Trump's Extreme MAGA Agenda Is Already Here
From child labor to book-banning, right-wing Republican-controlled states are already passing harsh laws to implement the authoritarian 'Project 2025.'
Whether she knows it or not, Iowa’s Republican Gov. Kim Reynolds will play a significant role in Democratic efforts to beat Donald Trump this fall.
That’s not because Iowa represents a battleground for the former president and Vice President Kamala Harris. It doesn’t.
It’s not because Trump will replace Sen. J.D. Vance with Reynolds as the vice-presidential nominee. He won’t.
And it’s not because Reynolds can help prevent Harris from siphoning off women voters from the Republican ticket. She can’t.
Instead, Reynolds will serve as proof — proof that the harsh Republican agenda outlined in Trump’s rhetoric and Project 2025 amounts to more than empty talk. In Iowa, among other red states, much of that agenda has already become law.
“The more people find out about it, the more they dislike it,” says Tara Buss, research director for a coalition of Democratic-friendly progressive groups called Research Collaborative. Yet “there are a number of voters who aren't yet sure that Republicans can actually implement the agenda,” she tells me.
“When we bring it back to what MAGA Republicans have already done,” Buss concludes, “that helps make it more credible."
Recognizing the political hazards, Trump has tried to distance himself from key parts of the Republican agenda. On abortion, he insists he wants the issue left to “the will of the people” state-by-state instead of a national ban. On the extremist agenda developed with help from key former aides, he claims, “I know nothing about Project 2025.” This week, the director of Project 2025 stepped down.
Given Trump’s reputation for lies and bluster, many voters don’t know what to think. In a Research Collaborative/ASO Communications/Data for Progress survey earlier this year, Buss notes that 71% of voters said Republicans would try to enact the MAGA agenda, but 35% doubted they could pull it off. That included 49% of critical Democratic targets – undecided voters and those leaning toward a third-party choice.
“The Furthest the Fastest”
Enter the Iowa example.