'Threat to democracy': Watchdogs sound alarm as $55M poured into controversial project

Conservative donors are pouring money into a controversial effort to overhaul the federal government and implement a right-wing agenda from the start of a potential second Donald Trump presidency, according to a report.

The Heritage Foundation launched Project 2025 last April to develop policy recommendations and identify thousands of political appointees who could carry out its agenda in the next Republican administration. And groups linked to conservative activist Leonard Leo and the Koch network have now contributed more than $55 million to the initiative, according to an Accountable.US review shared exclusively with NBC News.

“The ‘MAGA blueprint’ isn’t a one-off project — it’s backed by the same far-right figures who have long dictated the conservative agenda,” said Tony Carrk, executive director of Accountable.US. “Leo, Koch and others should be held to account for propping up a policy platform that puts special interests over everyday Americans and poses an existential threat to our democracy.”

More than 100 conservative organizations have joined with former high-level Trump administration appointees and an advisory board to develop a presidential transition operation that would remake every federal department and agency to prioritize conservative goals, and their work has been aided by significant contributions from influential donors.

The project's proposals would rapidly increase oil and gas leases through the Interior Department and end the Energy Department's focus on climate change and green subsidies, and the Environmental Protection Agency would gut its environmental justice and public engagement functions and eliminate its Office of Environmental Justice and External Civil Rights.

"Since 2021, Leo’s network has funneled over $50.7 million to the groups advising the 2025 Presidential Transition Project as part of its 'Project 2025 advisory board,' according to tax documents reviewed as part of the analysis," NBC News reported. "That sum includes donationsfrom The 85 Fund, a donor-advised nonprofit group that funnels money from wealthy financiers to other groups, and the Concord Fund, a public-facing organization."

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"In 2022, the donor-advised fund DonorsTrust, which received more than $181 million from Leo-backed groups from 2019 to 2022, contributed over $21.1 million to 40 organizations advising Project 2025," the network added. "It contributed nearly $20 million to 36 nonprofit organizations advising Project 2025 in 2021."

The Heritage Foundation contributed $1,025,000 to nine of the advisory groups, a substantial increase over the $174,000 in grants it distributed the previous year, and Accountable.US review found that Charles Koch’s network directed more than $4.4 million in 2022 to organizations on Project 2025’s advisory board through its donor conduit Stand Together Trust.