Former President Donald Trump has tirelessly tried to distance himself from the far-right policy map Project 2025. But as mounting evidence shows his alignment with it, as well as his allies' own support, it is becoming increasingly difficult to do so. Now, a coalition of Latino groups are warning about the impact of these policies if Trump chooses to enact them if he wins the White House.
Seven labor, environmental, immigrant and civic advocacy groups partnered for a bilingual campaign launching Tuesday in several states. "Defendiendo Nuestro Futuro" (Defending Our Future), will seek to expose the dangers of Project 2025 policies, particularly as they relate to Latinos in the U.S.
The campaign will include door-to-door canvassing, and it will focus on labor rights, environmental issues, education and health care access, key issues for Latino voters that the platform seeks to shrink or eliminate.
"There's not enough information [about how Project 2025] has really, really troubling ideas on issues that really matter to the Latino community," says Vanessa Cardenas, executive director of America's Voice, an immigrant rights organization.
One of the organizations taking the helm of the campaign will be Poder Latinx, which will be in charge of training dozens of canvassers on how to talk to people about Project 2025, says executive director Yadira Sanchez. The organization has about 70 canvassers in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Washington, California and Texas, and it plans to expand to North Carolina.
As the election quickly approaches, these canvassers will hone down on the Project's agenda.
"A policy is a reflection of their values, and when you look at some of the values that are laid out in this policy blueprint," it's about excluding people such as immigrants, and "sending a message that our community should not be receiving resources," Cardenas says.
"We want to make sure that people understand the implications of the choices that they're going to have to make in November," she continued.
The project proposes concentrating powers in the president, dismantling several federal government agencies and firing thousands of public officials, reducing protections for minor workers and banning unions, among other changes.
It also seeks to restrict reproductive rights, ban the abortion pill Mifepristone in the country, cut environmental protection policies, reactivate the construction of the border wall with Mexico and carry out mass deportations of migrants, which Trump defends at his rallies.
Trump has publicly disavowed Project 2025, pointing instead to his own platform, Agenda47.
However, the team behind the document is full of former Trump staff, including Paul Dans, who was chief of staff at the Office of Personnel Management; immigration advisor Stephen Miller; and Gene Hamilton, who was known in the Trump administration as second only to Miller in his knowledge of immigration policy and fervor to move it in a more restrictionist direction.
Similarly, in a private meeting earlier this summer, secretly recorded and leaked to CNN, Russ Vought— a former Office of Management and Budget head and Project 2025 contributor— noted that Trump was trying to distance himself from the Project "brand," but that he's "in fact not even opposing himself to a particular policy."
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