Project 2025 would upend Black Americans' lives: Analysis

A new report lays out a multitude of ways in which the conservative Project 2025 plan could negatively impact Black Americans. 

In the Legal Defense Fund (LDF) and Thurgood Marshall Institute’s report, titled "Attack on Our Power and Dignity: What Project 2025 Means for Black Communities," advocates and lawyers highlight how the Heritage Foundation’s controversial plan would jeopardize housing for millions of Black low-income families, reduce Black students’ access to quality public education and eliminate environmental protections that are especially important in predominantly Black communities.

“Our democracy stands at a crossroads: a path of infinite promise towards a more inclusive, equitable, and durable democracy on the one hand, and one of immeasurable and, potentially, irretrievable demise on the other,” Janai Nelson, LDF’s president and director-counsel, said in a statement. “The assault on Black communities envisioned by Project 2025 will almost certainly condemn us to demise.”

The report argues that Project 2025 will dismantle “essential agencies and regulations” that protect civil rights, many of which ensure racial equity. 

It points to Project 2025’s goal to eliminate federal diversity, equity, inclusion and accessibility programs. Doing so, the report says, could exacerbate the fact that Black federal workers are still less likely to hold senior positions than they are in the private sector. 

The conservative agenda would also affect the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the report says, by directing the office to limit its investigations of alleged race and gender discrimination despite being the most common complaints.

“Project 2025 will turn civil rights enforcement on its head by targeting programs designed to increase equal opportunity,” the report states. 

The report comes as early voting has begun in some states, and as both Vice President Harris and former President Trump battle over Black voters. 

Project 2025 has become a major campaigning point for Democrats, with many warning voters that the plan could upend their lives. They have also accused Trump of having a hand in the creation of the project, though Trump has denied such allegations. 

But six of his former Cabinet secretaries contributed to the 900-page book, while another four were ambassadors he nominated. His first deputy chief of staff has also been credited as a writer.

Still, the argument over Project 2025 may not have as much impact as Democrats hope.

According to recent research, while 56 percent of surveyed Black Americans opposed Project 2025, 46 percent had heard only a little or even nothing about it.

But Black leaders are adamant about informing the community what is at stake if Project 2025 were implemented. 

“Attacks on the civil rights of Black and other marginalized communities weaken the fabric of our democracy and move us away from the fulfillment of our nation’s ideals,” the report states. “At this critical moment, when Project 2025 aims to reverse civil rights protections for Black people and concentrate power in the hands of the privileged few to the detriment of our democracy as a whole, all communities must come together to fight for truth, justice, and equality as the cornerstones of our shared future.”