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Orbán’s influence on Project 2025 was highlighted further by leaked training videos
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As Project 2025 becomes more and more of a detriment to Donald Trump’s campaign, the fingerprints of people close to the Orbán-government are becoming increasingly apparent. Recently, the project’s training videos for internal use were leaked, featuring several people cooperating with the Hungarian PM’s political network.
Since replacing Joe Biden as the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris’s campaign positioned Project 2025, the roadmap created by a potential second Donald Trump presidency as a central issue of this year’s presidential election. Most recently, the Heritage Foundation’s project was bought up extensively during the August Democratic convention.
One speaker, Michigan state Senator Mallory McMorrow even brought a giant copy of the 900-page document, calling it the playbook of Trump’s prospective term and comparing its content to a dictator’s policies.
Trump for his part has been ambiguous about his relationship with the project. While reportedly endorsing it earlier, he denounced the project after it was targeted by the Democrats, claiming he knows nothing about it and doesn’t know who is behind them, while calling some of its content „ridiculous and abysmal”. In truth, many of Project 2025’s authors are former members of Trump’s administration.
Trump also did not help his case by appointing J.D. Vance as his running mate, a man close to Heritage Foundation’s president Kevin Roberts. Vance also attempted to distance himself from the project and claimed that he and Roberts were merely personal friends. In the Heritage Foundation, these denouncments led to the resignation of Project 2025 director Paul Dans.
A shift to illiberalism
Among other goals, Project 2025 envisions a massive purge of federal civil servants, replacing them with political appointees ready to further the agenda of „the next conservative administration”, removing many of the checks and balances that limit the executive branch’s power. Critics compared the roadmap to the strategies employed by autocratic leaders often praised by Trump, such as Hungary’s Viktor Orbán.
Orbán’s political network likely had direct influence on Project 2025:
Heritage Foundation and many of Project 2025’s authors have a history of working with organizations funded and controlled by the Hungarian government.
Originally a proponent of Reaganite Neoconservatism, the Heritage Foundation in recent years has become influenced by Trump’s brand of populism, and shifted towards isolationist foreign policy, especially when it comes to responding to the actions of Putin’s Russia. This transformation was finalized with Kevin Roberts becoming the think-tank’s president in 2021.
Roberts saw Orbán’s „illiberal state” as an example to follow. In 2022, Orbán welcomed Roberts in Budapest, and Heritage signed a cooperation agreement with the Danube Institute. The so-called educational institute is a branch of the Lajos Batthyány Foundation, a lobbying and network-building organization funded directly by Orbán’s government.
In December 2023, the Heritage Foundation hosted an international conference where people affiliated with the Orbán government (including officials of the Hungarian Embassy in Washington) lobbied US Congressmen to vote against the Biden administration’s planned military aid to Ukraine.
A direct influence of Orbán allies
More recently the investigative organization ProPublica published hours of training videos, made for internal use by the Heritage Foundation, instructing would-be political appointees in furthering the aims of Project 2025. Several of the people appearing in these videos have previously worked with the Danube Institute or other similar pro-Orbán organizations.
In one of the training videos, Spencer Chretien, co-director of Project 2025, offers advice regarding political appointees. He says that in a new conservative administration
„loyalty and ideology are more important than professional experience”.
Chretien was previously involved in building ties between the Heritage Foundation and Hungary. In May 2024, the (Hungarian) Center for Fundamental Rights – another state-funded organisation that exists mainly to praise Orbán’s government – hosted representatives from the Heritage Foundation, including Chretien.
In this event entitled “We Win, They Lose – America’s Choice”, Chretien presented Project 2025.
The project was also showcased in Hungary at another event in February 2024, this time organized by the Danube Institute. There, the Heritage Foundation was represented by Troup Hemenway, Senior Advisor to the Foundation and Co-Director of Staff Placement for the 2025 project.
In another leaked educational video, Roger Severino, a former Trump administration official, spoke about the role of political appointees in the legislature.
Severino last visited Hungary last year: according to Mathias Corvinus Collegium, he was invited by the entire Heritage management team to Budapest for a discussion on education, including Severino and Heritage President Kevin Roberts.
Mathias Corvinus Collegium is a private educational institute which received vast sums of public funds and was transformed into a trainig ground for young pro-Orbán elites.
In the video titled “Presidential Transitions”, Ed Corrigan and Rick Dearborn discuss how to apply for a political appointment during a presidential transition. Dearborn was Deputy White House Chief of Staff in the Trump administration, Corrigan was a member of Trump’s transition team and is currently President and CEO of the Conservative Partnership Institute.
In January 2023, the Center for Fundamental Rights hosted a joint event with the Conservative Partnership Institute in Washington, D.C. In February 2024, the Liszt Institute, part of the Hungarian Department of Culture and Innovation, hosted a joint event with the Conservative Partnership Institute in Washington, D.C. At this event, Ed Corrigan presented a book written by Balázs Orbán, a member of Viktor Orbán’s cabinet, together with the politician.
Written and translated by Zalán Zubor, the Hungarian version of this story is available here.