of the past.
But Project 2025 is mainly concerned with an enemy it deems much more dangerous: internationalist socialists and their plans for a global superstate. The fear may seem laughable, as Trumpists sometimes tend to conflate mild-mannered European social democrats with fearsome Marxist revolutionaries. Yet it must be taken seriously. First, because supporters of democratic socialism such as Bernie Sanders and Zohran Mamdani have become very popular among young Americans over the past decade.
Even more importantly, the authors of Project 2025 seem genuinely alarmed by international debates on taxation, climate reparations, or reforms of the global financial system that have gained traction since the 2008 crisis and the Paris Agreement of 2015. They loathe Brazil’s proposal to create a global tax on billionaires just as much as they resent the significant issuance of international currency (Special Drawing Rights by the International Monetary Fund) that occurred after the crises of 2008 and 2020. All the more so because the US will soon lose its veto power over such decisions as its share of global GDP declines.
A particularly telling section concerns trade, which takes the very unusual form in Project 2025 of two chapters setting out opposing positions. The main chapter advocates an avalanche of tariffs closely resembling what Trump implemented in 2025. Like the US president, the author seems to be under no illusions about the extent of industrial job creation this could bring. In general, the report displays little empathy for the poorest and relies on an instrumental, paternalistic, and hierarchical approach to the working-class vote. The main objective of tariffs seems to be to generate revenue for the federal government and to continue dismantling the progressive tax system—a project shared by liberals and conservatives since the 1980s, though conservatives have always maintained a lead in this area.
Project 2025’s second chapter on trade opposes such a strategy. The dissenting conservative author fears that by so openly repudiating the principles of free trade, the door may eventually be opened to global socialist planning. In future, opponents of the market will use this precedent to regulate trade based on social and climate criteria: the ultimate nightmare for conservatives. In the end, Trumpists opted for protectionism for both electoral and financial reasons, but the fear of a socialist drift is clearly acknowledged.
In reality, the true enemy of the nationalist and extractivist right embodied by Trumpists is the global social-democratic left. That left can win, provided it learns to organize and move beyond the liberal ruts of the past. Trumpist brutality is a sign of weakness. The US is losing its grip on the world. Across the Atlantic, some believe they can escape this decline by brandishing weapons and instructing Europeans to preserve their racial purity to maintain the Western alliance. All they will do is further tarnish their country’s image and convince the rest of the world that the future will increasingly be written without them.
This column was first published by Le Monde.
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US Billionaire Wealth Surges to $8.1 Trillion as Affordability Crisis Hammers Working Class
"Billionaires are raking in staggering profits off the backs of ordinary workers," said Chuck Collins of the Institute for Policy Studies.
Jan 02, 2026
The collective wealth of US billionaires surged to $8.1 trillion in 2025 as working-class Americans faced a cost-of-living crisis made worse by President Donald Trump's tariff regime and unprecedented assault on the social safety net.
An analysis released Friday by the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS) found that the top 15 US billionaires saw the largest wealth gains last year, with their collective fortune growing from $2.4 trillion to $3.2 trillion. That 33% gain was more than double the S&P 500's 16% increase in 2025.
What IPS describes as the "elite group" of US billionaires includes Tesla CEO Elon Musk, the richest man in the world; Google co-founder Larry Page; Amazon founder Jeff Bezos; and Oracle executive chairman Larry Ellison.
IPS emphasized that "these staggering combined billionaire wealth totals come as the Trump-GOP budget bill passed in 2025 defunded health insurance, food stamps, and other vital anti-poverty safety net programs, in order to pay for tax cuts for the wealthy and budget increases for militarism and mass deportations."
"The affordability crisis is hitting ordinary Americans particularly hard as we head into the new year, but not everyone is feeling the pain: Billionaires are raking in staggering profits off the backs of ordinary workers,” Chuck Collins, director of the Program on Inequality and the Common Good at IPS, said in a statement.
“These extreme concentrations of wealth and power," Collins added, "undermine our daily lives and further rig our economy in favor of the ultra-rich and corporations, while ordinary Americans get a raw deal once again.”
IPS released its analysis days after Bloomberg reported, based on its Billionaires Index, that the world's 500 richest people gained a record $2.2 trillion in wealth last year.
Omar Ocampo, an IPS researcher, said that in the US, billionaires are "paying far less in taxes compared to the huge amount of wealth they amass," allowing them to continue accumulating vast fortunes, supercharging inequality, and using their wealth and influence to subvert reform efforts.
“Not only are a small number of Americans holding more wealth than the rest of America, but they’re also not paying their fair share in taxes," said Ocampo.
The new report comes as families across the US struggle to make ends meet amid high and still-rising prices for groceries, housing, and other necessities. A Century Foundation survey released last month found that "roughly three in 10 voters delayed or skipped medical care in the past year due to cost, while nearly two-thirds switched to cheaper groceries or bought less food altogether."
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No, Trump Did Not End Taxes on Social Security
Time after time, fact-checkers and news outlets have pointed out that contrary to Trump and Vance’s claims, the “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) did not eliminate taxes on Social Security.
Dec 28, 2025
Watching President Donald Trump’s speech on national television and Vice President JD Vance’s remarks at the Turning Point event in Arizona, we identified with Bill Murray in the movie Groundhog Day. For those who have not seen the movie, Murray plays a TV weatherman who is trapped reliving the same day, day after day. We felt exactly like Murray when both Trump and Vance claimed once again that they ended taxes on Social Security.
Time after time, fact-checkers and news outlets have pointed out that contrary to Trump and Vance’s claims, the “One Big Beautiful Bill” (OBBB) did not eliminate taxes on Social Security. Most recently, Factcheck.org on December 18 reported that:
Trump called the One Big Beautiful Bill Act he signed in July “perhaps the most sweeping legislation ever passed in Congress” and touted provisions that include “no tax on tips, no tax on overtime, and no tax on Social Security for our great seniors.” (As we have said, fewer seniors would pay taxes on Social Security benefits, but millions of Americans would still have to pay.)
On December 21, Yahoo Finance was quite blunt in assessing Trump’s failure to deliver on his promise to end taxes on Social Security:
Prior to and following his inauguration for a non-consecutive second term, Trump had promised to end the most disliked aspect of Social Security. While his plan received nothing short of thunderous applause and overwhelming support from seniors, he ultimately failed to deliver on his vow when the flagship "big, beautiful bill" was signed into law.
MSN back in July forcefully explained why the OBBB could not have eliminated taxes on Social Security:
First and foremost, the idea that the megabill eliminates federal taxes on Social Security—a claim Trump has made repeatedly of late—is plainly false. In fact, congressional Republicans relied on the budget reconciliation process to advance the package, and it’s procedurally impossible to change Social Security through this complex process.
Rather, as the New York Times reported, “older single filers will get the extra $6,000 deduction ($12,000 for couples), as long as their income falls under a certain ceiling (below $75,000 for single filers or $150,000 for married joint filers). Above those income levels, the deduction begins to decrease, and it goes away once single taxpayers’ income reaches $175,000 ($250,000 for couples).” What’s more, the deduction benefit won’t apply for Social Security recipients younger than 65.
Will the Trump administration continue to misrepresent the impact of the OBBB on Social Security? If the past several months is any guide, the answer is an unequivocal yes. Perhaps the Trump administration, to borrow another pop cultural reference, is operating on the George Costanza principle. For those not familiar with the comedy show Seinfeld, Costanza, a hapless character who constantly misrepresents things, explains that he operates on the principle that “it’s not a lie if you believe it.”
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