A few months ago, I provided a brief description of something called Project 2025 initiated by The Heritage Foundation. Since then, their manual has grown in excess of 500 pages.

The following quote, dated Nov. 3, 2023, was taken from their website: “Project 2025, a coalition of more than 75 partners led by The Heritage Foundation to prepare for the next conservative presidential administration, released three additional training videos today via its Presidential Administration Academy [PAA]. The PAA is a unique educational and skill-building program that equips conservatives with the skills necessary to be effective policy professionals in the next conservative administration.”

The partners involved in preparing the manual are not a rag-tag bunch of ne’er do wells, but rank in the higher echelon of society. Most hold degrees from Ivy League universities. Their agenda is not new. It’s been in the works for decades. The tentacles of Project 2025 are far-reaching and dangerous. They’re a template for ultra-right administrations, not just the one that might return to power in this year’s election.

I listened to DJT’s speeches in New Hampshire and they were chilling. When he stayed on script, he was parroting much of what he said in 2016, with one major difference. His ideas are now polished. He was a blowhard eight years ago. His verbiage was like a shotgun blast. He threw pellets everywhere just to get a rise out of his audience. He was unschooled in the daily workings of government. He was a joke, an entertaining fool, the equivalent of a court jester. But that was then and this is now.

Now, partly because of his lies and partly due to his former accomplishments, real or otherwise, he’s considered sent by God to make way the path for the Second Coming. For some evangelicals, he is Jesus. The buffoon has transformed from a clown to a Savior. Men like Spencer Chretien, associate director of the Heritage’s 2025 Presidential Transition Project, will use their power to see he regains the presidency and holds it until death. Then it will be passed to another believer.

If you think I’m kidding, you’re ill-informed. If you think our democratic republic — with all its flaws and corruption — should be replaced, then follow DJT to the brink. But before you do, read Project 2025. You might discover it’s not the antidote to all our troubles, but venom introducing something much worse.

I’ll quote the “key takeaways” from their bloated outline: “It’s past time to lay the groundwork for a White House more friendly to the right. The policy book, Mandate for Leadership, represents the work of more than 350 leading conservatives and outlines a vision of conservative success. But it is not enough for conservatives just to win elections. If we are going to rescue the country from the radical Left, we need a governing agenda and the right people in place to carry it out on Day One of the next conservative administration.”

The ultimate goal is to give the president unlimited power and make him answerable to no one. Federal civil service workers will be hand-picked loyalists. The DoJ will be defunded. The FBI will be dismantled. The EPA and other departments will be eliminated. The Insurrection Act of 1806 will be invoked “to deploy the military for domestic law enforcement and pursue Trump adversaries.” Look what happened in Texas when the militia recently limited federal border authorities.

If DJT wins, things will never be the same. But what benefits the conservatives will also benefit the liberals when they resume power. Chew on that this morning.

— To contact Sharon Kennedy, send her an email at sharonkennedy1947@gmail.com. Kennedy’s new book, “View from the SideRoad: A Collection of Upper Peninsula Stories,” is available from her or Amazon.

This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: Sharon Kennedy: What is Project 2025?