During a Bloomberg Radio interview on Monday, Roberts suggested that if he could have turned back the clock, the Heritage Foundation would have rolled out the conservative policy agenda differently and pushed back immediately against claims made by critics. 

Roberts said he released Project 2025 in order to “insert substantive policy conversations into the political season” and “did not anticipate that the radical Left, which couldn’t run on its record because it’s terrible, would actually use that as the boogeyman and succeed in doing that.”

“And look, we made a tactical error in not responding in the first six weeks to their total mischaracterizations. That’s on us, but ultimately, the mischaracterizations are on the radical Left. That’s a tactical lesson that we’ve learned, and we’ll never repeat that,” he continued. 

As one of Washington’s most prominent conservative think tanks, the Heritage Foundation unveiled Project 2025 in April 2023. Created to be a policy blueprint for the next Republican administration, the 900-page document provoked ire from Vice President Kamala Harris and other Democratic critics who said it would “strip away our freedoms.” Harris made attacks on Project 2025 and efforts to connect it to President-elect Donald Trump a central part of her campaign.

Though one of his campaign’s spokespeople was featured in a Project 2025 training video, Trump distanced himself from the policy document throughout the course of his campaign against Harris. 

“I know nothing about Project 2025,” he posted on Truth Social in July. “I have no idea who is behind it.”

“I disagree with some of the things they’re saying, and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal,” he continued. 

Roberts suggested that Trump’s words came as a “political calculation” and that he made the remarks during his presidential campaign because he “saw the branding as a liability in the political season.” 

“All of the political calculations of the last few months, which were very understandable and about which we have no hard feelings, are in the past,” the Project 2025 mastermind said on Monday. 

With immigration policies being one of the Heritage Foundation’s top priorities, the conservative organization recently saw a boost when Tom Homan, who helped author Project 2025, was named by Trump to be his “border czar.” 

Commenting on the news during his Bloomberg interview, Roberts proposed that Trump’s move to pick Homan was not necessarily a reflection on the Heritage Foundation but rather because of the “mandate” given by his presidential victory last week. 

“The most important thing — forget Tom’s professional affiliation. Forget that he was a Project 2025 author. The most important thing is that he is aligned not just with President Trump but also with the American people, who want to bring an end to the ridiculous disorder on the southern border,” Roberts said. 

With polls showing concerns about the border consistently heading the list of top voter issues throughout the election cycle, Trump ran much of his campaign on the premise he would “secure the border” and put a stop to illegal immigration if elected. 

After he swept the Electoral College to win the presidential election, flipping six swing states red and winning the popular vote, Trump called the results “a historic realignment, uniting citizens of all backgrounds around a common core of common sense.”

“You know, we’re the party of common sense. We want to have borders. We want to have security,” Trump declared after saying that “America has given us an unprecedented and powerful mandate.”

— The American Conservative (@amconmag) November 6, 2024

With Trump looking to carry out his “mandate,” Roberts reiterated his belief that Project 2025 could be the means to help him do so. 

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“I also would anticipate moving forward that the president-elect and vice president-elect, with whom we maintain great relationships, will also understand that it’s the policymaking season that Heritage, and all of the other groups that are a part of our project, are built for,” he said. 

“Once again, totally up to the president-elect and vice president-elect. We operate in service to them and to the American people,” Roberts continued. “The American people have won here, and we look forward to playing whatever role, formally or informally, that we can to support that.”