Project 2025 Leader Confesses Deep Trump Ties in Damning Interview

One of the architects of the conservative Project 2025 manifesto demonstrated on CNN Monday the many ways in which Donald Trump is tied to the project.

Speaking to Kaitlan Collins on The Source, the project’s former director, Paul Dans, admitted that he’s visited Trump’s Mar-a-Lago estate several times and has spoken with Trump’s campaign staff there, including the campaign’s co-chair Susie Wiles.

Trump has tried desperately to distance himself and his campaign from the conservative Project 2025 manifesto, with little success. Collins pressed Dans, pointing out that six of Trump’s Cabinet members contributed to the document, along with some of Trump’s advisers, such as Peter Navarro and Johnny McEntee.

“And so some people say, ‘OK, well, 140 of his staffers worked on it. How can you say that he has nothing to do with it?” Collins asked Dans.

Dans tried to explain it away by saying Trump “personally didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“Certainly, a lot of folks, you know, worked on it, came out of the Trump administration, but that’s natural for any Republican administration. You’re going to have the carryover for the next one,” Dans said.

Dans resigned as director of the project in July, thanks in part to Trump’s attempts to disavow the conservative manifesto and in part due to a power struggle for control over staffing in a possible second Trump term. But Dans’s resignation did not tamp down criticism from Democrats over the project’s aims, nor did it successfully give Trump any distance.

The project’s agenda items include everything from the dismantling of government agencies, such as the Environmental Protection Agency, to the implementation of national abortion bans and contraception restrictions. Trump has influenced the project, and his running mate, J.D. Vance, also has extensive connections to it, even writing the foreword to a book by one of the plan’s architects, Kevin Roberts. Project 2025 has become an effective attack line by Democrats, who have successfully pointed out that it’s a Republican wish list with disturbing aims.

In less than 24 hours, Ohio Senator J.D. Vance turned an idiotic, racist conspiracy theory about people of color eating neighborhood pets into an actual threat.

The Republican vice presidential candidate added fuel to the fire of the inane conspiracy on Tuesday, specifically targeting Haitian migrants—and Vice President Kamala Harris’s aid for the community—as the root cause for the imaginary problem.

“In the last several weeks, my office has received many inquiries from actual residents of Springfield who’ve said their neighbors’ pets or local wildlife were abducted by Haitian migrants,” Vance wrote on X. “It’s possible, of course, that all of these rumors will turn out to be false.”

But the utter lack of proof didn’t stop him from intensifying his target on the vulnerable population.

“Do you know what’s confirmed? That a child was murdered by a Haitian migrant who had no right to be here,” Vance continued. “That local health services have been overwhelmed. That communicable diseases—like TB and HIV—have been on the rise. That local schools have struggled to keep up with newcomers who don’t know English. That rents have risen so fast that many Springfield families can’t afford to put a roof over their head.”

Vance then shared a clip of Harris on ABC’s The View in which the vice president explained how the Biden administration had granted temporary protected status to “over 100,000 Haitian migrants” on the basis that they “need support” and “protection.”

But the MAGA Republican, who has become a political punchline for his weird and disturbing remarks since being announced as Trump’s number two pick, couldn’t empathize with the disenfranchised group.

“If you’re a reporter, or an activist, who didn’t give a shit about these suffering Americans until yesterday, I have some advice: Spare your outrage for your fellow citizens suffering under Kamala Harris’s policies,” Vance wrote. “Be outraged at yourself for letting this happen.”

Vance concluded by praising the bonkers, A.I.-generated images of Donald Trump holding kittens that have sprung out of this conspiracy.

“In short, don’t let the crybabies in the media dissuade you, fellow patriots. Keep the cat memes flowing,” he wrote.

Alongside the violent rant, Vance—the husband of a second-generation immigrant—made simultaneous posts accusing the Haitians of “draining social services” and “generally causing chaos.”

The bonkers conspiracy appears to have sprung up from a Facebook post that contained no evidence of wrongdoing, according to the local newspaper, the Springfield News-Sun. Local police have not received any reports of pets being killed and eaten.

A recent report of an Ohio woman who allegedly killed and ate a cat added heat to the tall tale, though she turned out to be a U.S. citizen.

Donald Trump made an alarming promise to his conservative Christian supporters ahead of Tuesday’s presidential debate. 

During a pre-debate prayer call hosted by the National Faith Advisory Board on Monday evening, Trump whined that Kamala Harris wanted to naturalize undocumented immigrants, and claimed that it would come at a steep cost to one group in particular. 

“Every day she is flooding our country with millions and millions of illegal aliens. She wants to make them citizens, she wants to have them vote,” Trump said.* “Which will destroy the voting powers of Christian conservatives forever.”

“There is no more, and there should be no more important voice than the voice of Christians,” Trump said. 

Trump is attempting to set up a false exchange: that the power of one group would diminish the power of another. And in the fascist tradition, he is using immigrants as a scapegoat. 

While Trump would like Christian conservatives to feel that their voices are the most important to him, the Republican nominee has repeatedly sidestepped some of the policies they’ve advocated, in an attempt to widen his appeal ahead of the election. 

With Trump’s pushing, the Republican Party completely abandoned its commitment to a federal abortion ban, a longtime project of the Christian right. While Trump’s current abortion policy stance still allows for the passage of the highly restrictive laws, his blatantly opportunistic shilling should not go unnoticed. To Trump, there is no voice more important than his own.

This isn’t the first time that Trump has made an unsettling comment directed at his Christian conservative base. The former president previously promised his Christian supporters that after voting for him in November, they would never need to vote again.

“You won’t have to do it anymore. Four more years, you know what? It’ll be fixed, it’ll be fine. You won’t have to vote anymore, my beautiful Christians,” Trump said at Turning Point Action’s Believers’ Summit in July. 

When asked to explain the statement, he claimed that he was trying to motivate Christians, who rarely participate in elections—which is completely untrue.  

* This story originally misquoted the number Trump says.

The Trump campaign just lost yet another song from their shrinking catalog.

On Monday, musician Jack White announced that he was suing Donald Trump, his campaign, and Trump’s deputy director of communications, Margo Martin, for the unlicensed use of the White Stripes’ “Seven Nation Army” on a social media post of Trump boarding aircraft.

“This machine sues fascists,” White captioned an Instagram post of the legal complaint, a reference to Woody Guthrie.

The lawsuit, filed in New York, does not specify a specific amount of damages but does note that Jack and Meg White, who collectively comprise the band the White Stripes, “vehemently oppose the policies adopted and actions taken by Defendant Trump.”

Jack White promised the lawsuit last month, sharing Trump’s campaign video to his Instagram account with the text, “Don’t even think about using my music.” The original video, shared by Martin, was taken down by the time of publication.

Use of music in videos requires a separate and specific license from the one required for use at public, live events.

“If you want to use music in a video, you need a synchronization license,” U.S. intellectual property lawyer Jason Rosenblum told The Washington Post, referring to a type of license that requires direct negotiation with the publisher or musician. “If Trump’s campaign or whoever posted the video didn’t get those rights, the White Stripes should have a strong case against them.”

The roster of artists who have outright banned Trump from using their music is long and wide. Last month, Trump ticked off Swedish pop supergroup ABBA by using their music to advance his campaign without their permission. He also drew fury from the Isaac Hayes estate, Celine Dion, and Beyoncé for the unauthorized use of their music during campaign events and advertisements.

Other artists who have condemned the MAGA leader’s unauthorized use of their art for his political gain include Sinéad O’Connor, The Beatles, Adele, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John, Guns N’ Roses, Leonard Cohen, Queen, Prince, Pharrell, The Rolling Stones, The Smiths’ Johnny Marr, Rihanna, Neil Young, Linkin Park, the late Tom Petty, the Village People, and Aerosmith frontman Steven Tyler.

J.D. Vance amplified a false and racist rumor that Haitian immigrants are stealing and eating pets in Ohio—without seeing any evidence himself. 

The Republican vice presidential nominee shared the conspiracy theory on X Monday, accusing the immigrants of being in the U.S. illegally, “draining social services” and “generally causing chaos.” In addition, the Trump-Vance campaign sent out a news release repeating the false claims, saying, “It’s coming to your city next.” 

When The New York Times contacted the campaign, they did not provide any evidence and only said Vance was responding to large numbers of calls and emails from Springfield, Ohio, residents, who have also repeated the claims in town meetings. But according to the local newspaper, the Springfield News-Sun, there have been no police reports of any pets being killed and eaten and the conspiracy seems to have originated from a Facebook post that didn’t contain any evidence.  

The rumor was also given life after a report from Canton, Ohio, of a woman who was arrested for allegedly killing and eating a cat. The woman, however, is a U.S. citizen, and there is no indication she is a Haitian immigrant.

Conservative politicians, pundits, and influencers have all amplified the rumor, which furthers the right-wing narrative that immigrants are invading the country, breaking laws, and bringing their savage cultural practices with them. In 2018, Donald Trump reportedly claimed that all Haitian immigrants have AIDS and referred to the country as a “shithole.” 

With a presidential debate approaching Tuesday night between Trump and Kamala Harris, Republicans will likely repeat such claims in an attempt to frame Democrats as being soft on immigration, and conflate this false rumor with the perpetual “border crisis.” Will Democrats have an effective response and call out these claims for how weird they are, or will they adopt Republican fearmongering?

A survey published Monday found that voters in three swing states are supportive of an immediate cease-fire in Gaza and limiting military aid to Israel.  

A Cato Institute survey of 1,500 Americans conducted by YouGov found that a majority of likely voters in Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin favored an immediate cease-fire in Gaza, where Israel’s 11-month military onslaught has killed nearly 41,000 people, displaced nearly two million, and resulted in a catastrophic famine and health crisis. 

Eight in 10 swing-state voters, regardless of political affiliation, supported an immediate cease-fire, according to the new poll. In Wisconsin, 80 percent of respondents favored a cease-fire, while in Pennsylvania and Michigan, the numbers were 75 percent and 74 percent, respectively.

Across all three swing states, more than 88 percent of Democrats supported an immediate cease-fire, while more than 78 percent of independents supported one.

A majority of voters also supported making military aid to Israel conditional or not supplying it at all: 61 percent in Wisconsin, 51 percent in Pennsylvania, and 56 percent in Michigan. Limiting aid to Israel’s cause was supported by 74 percent of Democrats in Wisconsin, and 64 in Pennsylvania and Michigan. 

Kamala Harris’s campaign published its first official “Issues” page on Monday, debuting its milquetoast platform about Gaza. The position stood in sharp relief to advocates’ pleas that, as president, she might limit or end military aid to Israel, based on any one of the state’s array of violations of international law: its indiscriminate killing of civilians and aid workers, illegal occupation of Palestinian territories, alleged sexual torture of prisoners, and reported murder of a U.S. citizen in the West Bank. 

“Vice President Harris will always stand up for Israel’s right to defend itself and she will always ensure Israel has the ability to defend itself,” the site read, stomping out hopes of even a conditional aid agreement. “She and President Biden are working to end the war in Gaza, such that Israel is secure, the hostages are released, the suffering in Gaza ends, and the Palestinian people can realize their right to dignity, security, freedom, and self-determination. She and President Biden are working around the clock to get a hostage deal and a ceasefire deal done.”

With the clock counting down to the first presidential debate between Vice President Kamala Harris and Donald Trump, the Republican presidential nominee seems to prefer living in a fantasy land.

On Monday, Trump was practically writing fanfiction about the possibility of still facing off against his last opponent, President Joe Biden, despite the reality of the coming hours.

“Comrade Kamala Harris goes to an ultra Left Wing, Trump Hating, spice shop, which I hear has terrible, overpriced product, and calls for ‘unity,’” Trump wrote in a post on Truth Social, referring to Harris’s weekend stop at a Pittsburgh spice market called Penzey Spices. Penzeys is openly anti-Trump and anti-Republican in all its PR materials.

“As people begin to realize that she is a Marxist, FAR MORE LIBERAL than Crazy Bernie Sanders, or even Elizabeth ‘Pocahontas’ Warren, her poll numbers are beginning to crash. Who are they going to put in next? How about a Biden comeback?” Trump continued.

With less than 60 days until Election Day, Harris and Trump will face off for the first time Tuesday on ABC at 9:00 p.m. ET.

A HarrisX/Harris poll (no relation to the vice president) sponsored by the Harvard University Center for American Political Studies conducted last week saw Trump and Harris neck and neck among registered voters, though other polls have predicted Harris to have a slight advantage, particularly in key battleground states. Last week, the Trump campaign attempted to brush off New Hampshire entirely after spending considerable resources to win there, when a top volunteer leaked that it was clear the Granite State would vote for the Democrat.

“This election is going to be won in those seven swing states” and not in New Hampshire, the Trump campaign’s New Hampshire co-chair Lou Gargiulo told Politico at the time, referring to Nevada, Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia. “That’s where the effort’s got to be put.”

Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene on Monday praised a January 6 rioter who entered the Capitol building through a broken window and drank shots of whiskey in Representative Nancy Pelosi’s office.

Greene was leading a hearing on her report, “Unusually Cruel: A Continued Investigation Into the Treatment of J6 Political Prisoners,” and one of the people testifying was Trennis Evans, convicted of knowingly entering and remaining in a restricted building on January 6, 2021, serving 20 days in prison.

Greene asked Evans about his crimes, and he responded that “the government was kind enough to provide me a federal prison stay for demonstrations.” Greene followed up and asked, “Did you burn down the Capitol on January 6?” while holding up a picture of burning buildings, purportedly from one of 2020’s Black Lives Matter protests.

Evans responded in the negative, and said he would have been better off if he was an antifa protester, claiming that such a person was sentenced on the same day as him and only received probation. Greene then asked Evans if he assaulted anyone on January 6.

“Only the fabric of democracy, I hear,” Evans responded jokingly, drawing a chuckle from Greene.

“God bless you for your humor. Thank you,” Greene said.

It’s not surprising that Greene would appreciate a joke on assaulting democracy, given how she feels about the Capitol insurrection. Nearly two years ago, she remarked that if she had organized the riots along with Steve Bannon, “we would have won. Not to mention, it would’ve been armed.” Greene also doesn’t seem to know the difference between a peaceful protest and a riot, once attacking a sit-in at a House of Representatives building supporting a cease-fire in Gaza as an “insurrection.”

To praise a rioter, however, is to praise someone whose goal it was to overthrow a U.S. election and attack the people whose job it was to certify the results. Greene probably would be saying something quite different if left-wing protesters sought to overturn a Republican election through violence, and probably wouldn’t be laughing over threats to “the fabric of democracy.”

Donald Trump may have gotten a massive reprieve in the criminal sentencing for his hush-money trial, but that doesn’t mean that his attorneys are finished with trying to wipe the whole issue off the table.

Last week, New York State Supreme Court Justice Juan Merchan delayed Trump’s sentencing from September 18 to November 26, after the presidential election. But by Monday, Trump’s legal team had already asked a federal appeals court to intervene, requesting a total pause in the proceedings on the basis that Merchan’s adjustment “does not allow adequate time for interlocutory” appeal after the Supreme Court’s broad immunity ruling.

“Because of the significance of the Presidential immunity doctrine, the federal government and the public share an interest in that outcome—even if these novel and complex issues are to be addressed after the 2024 Presidential election,” wrote Trump attorneys Emil Bove and Todd Blanche.

Trump was found guilty in May of 34 felony charges related to falsifying business records with the intent to further an underlying crime in the first degree. Trump was accused of using his former fixer Michael Cohen to sweep an affair with porn star Stormy Daniels under the rug before the 2016 presidential election in an effort to skew public opinion.

Trump’s other legal trials are also hanging in the balance. The former president’s January 6 federal election interference case, which resumed Thursday, was considered practically dead after the Supreme Court granted the presidential office sweeping immunity protections. But the Republican presidential nominee has managed to drop soundbites in recent weeks that amount to outright confessions to the underlying charges—something that legal experts believe could be used against him in court.

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis doubled down Monday on his decision to dispatch state police to investigate thousands of verified signatures that helped to put a state constitutional amendment protecting the right to abortion on the ballot in November.

Following a roundtable discussion with condominium owners in Miami Lakes, Florida, DeSantis was asked to respond to reports that state residents felt “intimidated” after police officers were instructed to show up at their homes to verify signatures collected supporting an amendment that would overturn Florida’s current six-week abortion ban.

Last week, DeSantis requested that election supervisors across several counties submit 36,000 signatures for state review after the Department of State claimed that it had “uncovered evidence of illegal conduct with fraudulent petitions.” One supervisor with 16 years of experience told the Tampa Bay Times that the state’s enormous, last-minute request was entirely unprecedented.

DeSantis has publicly opposed the amendment, and last week, Florida’s Agency for Health Care published an official website opposing the amendment. Still, DeSantis insisted that the state’s investigation was simply due diligence, and not part of a state campaign to undermine the publicly supported amendment with police force.

“Are you concerned at all about that?” one reporter asked DeSantis on Monday. “That this investigation could lead to supporters of that amendment feeling intimidated by law enforcement?”

“Anyone who submitted a petition, accurately, that’s a valid voter [who] is totally within their rights to do it. They’re not investigating that, what they are investigating is fraudulent petitions,” DeSantis replied.

DeSantis claimed that the group behind the petition, Floridians Protecting Freedom, had submitted petitions on behalf of the deceased. “Uh, I don’t know how you do that, I mean, I thought that was a Chicago thing!” DeSantis exclaimed. It was unclear whether DeSantis was referring to this petition or a previous petition, but this specific claim appears entirely unsubstantiated.

The governor said that the state was investigating cases “where the petition and the name does not match the signature that’s on file.”

“I do think that they’ve identified examples that are not valid. And, they absolutely need to be—anyone that is trying to commit fraud in this process absolutely should be held accountable, and what I’ve found is if people know that there’s accountability then it really deters others from wanting to do it,” DeSantis said, giving a nod to his own game of chilling speech.

DeSantis went on to spread claims of widespread voter fraud, which he admitted could be entirely innocent mistakes, and baselessly complained that Democrats were fighting for noncitizens to vote in local elections.

“You look at what’s happening in Ohio, where they brought in all these illegal immigrants from Haiti, and they have like tens of thousands now in this one little town in Ohio. It’s just overwhelming all these services,” DeSantis said, repeating false talking points from Donald Trump’s social media earlier that day. “So you’ve had a massive open border, and deliberately bringing people in and dropping them in certain communities, which, you just can’t handle that type of influx.”

“It’ll be interesting to see how Kamala [Harris] answers this in the debate tomorrow night, because I just think it’s indefensible having been the border czar,” DeSantis said, complaining about immigrants from the Middle East and China coming over the southern U.S. border. DeSantis also alleged that “training camps for terrorists” were training people to “infiltrate the country” and said that noncitizen voting was tantamount to “foreign interference.”

“If people signed petitions, and it looks, for whatever reason, if someone uh uh, is questioning that. If you signed it, you signed it. And you have a right to sign ’em,” DeSantis said, sounding overwhelmed after diverting into right-wing anti-immigrant talking points for several minutes straight.

Meanwhile, DeSantis has been accused of trying to thwart the petition. “These are petitions that were already approved, that were done properly,” said Florida congresswoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz on Monday, according to the Independent. “This police intimidation tactic is clearly intended to chill the democratic process.”