Kevin Roberts, the architect of the highly controversial Project 2025, is constructing a new effort to shore up support for President-elect Donald Trump’s embattled pick to lead the Department of Defense, according to new reporting.
Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, said Thursday the right-wing group would commit $1 million to urge Republican senators to support Pete Hegseth despite serious questions surrounding his past treatment of women and alcohol abuse hanging over his confirmation, according to The Associated Press.
“It’ll be messaging right now with their constituents about how out of step they are with the Trump agenda,” Roberts told the AP in an interview. He also told the outlet that the criticism of Hegseth, a former Fox News weekend host, was driven by “the establishment.”
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Roberts’ new push to bolster Hegseth is just the latest indication that Project 2025 is making inroads into Trump’s second term White House despite the incoming president distancing himself from the right-wing manifesto for remaking the federal government for months. Several of its key architects have been tapped for top administration positions, the AP noted.
Roberts said during an event at Mar-a-Lago on Thursday that his group and the American First Policy Institute were “close collaborators on the Trump agenda,” according to the AP, which added that he also referred to Trump’s second term as the “beginning of the golden era of America’s next chapter.”
“I think we’re in the middle of a re-founding of this country,” he said, the outlet reported.