Noel King

And has the upheaval there changed the administration's relationship with Heritage?

That is very interesting, and it makes me wonder whether they are taking credit for what's been accomplished so far, whether they've said, like, in 2026, Heritage has additional agenda items, Mr. President, and we'd like you to, you know, take care of those, too.

It is not just Heritage, of course, that can't really figure out where it stands with the president.

There are huge schisms in conservatism right now over, oh my gosh, U.S.

intervention in Venezuela and elsewhere, the ACA premiums, the Epstein files.

When you look at these splits, what do they tell you about how united or not the conservative movement is behind what's in Project 2025?

I remember after Trump was elected, and of course, Republicans won the House and the Senate, and it was like, look, Americans voted.

If Trump proceeds to do a Project 2025, that's what Americans voted for, right?

So we have got the midterms coming up later this year, and I think there's a sense that Republicans are going to want to need to moderate to some degree to hold on to the House and the Senate, and they're going to have to pull back on some of this stuff that strikes Americans as extreme.

Do you see moderation coming this year?

And do you see that affecting how Project 2025 plays out?

So then that brings us to perhaps our last question, which is the changes that have been made.

Do you think that they are permanent changes?

Like if Americans say we don't actually like what's gone on here, is this the way that we live three years from now, five years from now?

And here I'm thinking about ice in the streets.

I'm thinking about midnight incursions into Venezuela.

I'm thinking about a lot of the things that have got a lot of Americans on edge and that polling is showing Americans feel quite leery about.

David A. Graham, he's a staff writer at The Atlantic and author of The Project, How Project 2025 is Reshaping America.

Today's show was produced by Avishai Artsy and edited by Amina El-Sadi.

Andrea Lopez-Crusado checked all the facts and Patrick Boyd and David Tadishore engineered.