'Malpractice': Ex-Project 2025 director calls on Trump to fire his top campaign advisers
The former director of the controversial Project 2025 policy blueprint accused Donald Trump's top campaign advisers of "malpractice" by helping to force president Joe Biden out of the race.
Paul Dans, an attorney who until recently headed the 2025 presidential transition project at the Heritage Foundation, said Trump should fire his campaign advisers Chris LaCivita and Susie Wiles for helping to push Biden out too early and failing to prepare for Kamala Harris as his replacement in the race, reported the New York Times.
“Trump should be running like Secretariat at the Belmont, but instead it’s a race to the wire,” Dans said, referring to the legendary racehorse's 31-length win at the 1973 Belmont Stakes.
The Trump campaign reportedly pushed for a debate with Biden in June, rather than waiting until September, and that gave Democrats ample time to select another nominee after the president faltered and amplified concerns about his age and fitness.
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“They pushed Biden off the stage and they had no plans for Harris," Dans said. "That is on par with historic campaign malpractice."
Dans told the Times he was blindsided when Trump distanced himself from the Project 2025 blueprint for staffing the federal government with loyalists to implement right-wing policies, and he said the former president's disavowal only helped strengthen Democratic attacks.
“They took the bait," he said of the Trump campaign.
But he also said the former president didn't personally have anything to do with the playbook for overhauling the federal government, although he said there was a lot of overlap between the Project 2025 team and the first Trump administration.
“Sure, a lot of us have worked in the admin and came together, but this started long before he even announced a run for president,” Dans said. “Not everyone agrees with what’s in that book, but the book’s actually only a part of that plan.”