Trump’s Cabinet and Inner Circle: Built by Project 2025
They wrote the playbook. Now they are embedded in the administration.
On July 5, 2024, Donald Trump dismissed Project 2025 outright.
“I know nothing about it. I have no idea who is behind it… I have nothing to do with them.”
That was thirteen months ago. Today, he presides over an administration where roughly 71% of cabinet-level officials, along with many of his most powerful aides, come directly from the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 network or its allied organizations.
The transformation is not subtle. It’s measurable in names, résumés, and the unmistakable overlap between those who wrote the Project 2025 blueprint and those now running the federal government.
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The Big Number
Formally, the U.S. Cabinet includes 24 positions: the 15 heads of executive departments, plus 9 other senior officials who hold Cabinet rank, such as the Office of Management and Budget Director, U.S. Trade Representative, EPA Administrator, Small Business Administration Administrator, and others.
By that definition, 17 of the 24 Cabinet-level officials in the Trump administration have confirmed ties to the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 or partner groups such as the America First Policy Institute (AFPI), Conservative Partnership Institute (CPI), the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), and the Texas Public Policy Foundation (TPPF).
That level of saturation is unprecedented. Ronald Reagan embraced Heritage’s first Mandate for Leadership in 1981 and appointed dozens of its contributors, but even at the height of that partnership, the think tank never commanded a majority of the Cabinet.
The Strategic Inner Circle
The influence extends beyond formal Cabinet rank. Trump’s non-Cabinet inner circle includes some of the most recognizable names in the Project 2025 network:
Stephen Miller (White House Policy Director) — Acting president of America First Legal, a Project 2025 network hub. His dual position allows him to shape policy from inside the administration while leading a key external group in the Project 2025 orbit.
Brendan Carr (FCC Chair) — Authored the Project 2025 Mandate for Leadership chapter on the Federal Communications Commission, outlining telecom deregulation, rolling back net neutrality, and reducing FCC authority. Now he’s leading the very agency he wrote about.
Russell Vought (OMB Director) — Wrote multiple sections in the Mandate for Leadership 2025 on budget policy, restructuring executive agencies, and reclaiming spending control for the White House. He’s now in charge of implementing those ideas at OMB.
E.J. Antoni (BLS nominee) — Authored economic and labor market analysis portions, including calls for dismantling certain statistical independence protections — the exact area he would oversee at the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Tom Homan (Border Czar) — Contributed to Project 2025’s immigration section, advocating aggressive border enforcement, expanded detention, and broad use of executive authority on immigration. Now he’s directing immigration policy from the White House.
John Ratcliffe (CIA Director nominee) — Listed as a Project 2025 contributor in the intelligence/national security section, which calls for a reorientation of intelligence agencies toward domestic political priorities.
Karoline Leavitt (White House Press Secretary) — Appears in Project 2025’s Presidential Administration Academy training videos.
Most of these directly authored or contributed to the sections in Project 2025 or Mandate for Leadership regarding the very agency they now head. These aren’t just ideological allies. They are the blueprint’s architects, now implementing their own designs from inside the federal government.
See our relevant reporting here:
This recent article is about E.J. Antoni.
Note: These articles about Stephen Miller and Russell Vought are more than 45 days old and now live in our archive. Consider becoming a paid subscriber for exclusive perks including complete access to all of our 850+ articles.
The Odds This Is Random? Essentially Zero.
Even if 30% of all qualified conservative appointees had Project 2025 ties, the odds of randomly selecting 17 or more out of 24 are about 1 in 60,000. Lower that baseline to 20%, and the odds plunge to 1 in a billion.
This is not a statistical chance. It’s the product of a deliberate staffing pipeline.
The Pipeline
Heritage and Project 2025 have spent years building that pipeline:
A 10,000-person pre-vetted database of loyalists, ready to step into government roles.
Partner organizations offering ideological training, networking, and funding.
Placement strategies that ensure key policy areas are overseen by movement loyalists.
By inauguration day, the network was ready with candidates for nearly every senior government position.
Source: DeSmog
Purging the “Subversives”
The Project 2025 network’s influence doesn’t end with appointments. It’s also reshaping the federal workforce by driving out those deemed ideologically opposed to the administration’s goals.
One Trump-aligned group, the American Accountability Foundation (AAF), backed by Heritage and other Project 2025–linked entities, has published online watchlists naming roughly 175 federal employees. Many of those targeted are women or members of minority groups. The lists single them out for alleged promotion of “liberal ideology,” especially diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) programs.
This campaign dovetails with Schedule F, reinstated by Trump to strip civil-service protections from tens of thousands of employees, and with the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), an internal unit empowered to dismantle DEI initiatives and fast-track removals.
Together, these tools create a system for ideological cleansing of the federal bureaucracy, exactly as envisioned in Mandate for Leadership 2025.
Public Silence, Private Alignment
Since taking office, Trump has not mentioned Project 2025 or the Heritage Foundation publicly.
Paul Dans, the man who led Project 2025 at Heritage, has had no such hesitation. In March, he said the Trump administration had gone “beyond my wildest dreams” in implementing the plan’s vision. For the architect of the blueprint, that’s not casual flattery. It’s confirmation that the project is not just influencing policy, but running it.
Conclusion
Thirteen months after his flat denial, Trump is governing with a Cabinet and inner circle steeped in Project 2025’s ideology and personnel. The names in his administration match the names in the blueprint. The staffing choices match the plan’s priorities.
This is not just influence. It’s governing from within the Project 2025 playbook.
Stay tuned. Soon, we will explore how the administration’s policies mirror Project 2025 7 months into the administration.
Stay Informed. Stay Loud.
Subscribe to The Coffman Chronicle for no-BS political analysis, action guides, and daily truth bombs you won’t get from corporate media.
Bibliography:
“An Architect of Project 2025 Is Pressuring Republican Senators to Confirm Pete Hegseth.” Associated Press, March 6, 2025.
“Trump’s Early Actions Mirror Project 2025, the Blueprint He Once Dismissed.” Time, February 14, 2025.
“70% of Trump’s Cabinet Tied to Project 2025 and Heritage’s Allies.” DeSmog, June 2, 2025.
“Trump Picks Project 2025 Mastermind to Be Put in Charge of Stats.” The Daily Beast, August 12, 2025.
“Trump Wants to Influence Government Statistics. Data Wonks Are Worried about What That Means.” Politico, August 12, 2025.
“Pro-Trump Group Wages Campaign to Purge ‘Subversive’ Federal Workers.” Reuters, August 7, 2025.
“What Is Project 2025? Heritage Foundation Proposal Trump Denies Knowing about Explained.” The Sun, July 5, 2024.
“Project 2025.” Wikipedia.
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I've seen more stable cabinets at IKEA ✊
Trump is product. Heritage Foundation is the real power.