Opinion: Project 2025 Is an Attack on Arizonans, Americans, and the Sanctity of our Democracy

As the 2024 election draws closer, Arizonans, and Americans nationwide, continue to express concern over the dangers of Project 2025. It is deeply unpopular, yet Arizona representatives Rep. Juan Ciscomani and Rep. David Schweikert continue to support Project 2025’s policies, regardless of the harm it would inflict on their own constituents. In fact, Rep. Schweikert, Rep. Ciscomani, Speaker Mike Johnson and more House Republicans have already voted for many of the elements of Project 2025 during this Congress. Project 2025 is not simply a potential threat, but rather a promise already being executed by the representatives who were elected to serve the people of this country, not to push a dangerous agenda and election conspiracies through Congress. 

Many House Republicans are attempting to distance themselves from Project 2025, despite clear evidence from their voting records that show they’ve aligned with the dangerous policies outlined in it. Arizonans need to know that their representatives are going to defend against the threat of extremist policies and ensure that the integrity of our democratic institutions is secured.

Although many Republicans put on a facade of not knowing the contents of Project 2025, they continue to promote anti-democratic, anti-American ideals that further attack the democracy they are sworn to protect and the freedoms that we enjoy. By undermining the institutions that safeguard Americans from government overreach, Project 2025 is the blueprint for MAGA extremists to enact unpopular and harmful policies such as restricting abortion access, attacking LGBTQI+ people, and abolishing the Department of Education. Now more than ever, we need all of our representatives in Congress, including Reps. Schweikert and Ciscomani, to oppose the policies of Project 2025 and commit to a peaceful certification of the upcoming election results, regardless of the outcome.

Despite House Republicans’ feigned pearl clutching over the Big Lie and supposed election insecurity, Project 2025 seeks to gut the very institutions that help to secure our elections. Project 2025 moves election denialism from the physical violence of January 6th into a bureaucratic assault on the rule-of-law. If enacted, it enables a complete corruption of the federal government – and House Republicans are already preparing for it as they attack election integrity well ahead of November 2024. Their planned takeover of the federal government threatens our entire democracy.

For instance, Project 2025 calls for a restructuring of the Department of Justice and other agencies in order to consolidate power within the presidency. Specifically, it would abolish the Civil Rights Division, which is responsible for enforcing federal laws regarding the right to vote, such as the Voting Rights Act. It also calls for the reassignment for prosecuting election-related offenses from the Civil Rights Division to the Criminal Division, which jeopardizes the FBI’s ability to protect election workers. This opens the doors for the corrupt weaponization of the Department of Justice to further erode Americans’ trust in our institutions and promote the Big Lie. 

This scenario is not theoretical. House Republicans, including Reps. Schweikert and Ciscomani, have been laying the groundwork for such a move for more than a year. Specifically, Speaker Johnson has pushed for legislation focused around conspiracy theories of noncitizen voting, while simultaneously calling for budget cuts to those offices which protect election processes, including the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division – a policy recommendation found in Project 2025.

In September, Speaker Johnson chose to engage in political stunts when he pushed for a funding bill that included the SAVE Act. Speaker Johnson and extreme right-wing House Republicans have shown a steady commitment to baking doubt into U.S. elections, instead of supporting legislation and the institutions that would ultimately support the American people and our republic. The funding bill spectacle put the government at risk of a shutdown at the expense of working families across Arizona and the nation. It should concern all Americans that Johnson was willing to  force the U.S. government into a shutdown in order to pass an extreme, unpopular agenda.

While these actors continue to use narratives to suggest that American democracy is weak and needs to be strengthened, their actions have continued to undermine the very institutions that promote democracy. Project 2025 also suggests barring the U.S. Cyber Command from combating election-related cyberthreats and foreign interference. This would hamstring the  government’s ability to protect U.S. elections. 

House Republicans are similarly adamant about limiting the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security’s ability to counter misinformation efforts by extremists and other adversaries who seek to cause chaos. The Republican funding bill also cuts funds for the institutions that are the most critical to the protection of U.S. elections. Republicans attempted to cut the Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division budget by $35 million, gutting an office critical to promoting fair elections. Project 2025 further seeks to deliberately discourage federal agencies from promoting voting access, and suggests federal agencies should avoid assisting with voter registration.

We cannot allow partisan extremism to be the driving force through which our elected officials are making decisions. Representatives like Rep. Juan Ciscomani and Rep. David Schweikert are complicit in advancing Project 2025, an agenda that does not serve their constituents or the American people, but rather facilitates the erosion of our democracy and constitutional freedoms. The legislative actions taken by the House majority in this session are an assault on the security of our democracy, and we need Representatives Schweikert and Ciscomani to come out against this dangerous agenda and protect our democratic institutions. This includes committing to a peaceful certification of the upcoming election results so we can reset the precedent that extremism will not prevail in obstructing our constitutional traditions.