Trump & Project 2025, Our greatest threat yet

Trump & Project 2025, Our greatest threat yet

Ambassador Curtis A. Ward

28 October 2024 — Early voting in the U.S. elections is well underway in many states but most Americans will vote on Tuesday, November 5, 2024. Many critical issues are on the ballot, but democracy is paramount for the future of America and for liberal democracies around the world. The threat to democracy is a threat to the underlying guarantees of rights and freedoms — for the rule of law and the freedoms we take for granted, such as freedom of the press, freedom of speech, and freedom of association and dissent. Fundamental to these threats and in addition to them are the threats to the immigrant and diaspora communities in the United States.

Project 2025 threatens our future

This election provides a stark contrast between Donald Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris, and between the Republican and Democratic parties. The threats posed by a future Trump administration is ominous. A large cadre of Donald Trump’s supporters and former members of his administration have collaborated with the leading conservative think-tank in Washington, DC, The Heritage Foundation, and produced Project 2025, a blueprint for the next Trump administration to transform America from democracy to autocracy. American citizens, particularly immigrants of color, and countries over which a second Trump administration would cast an ominous geopolitical, economic, and security threat, Jamaica and the rest of the Caribbean included, must be concerned, very concerned.

Project 2025, “Mandate for Leadership, The Conservative Promise”, is a 922-page document the entirety of which very few people will ever read. Those highlighting sections of this epistle will concentrate their reporting and analyses of those sections directly impacting the American system of government, and to some extent the inhumane impact on the immigrant community. Most will settle for the echo chamber alarm over the implications of Project 2025 for America’s future as a democracy. It’s important for The Ward Post to concentrate on some specific impacts on immigrants of color and the Caribbean region should Trump be re-elected president.

The Foreword explains the intent of The Conservative Promise plain and simple, stating, “Its 30 chapters lay out hundreds of clear and concrete policy recommendations for White House offices, Cabinet departments, Congress, and agencies, commissions, and boards.” This 922-page document provides a detailed blueprint for achieving the draconian objectives of a second Trump administration. If implemented, these ultra-conservative ideas for a new American society will transform governance and citizens’ rights, and the country’s global engagement will threaten international security and stability for decades. If implemented, many of the damages resulting from Trump’s policies will be irreversible.

The threats are so grave, it is important to highlight certain aspects of this voluminous document that will impact the Jamaican and Caribbean diaspora communities in the US and on the Caribbean region specifically. This is by no means exhaustive or ignoring the overall deleterious impact on American society, which includes the U.S.-based Caribbean diaspora, should Trump be given a second stint as president. All related issues cannot be articulated in one or two analyses or commentaries.

According to Project 2025, transformational changes will follow “along four broad fronts that will decide America’s future.” While all four objectives offer frightening prospects for America and its role in the world, I am particularly interested in Promise 3: Defend our nation’s sovereignty, borders, and bounty against global threats.

Impact on immigrants and Diaspora communities

Trump and his running-mate have repeated egregious lies about immigrants to underpin future execution of his anti-immigrant policies. Among their most egregious, are lies targeting Haitian immigrants, but their repeated lies do not disguise their hate for all immigrants of color. The policy, “Prioritizing border security and immigration enforcement, including detention and deportation, is critical if we (Trump Administration) are to regain control of the border, repair the historic damage done by the Biden Administration, return to a lawful and orderly immigration system, and protect the homeland from terrorism and public safety threats.”

 Trump has made clear his intention to implement this policy, including by rounding up tens of millions of so-called “illegal” immigrants, put them in detention camps and engage in mass deportation. They will not be accorded access to due process of law. Families will be summarily ripped apart and American-born citizen babies and children will be torn from their “illegal” immigrant parents. Citizen spouses will lose their partners. Many legal immigrants, including Jamaicans and other Caribbean nationals will be caught up in this dragnet.

 Referencing the United Nations, international organizations, and treaties, Project 2025 rejects international standards and takes aim at “International organizations and agreements that erode our (U.S.) Constitution, rule of law, or popular sovereignty should not be reformed: They should be abandoned. Illegal immigration should be ended, not mitigated; the border sealed, not reprioritized.”

Sealing the border includes ending facilitation of temporary workers, including an end to discretionary authority to increase H-2B (seasonal non-agricultural workers). The current family-based immigration system will be replaced with a merit-based system. Family unification immigration which has served Caribbean immigrants since 1965 will no longer exist. A merit-based immigration system will end “chain migration while focusing on the nuclear family, and the existing employment visa program should be replaced with a system to award visas only to the “best and brightest.”” Brain-drain on steroids! And there will be significant increases in already high immigration fees.

Foreign Policy impact — Jamaica and the Caribbean.

Project 2025 provides for a complete revamp of the structure and role of the U.S. State Department and the USAID. Soft-power diplomacy and foreign assistance programs will be transformed – weaponized – into tools for implementing and enforcing coercive measures. There will be no room for diplomatic persuasion or compromise. Countries that fail to comply with U.S. interests, without deviation, will be punished.

Jamaica and other Caribbean countries should be particularly concerned with recommendation on China-U.S. relations. Project 2025 states specifically that “Economic engagement with China should be ended, not rethought”.  One of the objectives of this policy is to curb China’s engagement in the hemisphere. At the least, the policy aims at ending China’s economic footprint in Latin America and the Caribbean.

The foreign and economic implications of Project 2025 require a great deal of space for further elaboration. But it’s important to add the recommendation to remove all restrictions on acquisition of guns. Already, with limited constraints, the prospect for controlling illicit arms trafficking to Jamaica and the Caribbean will be nullified. American made small arms will continue to food the Caribbean with little help, if any, from a future Trump administration.

© Curtis A. Ward/The Ward Post

Editor’s Note:

The Ward Post fully endorses Vice President Kamala Harris to be the next President of the United States, and Gov. Tim Walz to be the next Vice President of the United States. VOTE early or VOTE on Tuesday, November 5th 2024.

The Ward Post published its first article/commentary on 31 October 2016.  That was 8 years ago. Barack Obama was president of the United States. Please make a contribution and Support The Ward Post.