Although former President Donald Trump says he knows “nothing” about Project 2025, it is expected to be a blueprint for his administration if he is elected on Nov. 5.

Republicans who control the Louisiana Legislature had their own Project 2024 when they passed some legislation earlier this year like the changes that are recommended in Project 2025. That project gives the president strong powers, and Louisiana’s new laws do the same for Republican Gov. Jeff Landry.

Here is what Project 2024 accomplished:

One of the laws passed by the state Legislature lets the governor appoint the chairman of each board and commission whose appointment isn’t otherwise in the current constitution.

That law has allowed the governor to take control of the state’s four higher education boards. Landry was able to make state Supreme Court Justice James Genovese president of Northwestern State University.

Genovese wasn’t conservative enough for Landry so he is now able to help someone he endorsed be the favorite to replace Genovese on the high court. So the governor is reshaping the state Supreme Court.

Another new law increases the membership on the state Board of Ethics from 11 to 15 members and gives Landry authority to appoint nine of those members, more than a majority.  The governor isn’t likely to ever be accused again of violating the state’s ethics laws.

Landry got lawmakers to create a new majority-Black congressional district that he wanted. U.S. Rep. Garret Graves, R-Baton Rouge, who endorsed someone for governor other than Landry, was targeted and decided not to run for re-election this year.

The governor won legislative approval to allow his office not to respond to public records requests from national media organizations and others outside of Louisiana. Half of the requests Landry received this year came from out of state.

State Sen. Jay Morris, R-West Monroe, came only two votes short of getting a proposed constitutional amendment passed that would allow the Louisiana governor to appoint most members of the state Civil  Service Commission. The senator said he plans to bring the amendment up again because he thinks the current civil service system makes it too hard to fire state employees.

Looking back over the tremendous power Landry has received from the Legislature, we get some idea of what would happen if Trump is elected Nov. 5 and Republicans control both houses of Congress.

Project 2025 was written by the Heritage Foundation, which The Associated Press calls “the venerable conservative think tank in Washington,  D.C.”

The AP said the project would “gut the federal workforce and dismantle federal agencies.” And although Trump has disowned Project 2025, its architects came from the ranks of Trump’s administration and top Heritage officials have briefed Trump’s team about it.

“It exists not only as a policy blueprint for the next administration, but as a database of some 20,000 job seekers who could staff a Trump White House and administration and a still unreleased ‘180-day playbook’ of actions a new president could employ on Day One after the inauguration on Jan. 20, 2025,” The AP said.

The project calls for a “vast restructuring of the federal government — from installing more political appointees at the Justice Department to reassigning government workers with law enforcement backgrounds to handle illegal immigration to dismantling the Department of Education.”

When Project 2025 was unveiled in April of 2023, it promised to “dismantle the administrative state” by putting forward the personnel and policies that could serve as a roadmap for the next conservative president.

One of the plans would make it easier to staff the government with Trump loyalists by reclassifying some 50,000 workers into jobs where they can be fired. The AP said that is a revival of a policy that Trump tried to put in place before leaving office.

Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation who took over Project 2025, said, “The conservative movement is coming together to prepare for the next conservative administration.”

Spokespersons for Democrats and their allies said they want people to be sure they understand that Project 2025 is a threat to their civil rights, reproductive rights and other rights.

People obviously realize that is true. They were advised to look the project up and by the end of June Google searches for “Project 2025” surpassed searches for Taylor Swift and the NFL. So the threat is real.

Jim Beam, the retired editor of the American Press, has covered people and politics for more than six decades. Contact him at 337-515-8871 or jim.beam.press@gmail.com.

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