Local Voices Re: Convicted Felon Donald Trump and Project 2025

By Mary Alice Miller
When convicted felon Donald Trump told a gathering of conservative Christians that if they vote him back into the White House, “In four years, you don’t have to vote again,” citizens with cursory knowledge of the U.S. Constitution were alarmed.
Trump made the remark at an event in West Palm Beach, Florida hosted by the conservative group Turning Point Action.

“Christians, get out and vote, just this time. You won’t have to do it anymore,” said Trump. “We’ll have it fixed so good you’re not going to have to vote.”

There is a problem with Trump’s assertion. Although the U.S. Constitution does not explicitly grant citizens the right to vote, the Elections Clause gives Congress and the federal government the power to determine the “Times, Place, and Manner” of congressional elections. The Constitution also requires all states to have a representative form of government with elections and majority rule.
In addition, post-Civil War amendments and Civil Rights legislation grants the government power to protect voting rights.

Trump’s bright idea seems to have come from Project 2025, a guidebook from the conservative think tank Heritage Foundation. Project 2025 began as a policy playbook for Ronald Reagan in 1981.

Project 2025 calls for the Dept. Of Labor to roll back child labor regulations. It’s Family Agenda calls for marriage between men and women to be the ideal family structure, not step-parents, adoptive parents, foster parents, single parents, or homosexual parents. Project 2025’s far right agenda would weaponize the Dept. Of Justice, abolish government agencies like the Dept. Of Education, and would implement to firing of all federal employees then replace them with conservative sycophants.

Trump denies he will use Project 2025 as a guide during a potential second presidential term, but Trump’s federal judicial appointments, including those he appointed to the Supreme Court, all came from a list generated by the Federalist Society. And in 2018 the Heritage Society stated that Trump had enacted or embraced two-thirds of its recommendations in the 2016 edition.

Consolidating presidential power is straight out of Project 2025’s agenda. Trump’s stated admiration for Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un give clues to his fascist, authoritarian, dictatorial goals.
Community members working and shopping on Fulton Street near Restoration Plaza had strong opinions about Trump and Project 2025.

Debra Jacobs
I believe that Trump is going to change the country to the point where all parts of democracy are gone. He is totally racist. Any gains that Black people have achieved since the Emancipation Proclamation until now will be decimated. Caucasian people who support what we do, he would mow down as well. In my opinion, the last thing on Earth we need is someone with that type of mindset in government in any capacity.

Sandra Bradley, former teacher
I work with many associations that deal with the government. There is no way in the world I would want him back in office. I don’t think he is a fair person. He is an evil person. He does not look out for all the people of the country. He looks out for Republicans. I would vote for Mickey Mouse before I would vote for him back in.

Willie Thomas
I think he’s a damn fool. Imagine Trump being a dictatorship over you. He already stole information from the White House.

Bruce
I think he will do anything to win the election. I think the country needs to be concerned. I think he is dangerous. I don’t think he is the first person to do that. I think people who were smarter than him wanted to do that. But they have him as their figurehead. As much as I complained about this place growing up, I also learned the Founders did write that all men are endowed with inalienable rights. They knew that there was going to be a challenge to slavery. Slave owners wrote themselves out of business. It wasn’t going to happen in their lifetime. They knew that legally and morally, they were wrong and would lose.

Gerald
Anything is going to be better than Donald Trump. That racist with that Project 2025 agenda. I don’t think they are ready for a Black woman but I hope she wins it. I wouldn’t vote for Trump anyway. He ain’t nothing but a crook. He’s a fake businessman. He’s a fraud. He wouldn’t rent to Blacks back in the days. I would never vote for Donald Trump. Hell no!

Myra
Trump is an idiot. I only watch him for comic relief. He belongs in a circus. He is in the wrong line of business. I would like to tell him Ringling Brothers is hiring. Before Trump came out last week and said if you vote for him one more time you don’t have to vote anymore, I was telling everybody that voting for him is voting for a dictatorship.

We literally had to drag him out of that seat before. Do you think if he gets back in office that he is going to give that seat up? No, he is not. It is going to become a dictatorship. He is going to pass it on to his son and the son is going to pass it on to their son. It is going to be like Idi Amin over in Africa.

Vernon Jackson
Trump is a psychopath.