Trump campaign doubles down on warning to outside groups plotting 2025 administration

Former President Donald Trump’s top campaign advisers released a scathing second statement, less than one month after its first, addressing significant speculation over the makeup of his administration in 2025 were he to win the presidency in 2024.

In a Friday statement from Trump senior advisers Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita, the two said, “Some ‘allies’ haven’t gotten the hint” after their first memo.

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Additionally, they hit media outlets for being “all-too-willing to continue using anonymous sourcing and speculation about a second Trump administration in an effort to prevent a second Trump administration.”

The first statement from Wiles and LaCivita was worded much less strongly and thanked the outside organizations for their efforts in assisting a potential 2025 transition. “The efforts by various non-profit groups are certainly appreciated and can be enormously helpful. However, none of these groups or individuals speak for President Trump or his campaign. We will have an official transition effort to be announced at a later date,” they wrote last month.

But Friday’s memo left nothing uncertain. Not only did they specifically emphasize that only communications from the president or his campaign on this topic should be taken seriously, but they said third parties organizing jobs in a future administration are unwelcome.

“Let us be even more specific, and blunt: People publicly discussing potential administration jobs for themselves or their friends are, in fact, hurting President Trump…and themselves,” the memo read.

“These are an unwelcomed distraction,” it added.

In both memos, Wiles and LaCivita did not name any one group or effort specifically.

Alex Brandon/AP

The Friday statement, which hit anonymously sourced articles specifically, came one day after Axios published an article suggesting controversial former Trump official Stephen Miller, Sen. J.D. Vance (R-OH), former Defense Department official Kash Patel, and former adviser Steve Bannon, who was pardoned Trump, are shortlisted for top spots in a potential second Trump administration.

One venture looking to staff a Republican administration following the 2024 election is titled “Project 2025” and is being spearheaded by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank. The coalition of more than 80 conservative organizations has a stated goal of “ensuring a successful Administration begins in January 2025.”

According to Project 2025, “With the right conservative policy recommendations and properly vetted and trained personnel to implement them, we will take back our government.”

The project did not provide comment to the Washington Examiner.

While it isn’t explicitly referred to in the report of potential Trump officials, Miller’s organization, America First Legal Foundation, is notably a part of the coalition. And while other more establishment conservative organizations are included in the Project 2025 network, prominent leaders aligned with them weren’t included among the reported contenders.

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Another group involved, the still relatively new American Moment, recently garnered its own profile by Politico, which seemed to imply leaders Saurabh Sharma and Nick Solheim are playing a significant role in the recruitment and training of potential staffers. The group, which was backed by Vance during its founding, is aligned closely with the Edmund Burke Foundation — Sharma was just appointed its executive director — which is known best for holding conferences on the ideology of National Conservatism.

Miller’s foundation and American Moment are just a few of the Project 2025 groups that profess a wildly different view of the conservative movement than other members, such as Young America’s Foundation, an organization tied to President Ronald Reagan and what the former might consider “establishment” politicians and thought leaders.