Time to read up on the Trump playbook

Or, reading the lines, not between them

It’s time that Canadian officials admit (at least to themselves) to being afraid of the future. The writing may not yet be on the wall, but it’s in a US conservative playbook.

While Canada awaits the inauguration of President Trump 2.0, now is the time for reading the manifestos and appreciating what is in the public playbook of the Donald Trump movement. Right wing institutes and influencers in the United States have been circling for years, relishing the idea of a second, better prepared, fully aggressive Trump presidency, ready to swoop in and “Make America Great Again” (again). Their ideas permeate the Trump campaign platform and have deep roots in think-tank advocacy.

Let’s look at the end point—the Trump campaign platform--and then work back to some of the advocacy. The ideas trail is fascinating; the tendrils are strong, though not all operate on the surface of the GOP.

Its important to say at the outset that a campaign platform is nothing more than that—a set of promises. It doesn’t bind the un-bindable and mercurial Trump. It can’t take into account the many unknows that the Trump White House will face on the international and domestic political fronts. While Trump is starting to name members of his team, including a National Security Adviser who is a known China hawk, and a hard-line “border czar,” we won’t have the full picture for some time, nor will we know at what turnstile speed their comings and goings into and out of office will occur. Whatever the final shape of the Trump team, a campaign platform illustrates the ideological mind-set that will be influential, and it is a reminder that a so-called transactional President will conduct transactions in just such a framework of ideas.

The Republican Party/Trump campaign platform was called “Agenda 47.” ^[1]   (Hint 47^th President of the USA). The short version—the “common sense agenda”--contains 20 items to “Make America Great Again.” They are a mixture of the greatest hits and some dog-whistling.  Greatest hits—seal the border; “carry out the largest deportation operation in American history ;” turn the United States into a manufacturing superpower; restore peace in Europe and the Middle East… Dog whistling—deport pro-Hamas radicals “and make our college campuses safe again;” keep men out of women’s sports; stop the migrant “crime epidemic [and save those cats, presumably];” end the “weaponization of Government against the American people.”

The longer version of the platform provides some elaboration, especially on trade policy and the imposition of tariffs, described as a patriotic “America First” economic policy. ^[2]  There is a spill-over to foreign policy linking foreign wars to price instability in the United States.  The Republican platform promises to “end the global chaos.” The benefits of peace will mean that commodity prices can be brought down. It’s all about the money. An America-first foreign policy is all about the American economy at home.

For a deeper look, we can turn to “Project 2025,” an effort driven by the right-wing “Heritage Foundation” think tank but representing many advocacy groups on the American right who were devoted to planning in advance for a return of Donald Trump to the White House. Project 2025 became briefly notorious on the campaign trail when Democrats attacked it and Trump claimed to have never heard of it.  ^[3]

The Heritage Foundation dates back to the 1970s and had its first success in staffing the Reagan White House and feeding ideas into its tank. During the 2010s, it backed the Tea Party movement within Republican ranks, targeting legislators who showed insufficient conservative credentials. It backed a Trump candidacy, made a move to orchestrate the Trump transition in 2016, and helped fill many jobs in the first Trump administration. Its back at it again.

The goal of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, and the broad conservative coalition it created, is simply put: “if we are going to rescue the country from the grip of the radical Left, we need both a governing agenda and the right people in place, ready to carry out this agenda on day one of the next conservative administration.” (Mark your calendars!). ^[4]

The Foundation’s Policy Agenda is to be found in its 900 pages, spread across 30 essays. Few will have read it at the time of its publication. Its time has come around again.  What was that Yeat’s poem? (The Second Coming, 1919):

“And what rough beast, its hour come round at last

Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born…”

The thirty essays in Project 2025 are broken down into four subject areas: 1) “Taking the Reins of Government;” 2) “The Common Defense;” 3) “The General Welfare;” and 4) “The Economy.” They all tackle a specific department or agencies and propose an often radical agenda for change.

I am going to zero in on the second subject area—dealing with “the Common Defense.”  There are six essays in this batch, dealing with Defense, Homeland Security, State, the Agency for International Development, media agencies and the Intelligence community. ^[5]

But before we get to the essay on intelligence, my special interest, a quick skim through the others. One author proposes that the Department of Homeland Security, created after the 9/11 attacks, be disbanded and replaced by a smaller department with a focus on border security and migration controls. Here is a taste:

“the federal government’s newest department became like every other federal agency: bloated, bureaucratic, and expensive. It also lost sight of its mission priorities. DHS has also suffered from the Left’s wokeness and weaponization against Americans whom the Left perceives as its political opponents.”

The essay on Defence argues that the US military needs significant upgrading (and shielding from ”Marxist” teachings) and must focus its capabilities, including nuclear and space assets, against China. More burden-sharing from allies is required; Nato needs to step up to provide sufficient forces to defend Europe, allowing for a US drawdown.  On-going support for Israel is mentioned; the absence of mention of Ukraine is deafening in its silence. There is a suggestion that South Korea needs to ready itself to go it alone in its defence.

The State Department is characterized as left-wing and predisposed to resist a conservative President’s foreign policy agenda (as opposed to dumb ideas). Solution?  Make sure the President’s men run the place. US foreign policy needs to be reoriented to China, as posing the greatest threat. A debate within conservative circles on Ukraine is noted, and a saw-off between no support and ongoing support camps is proposed:  control the cost of US military aid (e.g. reduce it), let Europe do the heavy lifting on economic support for Ukraine and, in a more gnomic vein, determine what interest  the American people have in the conflict.  That’s a pretty neat explanation of America first. Not much here to reassure Ukrainians.

The chapter on global media would defund PBS and NPR as of no interest to conservatives and argues that the Voice of America has become an anti-American propaganda outlet (what? are these guys weird?).

As for the US government’s overseas aid program, well it is in for a rough ride.  Here is the verdict against the Biden administration:

“The Biden Administration has deformed the agency by treating it as a global platform to pursue overseas a divisive political and cultural agenda that promotes abortion, climate extremism, gender radicalism, and interventions against perceived systemic racism.”

Instead, a future conservative aid program should have as its focus an effort to undercut China’s belt and road initiative globally.

If this is the warm-up, what does the essay on intelligence have to say? ^[6]   We can expect, in line with the other essays, an attack on “liberal” policies, a realignment to serve America-first interests, greater political control, and a focus on China.

The intelligence chapter is written by Dustin Carmack, a former Republican staffer and chief of staff to one-time Director of National Intelligence, John Ratcliffe. This lineage is, in and of itself worrying, given Ratcliffe’s behaviour as DNI. Ratcliffe served for only 8 months. Democrats asserted his only qualification for the job was his loyalty to Trump.  Its not clear that Carmack himself has any deep qualifications as an expert on intelligence beyond the time he served with Ratcliffe. He currently works for Meta drumming up business for the tech giant below the Mason-Dixon line.  But he is no doubt poised for a return to Washington (though he may have to take a pay cut).

Broadly, the US intelligence community (IC) is painted by Cormack as a vast, intricate bureaucracy inclined to caution, hesitancy and groupthink and led by people with personal agendas. A still darker note is set early on in the essay about the need to “punish” any officials “who have abused the public trust.”

Cormack wants to make the Director of National Intelligence more powerful, in essence the intelligence czar (though he calls it “orchestra conductor”) operating in accordance with the President’s intelligence priorities. He would be the President’s man in shaping a new US intelligence system. The intelligence czar must, Cormack tells us, “address the widely promoted ‘woke’ culture that has spread throughout the federal government with identity politics and ‘social justice’ advocacy replacing such traditional American values as patriotism, colourblindness, and even workplace competence.” There you go.

Cormack then goes on a related charge about politicisation in the US intelligence community, citing such sore points as “claims of Trump-Russia collusion following the 2016 election” and “suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop investigation.”  While suggesting that the US IC needs to be more forward looking, Cormack also wants an audit of all instances of past politicization and abuses of intelligence information.  Sounds like a witchhunt.

He would also like to seal the mouths of former intelligence officials who might be critical of the new government by taking away their security clearances (which can be their livelihoods). Nor is Cormack a fan of transparency in any way, shape or form. According to him, intelligence should work in the shadows and its leaders should “practice extreme restraint in engaging with the public and the media.” No transparency in this democracy.

There is a twistedness to Cormack’s argument. He stresses the need for political neutrality in the intelligence community, for avoiding appointments to senior positions based on policy views or loyalties, for ensuring that the intelligence community never “cooks the books” to come up with reporting to please the President. All good and proper. And yet much of his critique of the current US IC rests on allegations of political, anti-conservative bias that needs to be torn out, root and branch. Cormack wants an independent intelligence system that will be re-shaped as loyal to a conservative President. A culture war will have to be fought within the 18 agencies that comprise the US intelligence community.

Whether this reformed, politically corrected, intelligence system will come to pass under Trump 2.0 remains to be seen. Cormack’s railing against politicisation is highly likely to produce a politicized intelligence system, whatever he says. This would be a US intelligence community that the President and his senior advisers could weaponize.

For Five Eyes countries like Canada the dangers are many. A Trump presidency could use intelligence sharing as a bargaining chip to force policy changes. It could create a new intelligence culture of loyalty to the President. It could conduct witch-hunts within the IC, destroying effectiveness and morale. It could set off a new round of leaks. Trump has a track record of treating highly classified intelligence cavalierly.  

The United States, worst-case, could become an intelligence partner not to be trusted, taking

a leaf out of the practices of authoritarians states. For Canada, the US is an intelligence partner that we rely on to an extraordinary degree. What happens when you can’t rely on an intelligence partner you rely on?

Already, alarm bells are ringing among some Five Eyes partners. UK intelligence officials have hinted they are particularly concerned about intelligence sharing in the context of support for Ukraine. ^[7]   Intelligence could be at risk should Trump try to hold hasty and one-sided peace talks with Putin. Should Ukraine resist pressure from the US on the terms of a negotiated settlement with Russia, that might lead to the cessation of US intelligence support to Ukraine, which would be a major blow.

Canadian intelligence officials are, I think, inclined to optimism that the ties that bind the Five Eyes intelligence sharing relationship are so strong they can resist any President. I would not be so sure, if the President goes to war against the intelligence community he inherits from Joe Biden. He failed to fix the “deep state” the first time around. He seems sure to have another go.

We don’t spy on the United States.  But a concerted effort will have to be made to map the new US intelligence  ecosystem and the people who will run it. Follow every move of the President’s transition team and follow beyond it. Mapping who’s in, who’s out, what their views are, what past history, what their power base might be, their connections to the administration, all of that should be an intelligence priority for Canada. Spying without spying, or open-source intelligence, will have to be done at high tempo leading up to January 20, 2025, and will have to be sustained beyond as the new President reaches for early goals in his first 180 days.

The results may not be pretty.

---

^[1] Donald Trump, “Agenda 47,” https://www.donaldjtrump.com/platform

^[2] https://rncplatform.donaldjtrump.com/?_gl=1*1f2q44a*_gcl_au*ODU5NTM0MTE2LjE3MzEwNjUzMDk.&_ga=2.20777400.1822346298.1731385401-936169256.1731065309

^[3] See the investigative report by Jonathan Blitzer, “Inside the Trump Plan for 2025,” The New Yorker, July 15, 2024, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2024/07/22/inside-the-trump-plan-for-2025

^[4] “About Project 2025,” https://www.project2025.org/about/about-project-2025/

^[5] https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf

^[6] Dustin J. Carmack, “Intelligence Community,” Chapter 7, Mandate for Leadership 2025, https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_FULL.pdf

^[7] https://inews.co.uk/news/trump-threaten-withhold-intelligence-uk-security-3368958?srsltid=AfmBOornnpjR-Z5IdgbjqYIofr0KurJCDNdGhWfQifCkR85G1KRImQBB