# Leader of Project 2025: This is our LAST CHANCE to Save America and Western Civilization

**Creator:** Dad Saves America
**Platform:** youtube
**Duration:** 1h 18m
**Source:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM

## Summary

Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, discusses the evolution of conservative politics in America, particularly in the context of the Trump administration and the Project 2025 initiative. He emphasizes the importance of re-establishing constitutional order and the need for a unified conservative movement to counter the radical left's influence.

- Roberts describes his transition from Texas to Washington, D.C., viewing it as a calling to engage in the political arena.
- Project 2025 aims to prepare a new generation of conservative leaders and policies, emphasizing the importance of a personnel database to support future administrations.
- He argues that the radical left represents a dangerous ideology that undermines moral order and promotes chaos.
- The Heritage Foundation's approach focuses on collaboration among various right-of-center organizations to strengthen the conservative movement.
- Roberts believes that the administrative state has grown beyond its constitutional limits and needs to be reformed or dismantled.
- He advocates for school choice and the abolition of the Department of Education, arguing that centralized control has led to declining educational outcomes.
- The conversation highlights the need for a cultural shift in how Americans view expertise and authority, moving away from technocracy.
- Roberts emphasizes the role of fathers in shaping the next generation's understanding of freedom and responsibility, advocating for excellence in daily life.

## Transcript

[[0:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1s)
Kevin Roberts welcome to Dad Saves America I've been wanting to do this thanks for having me I don't know why you would be wanting to do this because you're G to get grilled it's a strange motivation so maybe I'll change my answer by the end you are the now three years in president of the Heritage Foundation the largest and arguably although I think you would not argue most influential right of Center conservative think tank in Washington DC

[[0:28]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=28s)
um but used to be in the town I now call home Austin Texas at Texas public policy foundation so first question real quick before we get into all things 2025 um why come to DC why would you leave Texas Texas is like America 2.0 and now you come to PanAm to the eye of Sauron why because as a serious Roman Catholic I believe in purgatory and I think I'm going to spend

[[0:59]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=59s)
many a lot of time in purgatory and thought that maybe I could shave off some of those days and come to the Imperial City it's actually partially true but the real answer professionally and somewhat spiritually if I may and I think this would be true for anyone of any faith was it was a calling it was literally a phone call I wasn't expecting the Heritage called me up and said would you entertain applying for this job and this very short version of

[[1:22]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=82s)
a long story was my first answer was no not because of Heritage which is awesome yeah but because of the very thing you mentioned which is DC and then my wife and I prayed about it and we realized you know I've been going around telling people this is after the election of 2020 that they needed to remain incouraged they needed to lean into the present and future of America they needed to dig a little bit deeper and

[[1:42]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=102s)
she said Kevin you might need to take your own advice and although we don't want to leave Texas and we were having this conversation by the way Liberty Hill Texas we had a great view of the Texas Sunset drinking some Spanish red wine we said this is what we have to do and I will say to conclude this response that we've been very blessed as a result the people at Heritage are awesome there are many people inside DC who are

[[2:04]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=124s)
awesome there are many people who aren't but that's what we're called to do is to to be 11 and in this Public Square in DC I think the most important in the world obviously we get an opportunity to play a tiny role in that one of the things that was so strange about this past election cycle is and I'm you know I'm 47 so it's like I've been through as a as a as like a paying attention adult

[[2:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=147s)
only so many elections but I don't remember like a totally expected this is what think tanks do it's their job essentially white paper called project 2025 never heard of it to become the kind of thing where even in my own comments people who I think were like supportive of of the of President Trump and or at least liked our show like our show's definitely got a right to center audience um we like what about project 2025 like the Democrats failed

[[2:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=178s)
in making it something that would win but they succeeded in making project 2025 like like a a demon on the trail like a a a uh a buzzword a thing that you know people put on signs stop project 2025 and of course you'd ask people what is Project 25 I don't know something bad something not democracy what is or what is or was Project 2025 for people who only heard the buzz word and are like you're

[[3:29]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=209s)
sitting next to To The Man Behind project 2025 oh the architect and you and you still call me a friend you wrote it you wrote all of it all like 100,000 words or whatever it is part of this is so bizarre because to your point this is what policy organizations do and this policy organization in particular since 1980 has been doing this fairly boring work it's very important but it's fairly boring if you're not an academic or

[[3:54]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=234s)
policy person as I am of writing policy suggestions recommendations never ever with the sense of entitlement that any president however aligned he or she would be would Implement all of them right this is like a a menu but the thing that I think really set off the radical left this time is a component of this transition project that we've never done on scale and that is the Personnel database never before has a group of organizations 110 right of Center

[[4:25]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=265s)
organizations based in DC and around the country come together and said we're going to try to cultivate curate and train the Next Generation or two of public officials and not just for the president of the United States I should probably say plural because our transition project was is and will be for forever but also for Governors for Mayors for County Commissioners I mean we're just getting started with this part of the project and I think the left

[[4:53]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=293s)
said we've never seen the political right be this organized we've never seen them this be coales so let's see if we can drive a wedge in the middle of this political campaign and use it as a cudel against Trump because they couldn't run on their own record and and obviously in the political season as I said at the time and I told president Trump firsthand look do what you got to do because we're just doing our work but

[[5:13]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=313s)
once we get into the policy-making season all of this is still going to be there and so ultimately it's it's rather boring but very important work and it's up to the elected officials to decide which of those policies if any who among those people if any they want to adopt okay I'll keep this quick be sure to hit that like button subscribe to the channel and ring the bell so that you won't miss more dad Saves America as our

[[5:40]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=340s)
videos come out each week and it also really helps us because when we reach out to guests they look at how many subscribers there are to decide if they want to come on and share their ideas so please subscribe to the channel it really helps us out and thanks for watching now back to the show one of the things that um has struck me as I've paid more attention to politics and become more wonky is I know that the president of

[[6:07]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=367s)
the United States has the same 24 hours in a day that I have because he's a human on the earth and you come in to this organization that is the executive branch and all of these agencies that all lad up to you as the boss of the executive branch none of which by the way seem to be like really clearly authorized by the Constitution really like I don't know where does it say we can have a Department of Education in

[[6:35]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=395s)
the Constitution and I want to get to that but it's so hard to hire people it takes so much time to to hire someone have them come into a new job as an entrepreneur I know this firsthand very very well for for good and for Ill see them get on their feet see them learn their team um know what to do and how to do it and just getting set up with your tools takes takes you know a couple

[[7:03]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=423s)
weeks so you know how much of what project 2025 was about was trying to make that process as fast as possible because you only have like two years before the midterms and then you start to get into the next election season and just there's not that large of a window for a president to act with with the wind at his or her back it pretty quickly becomes just political season again the midterms and then the next election and

[[7:33]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=453s)
all the nonsense and and the unforeseen crises that that happened so given your experience and success as an entrepreneur I think you will apprehend better than most what I'm about to say 100% of the motivation of doing our transition project on such scale was because of the urgency of the moment we have even with what I would say is the tremendous almost perfect success of the second Trump term far still a very limited window to save this country

[[8:03]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=483s)
that's not an overstatement we've had the radical left March through almost every institution we've had center-right people including myself sometimes not fight hard enough to resist that we have to rebuild and refound institutions but as it relates to public policy and government we thought as a conservative Movement we need to learn the lesson of 2017 when we had this great creative disruptor Donald Trump come into the office with the best of intentions and our movement wasn't prepared to support

[[8:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=510s)
him and so when we sat down in 2021 and 2022 at Heritage we said we're going to do a couple things differently the first is we're going to do this Personnel database we were just talking about but the second thing is we're going to involve we're going to invite every right of Center political policy organization in this country into this project because one of the things we can't handle we can't do again because of the urgency of the moment is to have

[[8:54]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=534s)
this fractiousness in the movement and so at Heritage we operate with this motto of adding and multiplying don't subtract and divide try to make the movement bigger we're obviously very keen on this realignment Trump has of course succeeded in doing and therefore if you can do that if you can eliminate most of that fractiousness and the president has his great motivation he's got great people great policies you can move quickly and when you move quickly you're sustaining the popular will

[[9:20]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=560s)
that's so important to making this movement this realignment this moment we're in last more than just a couple of years actually think if things continue to go as they're going the American people will continue to be convinced that this pace the substance of the pace are reasons that they should continue to elect Common Sense people to all offices and we might be at the beginning of a generation of conservative dominants the um I've heard these words before I feel

[[9:47]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=587s)
like it was a 20 after George W bush won in uh in in 2004 there was a lot from a probably a friend of yours Carl Ro who was pretty confident about this I've heard the name um I want to get into the pace but before I do the uh the right of Center let's say includes a pretty broad range of perspectives just like the left does you know you know if you start I don't know what the center would be exactly um

[[10:17]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=617s)
I don't know who would be like the um avatar for the the center in American politics um probably somebody that nobody likes but um you know the left's got a whole range of stuff from just downright Communists to you know sort of early late 90s clintonian who just want to preserve the welfare state but make changes at the margins and maybe increase marginal tax rates a little bit to pay for XY the right has the same

[[10:44]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=644s)
thing from like radical like anarco Libertarians who believe in capitalism but otherwise that's that to you know Christian conservatives to constitutionalists to you know sort of populist you could say Christian nationalists how do you get all these different people that are often often really in a lot of conflict with each other to come to the table for this kind of project and did they did that actually succeed ultimately it did succeed bottom line up front it it

[[11:15]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=675s)
succeeded so well the left probably gave us a billion dollars in earned media trying to demonize the project which certainly complicated for a couple of weeks president Trump's election campaign but then all of us realized this isn't working and so what they did was create this this this brand recognition which we couldn't care less about that's not why we exist we we we want the American people to win but it worked because people realized all of

[[11:40]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=700s)
those people in those different camps on the center right of the United States the urgency of the moment and they realized that if the radical left won this presidential election if they won both chambers of Congress that America was probably done even for those of us who have a supernatural optimism about the future that all of us who have been active in conservative politics probably would have had the FBI knocking at our doors the next morning and and we're not

[[12:07]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=727s)
alone at Heritage in saying that but I can tell you at Heritage we were prepared for that there were hundreds if not thousands of conservatives an Aral Libertarians Christian kind of conservatives who thought that they might be in in the in the crosshairs the I um I want you to Define first who or what sort of worldview is the radical left it's an easy it's an easy phrase um but but what what do you mean what do

[[12:34]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=754s)
youan who's the radical left or what is the radical left it may be easy but I mean it very intentionally very purposefully the radical left is an ideology that originates or at least is is exemplified well in modern history by the the Jacobin and others in the French Revolution it is it is to be sort of unintentionally pedantic here certainly left of center but beyond that the logical expl or The Logical outcome of the radical left is anarchy it is that

[[13:07]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=787s)
there is such a hyper individualistic sense of Freedom which they Define as the freedom ultimately to do whatever the heck you want it runs rough shot over any of us who have some sense of Morality In the Public Square and by morality I just mean sort of governing natural law of how you behave how how you sustain and perpetuate institutions and therefore it is an idot ology that is eventually is exemplified by the screeds you see just in the last weeks

[[13:36]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=816s)
of members of Congress who can't argue on the substance against what Trump is doing even though someone may posit for the sake of argument there's some legitimate argument to be made there there's some different philosophy they have to say the only way to fight this is to fight these people this does lead to violence and it's something that I've talked about in the last year that's not something that comes from us on the right because of our belief and order

[[14:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=841s)
but it is something that is very much inherent I would say in the radical life one of the things about um American politics in particular but I think American politics today especially is that we have these words left and right as I understand they ultimately like go back to the French Revolution right so so so for those that aren't familiar like where where did we get this notion of the left and the right when you walked into the French

[[14:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=867s)
National Assembly in 1789 the political parties the the members of the assembly on the left of the jackban and even more radical at the time were there on the left those were the ones who eventually by the early 1790s wanted to separate the king's head from the king's body that's what I mean by not just a radicalism but a a radicalism that creates disorder this is not the left of the days of Daniel Patrick Monahan in the 60s and 70s actually a

[[14:55]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=895s)
political hero of mine someone was very thoughtful about the role of the state and government and while I might disagree with that he wouldn't be a member of the radical left in fact he'd likely be a member of this Trump reignment today but going back to 1789 when you walked into the French national assembly on the right were the xir Ronan the the and and even more Ultra monarchists who believe so much in order and so we've kept that that sense

[[15:19]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=919s)
particularly in Western Europe in the United States of left of center folks being the Liberals the political liberals and R with Center being conservative even though in the United States as conservatives I'm not sure of anyone who is a monarchist the part that gets interesting for the US in particular is that in Europe you had monarchy you have blood and soil and I know you're you know your actual trade before all this is as a historian isn't

[[15:42]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=942s)
that right that's right so that you you know what you're talking about more than I do but um when you go when you go to Europe you have a different character it seems like to me of what being conservative means partly because for example you know in in the UK you're talking about thousands of years of people they are the indigenous people you can be conservative and your conservatism goes straight back to the Magna Carta and before there was even

[[16:12]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=972s)
like Civilization but in America when we say typically when you say you're conservative you are fundamentally conserving something that was part of the you know like the classical liberal Enlightenment which is the Declaration of Independence which is has a very individualistic underpinning a sense of all men are created equal and endowed by our creator with unalienable rights to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness and so there's this like what

[[16:45]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1005s)
we want to conserve I think historically as American conservatives and I I'll roll Libertarians into that is a certain kind of classical liberal cons ception of the role of the individual the Civil Society and a very very limited government is that how you understand what conservatism's Foundation is yeah roughly speaking although I would add to that it's it's not really a quibble as much as just an addition that whatever label you want to

[[17:17]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1037s)
use I prefer conservative friends who have the same identical worldview as I do say classical liberal that's fine whatever label you want to ascribe to it that what we are conserving are what Russell argued were the permanent things I might call the natural law and so it really comes down to one's conception of freedom take the radical leftist we were just talking about their conception of freedom is the freedom to do whatever the heck you want our conception of

[[17:46]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1066s)
Freedom the conception of Freedom that our Founders understood whether they were someone who's more libertarian like Jefferson yeah or someone who's more we would recognize to be you know really conservative they understand it as the freedom to do what one ought and that that confers it speaks of a moral duty not just to be a virtuous citizen which all of these Founders even Jefferson the deist believed in but that that there exists that moral obligation in the

[[18:18]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1098s)
Public Square by the way that's what the radical left disagrees with I mean this is a very fundamental understanding and so one of the reasons just to kind of go back to an earlier thread if I may John that heritage so comfortable with this adding and multiplying idea even though we've got differences of opinion across all of those groups in this realignment is that we are all bound or I think all all of us almost all of us are bound by

[[18:38]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1118s)
that concept of what freedom is and it doesn't mean that we're going to dictate you go to a particular church this is America after all but it does require that you believe there's a moral order and we have an obligation to that not just as individuals but to society I had a really interest like you you've articulated ated something that I heard and and dealt with really in some case actually for the first time last year so

[[19:06]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1146s)
last October I should say the October 2023 I um my son Mato was finishing High School having having shopped around for schools he hadn't gotten he hadn't spent much of his time in Catholic school we were both Catholic we're both papists and um and so he was finishing out high school at San Juan Diego on First Street and and I said okay Mato you're we're talking about maybe going to Italy next year I have a requirement you're going to be

[[19:38]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1178s)
confirmed you're I made a bow with your baptism that you that I would raise you Catholic and we have in a lot of ways but you haven't gotten Eucharist or or the things that the sacraments that make you a full participant in the church and he he also had this like and still does this Catholic girlfriend which was a great thing from my perspective in so I took him to rcia the adult right where you know because he was an adult

[[20:04]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1204s)
legally and this conception of Freedom that you just articulated exactly how you articulated it was brought up that freedom the freedom to do what one ought and I asked the Deacon how is that freedom exactly because if if if I am free but only free to do what I am supposed to do by some some that that presupposes there's a there's a right choice and a wrong choice and that my I'm only free to do that right choice

[[20:31]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1231s)
which doesn't sound like Freedom as I've thought about it as a very classical liberal libertarian type and this table reminds me of his answer he said okay well let's imagine he gave me a couple answers but this table is reminding me of my favorite let's imagine that you're that this table is the top of a cliff the edges of which are so far down that that your survival your death is guaranteed if you go off the edge now let's let's

[[20:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1258s)
imagine you're going to play a game of soccer and one goal is here and one goal is here are are you going to play that game more freely or more cautiously if there's a fence or if there's no fence at all and I that it was striking to me that that was it was true that the a guard rail around catastrophe actually was an enabler of your freedom to play the game at hand with

[[21:29]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1289s)
Gusto to dive at the ball to go for that big kick to to try to block the goal all that stuff you could play that game on this on on the top of that mountain with the guard rails you take them away and it looks like 5-year-olds gently tapping the ball staying somewhere in the middle and hoping that you don't lose it over the edge and not getting too close enough to even try how do you how does that strike you as a way

[[21:55]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1315s)
of thinking about this oh man that's truly the best analogy I've ever heard about this pretty high-minded concept right and a couple things about that one I'll I love adding on to these analogies not only can you play the game with gusto like with real freedom but I would also submit to you you also develop a you can play that game with gusto and really challenge your opponent you know the other soccer team but you also care

[[22:19]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1339s)
for them because you share something which is you don't want to fall off the cliff I mean even if you kind of get an elbow you you don't really wish the guy death but the second thing I would say is it's for for you who often will Define yourself as a Libertarian leaning Catholic there are a lot of people in your audience no doubt who do this is a very natural evolution of thinking particularly as we as we get older and I

[[22:43]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1363s)
went through that as well when I was an early early in my career as a history professor at a big State University in the southwest it was easier for me professionally just to let people think I was a Libertarian and I and I kind of was more than I am today but the the when the light bulb went off it was when I read Russell Kirk's the roots of American order which I had never done in

[[23:02]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1382s)
graduate school and I realized man I've been missing something I've actually to use this analogy I've been playing in the center of this field like kitty soccer now I get to play the whole thing and so there are they just be somewhat religious here for a moment there's so many blessings that come from that and for someone who's agnostic you know someone who who doesn't have a real passion for organized Faith you can still feel it because it's the natural

[[23:24]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1404s)
law um the thing that it raises that's the counter a counterveiling argument would be that's a great analogy who um who drew this circle who decided that this is the bounds and is that not sort of where our politics are like we are debate we we are in a constant debate about what is right and wrong and you know you're presuming you've got this nice tidy clear line of the natural

[[23:55]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1435s)
order but I disagree with your view of the natural order order and who's who's the final say on the matter so how you know and I want to move on to more practical things but um how do you respond to someone someone who's a you know an individualist like whether they're an objectivist or sort someone who's more more radically pushing back against um the particular order or the sense that there is an order that we know to be the order

[[24:24]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1464s)
and this is where the the lines should be drawn like and say no I that's the debate I want to tear up chesterton's fence because I I I don't I don't feel this is freedom for me in fact I don't even think there's a cliff over there I think that's the wild blue yonder that's where the new world is what's your answer well first of all I would say that's a thoughtful question I've had this conversation with a lot of folks

[[24:46]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1486s)
friends good friends in in that scenario and so to ask that question is is to be thoughtful but I I would say the right question is not who created that fence but taking a lesson from Thomas aquinus who didn't create it and for that thoughtful person who no doubt is someone of good intellect and you know obviously we're ascribing great intentions here they're willing to think if you go through the process of who it isn't who it couldn't be then it's

[[25:18]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1518s)
someone or something that's so much greater than us even if it is this as agnostic friends still claim to me some like a Big Bang Theory that created there's some order that happened there it's not an absence of order it's it's a very real thing that we've seen across history that that we can prove and that usually creates at least a very friendly agreement to disagree but I will also say that in every case all of my friends

[[25:48]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1548s)
in that category all the people I know in that category eventually move closer to embracing the concept of being on that soccer field with Chester's fence because of the the apparent truth of it I don't mean that at all in any sort of condescending way like I am have some magic power to possess the truth no I've go through these same intellectual conversations in my own mind it's good to do this the um last sort of thought

[[26:14]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1574s)
on this point before I want I want to get into the past couple weeks I can tell is um is uh at different times in our in American history just to keep it on American history there's been obvious cases where eston's fence has been on the wrong in in the wrong spot slavery being the most obvious um and that wasn't uniquely American no matter what you know bozos at the New York Times try to say that

[[26:39]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1599s)
was the a universal practice that actually America led the world in abolishing and all you have to do is go back and look at the northern states that instantly abolished slavery the second they that the Declaration was uh was was put out into the world but it we do sometimes have order which are bad and they are believed to be good until there is something akin to a revolutionary moment you could say the birth of Christ is one of those

[[27:08]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1628s)
revolutionary moments the claim the claim in Rome that actually no you can't be um you can't treat other people like they're below you in fact the people you're treating like they are below you are my favorite people and you you are going to be waiting in line that's reev that is Revolution that is radical so when how do you think about when that fence or maybe how or how do

[[27:39]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1659s)
you approach understanding when the fence might actually be in the wrong spot first with the an understanding of I guess the philosophical Foundation of that and and that is human nature is flawed we're sinful by our nature and well there might be disagreement on that if you start with that agreement or that understanding then it makes perfect sense that something is evil and tragic as slavery United States which was my academic expertise as you know could

[[28:10]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1690s)
exist because men and women are flawed and and ultimately yet God still put on Earth Someone Like William wilburforce who at Great personal cost and sacrifice led the effort to in the slave trade and then slavery in the British Empire so much so that the British Empire purchased the freedom of slaves so so that's you can you can take that example it's an excellent example by the way and you can look in each generation of History God gives us the free will to

[[28:38]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1718s)
our nature if someone prefers to make good choices or bad choices and sometimes enough men and women make enough bad choices that something like that outside of the order can happen so the problem really isn't that chesterton's fence IDE idea is wrong it's that man's application of that to particular circumstances is flawed the one of the things that's happening right now and this this is my this will be my transition is that there are a lot of

[[29:04]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1744s)
fences getting uprooted in Washington DC right now there sure are um you know Elon and a and a group of 20s something you know probably on the uh autism spectrum super brains are taking a digital wrecking ball to the executive branch or at least shining the brightest light the damn thing's ever seen and I just I think last night saw a video that was really off-putting to me although not surprising but some one of the participants I was kind of surprised to

[[29:36]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1776s)
see Caris swisher and um Scott Galloway were bemoaning that that Elon and his Cadre put in place by the elected president they're what they're doing they said literally we need to dox these young people and and have Governors throw them in prison Scott Galloway of NYU who I've actually wanted to have on this show and i' still welcome him to come but I I found this utterly outrageous like how

[[30:09]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1809s)
dare the executive have appointees look at the activities of the branch that he runs was what I'm hearing so how do you understand let's start with um what Trump's power to let Elon run around shining a light on everything and and and like taking letters off buildings like usaid like how much power legitimately does the president have to

[[30:40]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1840s)
do this I'll answer that after a very brief response to Scott Galloway as an example what an excellent example of the radical left can't argue on substance so let's dox these people and take them out of the game having been doxed during all the project 2025 stuff at some threat to personal and family security which persists I can tell you that that's the radical left and I'm not alone in that regard it's just bullying it's just

[[31:05]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1865s)
we're going to we're going to scare you into we're going to try to scare you out of doing this thing that you've been asked by the elected president to to do yes that's right and and I mean think about Donald Trump is the best example of this in modern American history but to your your point was a very good question about the appropriate Authority the amount of authority the president has it's an immense amount of authority

[[31:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1887s)
so let's just take a step back from Donald Trump yeah let me just answer as a historian I'm a trump guy so people say well Roberts is is you're just a to yeah that's right no no no no no well before Trump I would have given you this this answer and it is that what has happened starting particularly with woodro Wilson's presidency 100 years ago Amplified during the New Deal obvious to your audience Amplified further by the

[[31:53]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1913s)
Great Society and by Republican and Democrat Administration sense is the creation of an extra constitutional branch of government the administrative State when Thomas Jefferson was President there were just a couple hundred employees in the federal government as we sit here there are two and a half million that on its face should tell you that something has changed and what's changed is not just the number of federal employees and it ought to suggest that they're intrusive on our lives but even more importantly

[[32:25]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1945s)
regarding the extra constitutionality of this there's nothing in law that gives them the authority they have why for example should the Environmental Protection Agency have law enforcement agents yeah why does the Health and Human Services buy bullets yes the same insane we could spend an entire episode talking about these examples but rather than than argue from the detail argue from the general and say that what has happened is that members of Congress have frankly abdicated their Authority

[[32:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=1978s)
to legislate and because over many decades both Republicans and Democrats didn't want to make hard decisions they transferred those decisions to unelected bureaucrats who maybe many did with the best of intentions but certainly in the last Administration some of them were not with the best of intentions and so all Trump is doing is returning us to constitutional order and he has full authority to appoint whoever the hell he

[[33:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2010s)
wants to appoint to analyze government and furthermore when it comes down to the potential firing early retirements of federal employees depending upon their classification that might need legislation but a lot of them of course can be made this offer which Trump has done for an early retirement and and best as we can tell at Heritage the Administration has gone through this with a 100% legal and constitutional Authority and there needs to be a couple

[[34:02]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2042s)
years of this in order to rightsize the government I'm going to make an analogy that I think you'll appreciate is it a soccer Fielding it's not but it is a Catholic one because I've become more interested in my in my in in in what it means to be Catholic and so I've been going down all these like weird apolog my YouTube feed is increasingly like Apple news Toyota cars politics and apologetics it's like it is actually

[[34:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2067s)
amazing how how successful mine's similar although I've got one channel I love dogs I raise hunting dogs and but it's very similar um one argument that Catholics make versus Protestants um is that Protestants have this concept as I understand it and I can get I can get in deep water that I can't swim in real fast here but Sola scriptura that all you need is the Bible itself the words of the Bible and I can just read it for myself I don't need the

[[34:54]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2094s)
church fathers or all this stuff that got architected and built over a couple thousand years um you know coming out of Peter and Paul that that's all a power structure I I have the word of God I can just read it I think to some extent in American politics we do treat and and for obvious reasons because it is the law of the land the um the Constitution and its amendments as a kind of political solar

[[35:21]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2121s)
scriptura and so what the Catholic might say is look Roberts it's not just the Constitution which is a very small document that you can fit in your pocket it's the full body of precedent of the Supreme Court's rulings over time that constitutes truly what the law of the land is it's not just hey show me where usaid is authorized to be created by the Congress because I don't see it in the Constitution but no no no we're in a

[[35:54]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2154s)
common law we've inherited a kind of British common law and that's what and then so that's that's the law of the land so what's your response to that cuz that because that's what the Catholic church just to close the loop on the analogy those of us that are Catholics say it's not just the Bible it's the Bible and all these interpretations I think it's really useful to turn to Thomas aquinus and not just read this old text with no help and

[[36:18]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2178s)
I so H how do you um how do you respond to that idea that there's a you know if if uh the brandise Court ruled X Y and Z that is part of the law of the land and etc etc I think that's the I want to try to Steelman the argument yeah for this monumentally complex superstructure where people can be told they're not allowed to grow wheat on their own property like you know wi Wick V filburn

[[36:45]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2205s)
which was you know manifestly insane but it was a ruling so I guess we have to take it seriously yeah look we I follow you we Steelman arguments of the other side at Heritage both out of respect for other people in the Public Square but also because we want our arguments to be as persuasive as possible so I follow you and it's with that calat that I say it's a very imperfect analogy respectfully it's not totally imperfect

[[37:12]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2232s)
but somewhat imperfect because the world of Theology and the world of politics are not the same having said that I'll play along ultimately let me let me now just to show you I'm going to steal man this or at least attempt to maybe I will be imperfect in doing this let me just pause it I accept everything you say then your claim has made my argument because of the Chevron Doctrine being overturn so I happen to disagree as a

[[37:41]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2261s)
constitutional originalist like strict with Justice Alo and Justice Thomas that the constitution is the guide doesn't mean that other law and other precedent are unimportant but let's at least start with that but even if I want to accept your uh jur judicial worldview then the argument still is in favor of what Trump is doing because what the Supreme Court said in the last months was this interpretation for SE several years couple decades that the administrative state had this power to

[[38:11]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2291s)
issue law I mean basically this is a Layman I'm not a lawyer is wrong the court was wrong it was going back to our earlier Thread about sometimes getting the the parameters of the debate wrong and so on those grounds Trump actually should be moving even faster and Bolder because much if most of the administrative state is extra constitutional one of the things that um I'm curious how to think about because I I don't have understanding

[[38:38]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2318s)
this is like usaid so this seems to be the worst thing ever at least pretty close I mean it's like let's uh I mean okay in the best possible light it's this seems like it's mostly a tool for foreign policy to buy favor in the best possible light by doing arguably good things for people in other countries so that they like us and we'll do what we want them to do when we need them to do something that's in our

[[39:08]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2348s)
interest that I think is maybe the best argument it's very fair for for what that was trying to do like um of course do I want you to teach atheism to people in foreign lands or subsidize transsexual stuff in other lands that are based that that the local people will probably find absolutely satanic seems like a bad idea to me um but I as I understand it the Congress did create this thing and fund it so is

[[39:39]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2379s)
it really part of the executive power to say I don't think so I'm taking I'm taking the letters Off the Wall you're all fired I'm not spending any of that we're done like help me understand where that just as that particular example that's what's in the news right now for for the next 40 hours until the next thing happens usaid was created by executive order under President Kennedy and it's funded by Congress and so so even that one's not legally the

[[40:10]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2410s)
president can do both of these things and and and the first is obvious he can undo it by executive order which he's done but even on the funding component my great friend and collaborator on the transition project Russ vote director of office and management budget can say and has said that when we're not going to allocate that money because it's it's it's extra constitutional that Congress just to be technical here has funded something that the President says

[[40:35]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2435s)
doesn't create what you're seeing here just to take a step back from this although I think the president's on 100% solid ground on the usaid stuff what you're seeing here is the first presidency in a long time reclaimed The Authority as it's articulated in the Constitution and in president from the judicial and legislative branches and because this is the first time in a long time that's happened even for people who voted for Trump and like trump it might

[[41:05]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2465s)
seem a little weird that mean maybe he's doing something wrong he's just doing something that's right that hasn't been done in a long time one of the things that strikes me as being right as I understand the spirit of the separation of powers is that the founders understood that power corrupts absolutely and so they set these three branches against each other and one of the things that has that that that assumes is that they're going to grab

[[41:36]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2496s)
power they're go the Congress is going to well the Congress has managed to not do this very well but uh the courts uh you know the president and the and the and the Congress the legislative branches will VI for Supremacy and that even Supreme Court um rulings ultimately will then go get kicked back into the legislature process and so there is no there is no final answer but the assumption is I would think more or less what president Trump

[[42:06]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2526s)
is doing which is to say no I'm going to push this to the Limit and it's up to you guys to push back on me but the notion that this is some Supreme violation of the Norms of our Republic or Dem you know Democratic but our Republican order small r i don't understand where that's coming from if you're being honest yeah it it couldn't be further from the truth although I think I know where it's coming from and

[[42:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2550s)
I'll try to steal me that in a minute but if you read or reread the Federalist Papers the which are the greatest most I think convincing essays that explain what you just did which is that the three branches don't just coexist they're vying for as much Authority as possible for the express purpose of diffusing power so effectively but rather inefficiently that the people can go about their lives

[[43:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2581s)
and if Hamilton and Madison were sitting here today and and admittedly I am very fond of of both of their political philosophies they would say the system relies on as Hamilton said a vigorous executive a vigorous executive who would challenge not the the the Norms the custom the law but challenge all of those members of Congress challenge all of those members of the judicial branch from saying we're more numerous than you and so we outweigh you no he's or she

[[43:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2610s)
the only elected person on a national level right the founders meant something by that where does the analysis come from the opposition come from it comes from a century of American left of center folks trying to change that starting with capital P progressivism and continuing all the way through you know today where the radical left I think does not even want sovereign states to exist with

[[44:00]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2640s)
within the United States I mean I think about this um this it's become not just a philosophy it has become a culture trust the experts trust the science TM which is of course like a fundamentally anti-scientific CL it's like you're instantly a crank if you say trust this trust the science if you even just say the science without trust you're not really in the realm of science anymore but um I think about woodro Wilson he

[[44:31]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2671s)
was sort of the original Claudine gay he was an Ivy League Professor who had a real disdain for the public he also happened to be like a racial essentialist that resegregated the federal one the worst ever so he sucked real bad um he comes in and this seems like this is the you talk about the capital capital P Progressive Movement this notion that we have betters who are the experts who should get difference and can design the way the

[[45:03]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2703s)
the the structures in which all the rest of us will live and how dare we elect someone that says what are you talking about no none of that stuff um that seems like the Battlefront I mean that seems like what that um the the like horror of Caris swisser and Steve and um Scott Galloway is rooted in like we're ivy league types we're we're smart we're smarter and I know Scott came from humble beginnings but he's lost the plot

[[45:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2730s)
he's in Aspen ideas Fest land now it's always a bad sign yeah this is personified by Anthony fouchy who would be so comfortable in woodro Wilson's Administration and including the Eugenics fism the whole thing I mean fouchy and this this this whole group they really are traitors to self-governance because they're holding out their credentials they're holding out their supposed expertise they're holding out what they see as a fact which isn't which isn't and that is that

[[46:02]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2762s)
technocrats are more important than common sense or just more important than people with degrees from other places who happen to understand the scientific method and therefore know when you say trust the science and it doesn't include challenging a hypothesis that you're of course not doing science one of the things that this points to is um is the question of what in a civilized society our relationship with expertise should

[[46:33]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2793s)
be because I think there is um there is a there is a little bit of a danger I I can feel it in myself because I at the end of the day if I wasn't doing this and being all hoyy toyy with history talk I would probably be happy swinging a hammer on a construction site personally that's like the other route I would take um the uh to do things well you need to have people who know how to do them

[[47:00]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2820s)
well the government has been charged by we the people with doing a bunch of things some of which involve a fair amount of expertise like running half of spending on all of healthc care I don't like that but that's the reality we're in so how how do you have a federal government that is charged with doing a a bunch of stuff that requires expertise but all of the people in it turn over every two to four years um because of

[[47:33]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2853s)
the political power that you know that I think we're agreeing is Justified to say no get fire all these people they're they're they're a bunch of lefties fire them and then at some point we'll get some left Wier back in the office and it'll be like all right Academia give me your unwashed masses to fill these agencies back up how do you think about what is like justifiable longterm expertise in the federal government well the first step is to recognize there is

[[48:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2881s)
a huge difference between expertise and technocracy and so we want expertise we want professional competence but technocrats are people like fouchy I mean really personified in this generation by fouchy who say that they don't just have expertise which he clearly has we're not challenging that but that his expertise is of such a special realm and he's been given sort of a magic ring to tell us us how to completely live our lives and as if that

[[48:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2910s)
weren't bad enough if if that weren't arrogant enough this is the real Telltale about the difference a technocrat doesn't want to be challenged they're not comfortable ironically being engaged in the scientific method whereas the nature of developing expertise whether in your field or mine is not just a level of comfort but rather embracing being challenge so that you can test the scientific method so often that you finally get to the point think about the Manhattan project where you've

[[48:57]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2937s)
got scientific Perfection or near Perfection all of that to say that if you think about what Trump and Vance are doing with the administration they're not getting rid of expertise or competence in the government they're getting rid of radical left ideology which is when combined with expertise creates this technocracy I should say though to be fair that technocracy can and does exist on the center right as well for for for the same same motivations and so again give me an

[[49:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2967s)
example of that what do you mean uh I remember during the covid days I was back in Texas I was asked by Governor Abbott to serve on his test Force to reopen Texas and one of the the people I'll just you know name names uh I constantly buted up against was Scott go who's a FDA director total statist um he is he a fer board member now I mean it it says I don't ever intentionally want to

[[49:53]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=2993s)
engage in ad hominum I don't want to I don't mean it this way but substant ly this man is conflicted and compromised and a technocratic jerk who I can tell you firsthand in these conversations didn't like being challenged by a lowly historian now he's forgotten more about his area of science than I will ever know but I'm not a dummy and so an I was asked to be on this task force to ask questions and he didn't like it and it's

[[50:19]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3019s)
because it's all about power it's not about actual competence and so actually I think what you're going to see is not only the continuation of career employees over 10 20 30 35 years there's not going to be this turnover two or four years of all federal employees but you're going to see those whose expertise has been suffocated by the technocrats actually Blossom the area that I am most radical is education and what I mean by that is um if you ask me I know this

[[50:52]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3052s)
would be unpopular even with most of the people here I would abolish Public School I don't think the government in any level has any role to play positively I think it is a force for bad so I will say that to set the there's the libertarian coming out we didn't have public school in this country um in any meaningful sense for for quite a long time churches and communities and one room School houses created a highly

[[51:19]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3079s)
literate public and then Along Comes Prussian inspired technocrats like uh like Horus man and and and the like and and and rock and the Rockefellers and all this stuff and and erect a structure that has now been captured by the scariest people I can possibly imagine you know confusing our kids about the nature of their sexual reality uh thrusting them into a world in which they are more depressed um more anxious more prone to suicidality than we have

[[51:49]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3109s)
ever seen so I would take a blowtorch to all of it tomorrow I would push the button for it to vanish in a puff tomorrow that's my I will say it loud and clear every time I can it's my show I get to say it um but one area that you might not agree with all of that but one area that I think we do agree is I agree with a lot of it the Department of Education

[[52:10]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3130s)
in particular is just a cancer that needs to be cut out and then heavily choed in the surrounding area for a long time it's it's a stage four cancer it's metastasized throughout education throughout government it's actually made your argument about abolishing all of public education very convincing and two things the first is the Department of Education needs to go away Ruden Branch actually I think that it will I was asked by the way how long has Heritage

[[52:40]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3160s)
been arguing for the elimination of Department of Education and said since the press release when it was created in 1979 this is a long- held position of of ours in a lot of people but to your point about the structure of public schools I actually argue that the most noble promise we make in the United States given our pluralism given some checkered chapters in our past is guaranteeing equal opportunity to the finest education in the history of the

[[53:08]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3188s)
world to every American I don't you don't disagree with that I don't think where we might slightly have a difference of opinion is what's the implementation of that and it need not look anything like what we have done for the last 150 years and really to the extent that the states and local governments through their taxpayers money are funding this government funded education it needs to be total freedom where parents and students can make their decision yeah I think it you know

[[53:36]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3216s)
the second best is definitely and it's as strong second best as universal school choice which by the way the swedes have the swedes have Universal School swed of all people they were good on Co too I mean you know uh if we there's a lot of Realms in which if we were more like Scandinavia we would actually be even more despised by the American radical left because they don't have have any clue the way these these

[[53:59]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3239s)
these societies are actually structured they like they're higher than us in many cases on freedom indexes but but go at the department of Ed lay out for the for the listener who think paa I watch you but this is where I think you sound like a lunatic um wh why why was the department of Ed created why should it be excised and why do you think that that's actually going to happen since every Republican president except maybe

[[54:28]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3268s)
you know George W bush who empowered it with No Child Left Behind and kind of made it worse um has been saying this Reagan said it Reagan couldn't do it and it was young he could have killed it in the in the Cradle so explain your enthusiasm and why it's Justified I'll steal man the motivation for creating the department so that people who are a little apprehensive about eliminating it understand where we're coming from President Carter thought that if the

[[54:59]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3299s)
United States continued to be challenged if not fall behind the Soviets not just in the Cold War generally but in science and in education that it would be terrible for the Republic and so he thought the answer being a political liberal was to to create this federal department and place a priority on funding those schools that was in 1979 although correlation is not causation all that's happened since 1979 after spending 1 trillion with a tea $1

[[55:29]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3329s)
trillion at the federal level that doesn't count state and local money $1 trillion in the department of education is that educational attainment in this country has declined in every single demographic grout white guys like you and me black women asian-americans it does not matter it's gone down something is broken I'm Italian so I'm like I'm white I'm white with an asterisk yeah I triggered you thanks for not being a snowflake and I'm a Cajun so you know

[[55:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3358s)
yeah I'm I'm lucky just to speak English that I can understand you as an accomplishment that's right not all of my relatives would you be able to you need a translator but what has happened is that we've in that over centralization of dollars we've also over centralized power and what has happened in every educational unit in this country is that about three4 of every dollar 75 cents of every dollar we spend on education goes not to students

[[56:24]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3384s)
not to teachers not to instruction but to administrators yeah and so it's not about education it's actually about creating a system and so our motivation for wanting to eliminate the department is actually to improve education it's you know sometimes the left is they're not steal meing our argument they're actually strawmanning it say oh they hate public education you know I'm a dirt poor kid from Louisiana only went to public schools and so perhaps that's you know my lingering passion for

[[56:52]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3412s)
getting them right the Department of Education stands in the way of that project block rant this money to the states let them figure it out let them be Laboratories of democracy and when California gets it terribly wrong and Tex Texas and Florida get it mostly right California eventually will have to compete and every American child will succeed the um one of the things that is a very deep challenge to our inclination towards something like voucher style

[[57:21]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3441s)
programs and I worry about this for real and you were in Texas you were at Texas public policy Foundation fighting for school choice so you know this at the state level very very well I know that is money seems to almost inevitably bring an increasing number of strings attached to it even if it starts off fairly constrained and that is because let like let's take I will I will attack my policy my fa my favored policy and yours

[[57:51]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3471s)
for a minute at the state level okay you get um School vouchers or education savings accounts and now every parent won't be have to go to the local zip code school that is in the neighborhood they happen to be able to afford which is the most segregationist social policy in the history of all imagination but is defended by so-called progressives for some reason because I don't know why but um but you can say

[[58:22]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3502s)
okay I can't afford nice ritzy uh uh neighborhood but I now am getting essentially something like the GI Bill and a check that I can take to a different school and then Joe Blow In in area code 78704 let's say which I know you will understand that reference um says how dare you how dare you send your your your child on my taxpayer dollars to some dogmatic Christian School UT trite

[[58:57]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3537s)
and thus the demand to say no if I'm going to give you taxpayer money there needs to be strings attached I need to make sure that the school is certified and who are these certifiers oh they're the worst of the worst kind of bureaucrat scum you could possibly conceive they're basically swamp creatures born out of like the mut Mutant Lair um and I say that with total lack of concern for how horrible it is cuz they are

[[59:26]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3566s)
um having dealt with accreditors I can vouch for that like this is what these people are it's like why aren't there more universities cuz literally like the accreditation of existing universities is controlled by the existing universities and if you want to get uh if you want to get government-backed student loans you have to go to an accredited University controlled by the existing universities and that is why it is so darn hard to start a new one and

[[59:50]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3590s)
it's also why like places like Hill Hillsdale just say we don't take any of that so that we don't Hillsdale is the perfect example I know rambling a little bit I'm following you but Hillsdale stands as my example of the warning sign so Hillsdale conservative University great education um they're like we're not taking any government money student loans back by the government because we don't want the SW the strings attached and as a result they're not subject to Title 9 with all

[[60:15]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3615s)
of its whack jobs psychopathy um and they can run their school the way they want are you worried that school Cho might have this poison pill in it and basically if maybe it will be two steps forward and one step back but speak to this concern because there's a lot of conservatives who are worried about school choice on these grounds and I'm sure you you know about this oh very well I mean and it's a legitimate

[[60:44]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3644s)
concern and let me just say upfront though when I was president of w and Catholic College as the second president we be led us through the second phase of accreditation and that allowed us to be El for federal student loans and grants and very much to the basis of your question we said hell no we don't want these loans and grants and so many presidents of other colleges of Faith came to me and said you'all made the

[[61:05]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3665s)
right decision early in your history not to get used to that money now looking at the K12 question and school choice it is a very legitimate it's actually a real problem in some state-based Universal school choice bills as my colleagues often write about that these poison pills exist that there isn't just some accountability of the money that you know there isn't some just modom of making sure that it was used in a school as opposed to being used at the grocery

[[61:31]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3691s)
store but that actually there are such strings not just on the parents on the family but on the schools who are receiving the funds as well that's why Heritage stands for Universal school choice period the best people to determine if the money is being used well are parents and if in fact flawed as we might be we're a hell of a lot less flawed than government bureaucrats and accreditors and that my colleague Dr Jay green is the the greatest education

[[62:00]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3720s)
reform researcher on the planet has written about this it is absolutely barnone a law like that has a lot less waste in fraud than say Medicaid or Medicare not that those need to be the standards right and so we need to be very Vigilant about disallowing these poison pills in particular as we sit here this is being debated in the Texas legislature and there are well-meaning conservatives from George W bush status tradition who say that we're going to

[[62:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3750s)
have all this accountability all of these tests it's hogwash give the parent the education savings account make sure that yes it went to a school not to you know CVS or something and let the people pick the schools of their choice education quality will go through the roof as we've proven here time and time again as we have researched these programs um as you um looking out at the possibility of the department Department of Ed going away or really being

[[62:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3778s)
downsized but hopefully just going away you know what is the path towards that do you think you know the president has a very slim majority in the House of Representatives I mean I assume he does need the Congress to act to shut the thing down you know it's not for good because it can just be recreated just like the uh National Bank going further back into US History uh Andrew Jack which is maybe the most trumpy former

[[63:27]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3807s)
president killed the national bank and then it came back um but but how comp why do you think you're why are you confident that that can happen well it's it's apparently going to happen uh the first steps of this will happen through executive order we subscribe at Heritage to an idea of Reform that I call radical incrementalism and so go get done what you can get done with your eye on the prize I think by the end of the 2020s

[[63:52]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3832s)
the Department of Education can be gone maybe sooner but the reason and look I want it to be gone I mean someone should not misread my comments that I want to move that slowly I would get rid of it yesterday I've been calling for this my entire career in public policy but realistically you have to use some legislative Vehicles the House and Senate have to pass some laws in order to take those steps and so in the

[[64:15]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3855s)
meantime what Trump and the the secretary soon to be secretary Linda McMahon can do is is unwind some of these programs and there there is a very clear plan of how you do that it's possible that some of the funding mechanisms could be housed in the US Department of Treasury which is not going away by almost by definition yeah um but the Department of Education can certainly go away if there are legitimate Civil Service duties of the Department of

[[64:45]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3885s)
educa or U I'm sorry civil rights duties of the Department of Education that can be hous and Department of Justice which needs to be reformed too the point is you don't need this whole department but Congress is going to have to act one of the things that I found in myself that has been that has been a shift and I think JD Vance talked about this and and even if it was a talking point it was a

[[65:06]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3906s)
good one because he was asked in a New York Times uh podcast you know you said some pretty harsh things about President Trump going not that far back and now here you are like super Trumper pretty vifer critic like threw like Nazi talk around about comparing president Trump to whatever and his response resonated with me which was was in 2016 I thought Trump's Brash sort of Loos lipped approach and was

[[65:37]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3937s)
irresponsible because I had more trust in the American institutional structure and essentially American Elite than I do and what's happened since 2016 and I think covid was a Crux of this for a lot of people myself included it was like oh no we've got you want to talk about bad ombres we're in the town of bad ombr we had essentially communism instituted in the United States during covid with the

[[66:09]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=3969s)
government telling us we can't leave our house we had our our intelligence Community a euphemism that I find ridiculous it is um actively lying to the public about its programs while it spied on us illegally and then actively intervening to try to depose a president on false pretenses with with Russia gate which sure sounds like an actual coup attempt and then strong arming our

[[66:43]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4003s)
public our digital publishing sector into censoring people which is basically the violation of the highest and first law of the land all of which sounds like treasonous criminality and I'm supposed to feel good that the institutions and the Norms are fine and so like you can hear from the tone of my voice I'm with JD now like nah nah I don't know what you're talking about but before but we are in a different ball game now is that how you think about

[[67:10]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4030s)
where our politics has come to because it it does seem like one of the things that's happened is Right Wingers like you and I have gotten more um Shaggy and wild and Wy and and I you know how do you think about the political transformation that that represents it's remarkable you know Trump knew what time it was before the rest of us did and he's like that pharmacist he's been popping red pills for years he's now

[[67:37]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4057s)
giving them out right and and the vice president got them we had Heritage did it it doesn't mean that someone's bad if they gone through that Evolution because it's a good thing to trust institutions but God bless Trump for recognizing early on that the institutions the things that are described as Norms which really aren't Norms they are bastardization of the Norms all had to be upended what's glorious with this electoral Victory they have isn't just the the politics of that it isn't just

[[68:04]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4084s)
that Republicans control the White House and both Chambers it's that an increasing percentage of people who call themselves conservatives or on the center right are aligned with this notion that this really is the refounding of this country I've I've called this in the last year of the second American Revolution liberals can't understand metaphor and so they think that that some called the violence is the opposite it's that the most important part of the Revolution was what came after Yorktown which was the

[[68:31]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4111s)
the refounding of these British institutions as distinctly American ones and what's going to happen as a result of the Trump Vance realignment isn't just great policy as important as that is not just electoral victories as important as they are it's that we are going to refound we're going to revitalize so many institutions in the image of everyday working Americans and those that stand in the way will cease to exist because of their growing irrelevance the thing that I find so

[[69:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4141s)
striking and and I have plenty of areas where I disagree with the president's impulses especially on tradeing tariffs and I don't think we have time to talk about that in this conversation so I'll have to do it another time um but uh so the thing that I find so shocking now that it's not a oneoff you know because 2016 you could have said hey Hillary got the popular vote and she just was a uniquely horrendous candidate

[[69:26]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4166s)
and the popular vote itself is because of California and New York um but now this this is different and one of the things that's so strikingly different is is that the the right the Republican Party under Trump the broad the Coalition of people who who have come to him you look at the RNC and you got Hulk Hogan and Dana White we are a working class movement now and that's pretty weird because we're

[[69:58]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4198s)
also we also have like the richest guy in the world and we and and and being pro broadly speaking Pro business there is another you know there's a little like snuggling up with unions which I also don't like so it's it's it's a mly crew but it doesn't seem like there's ever been quite this kind of Coalition politically that is me you know the working class middle class people and I

[[70:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4230s)
mean the educational divide sort of says it all college educated educated College credentialed voted for Camala Harris to defend democracy through appointment and um and life educated voted for Trump how do you understand what's going on there and do you think it will survive him eventually exiting the stage or is it some strange force of his personality that has brought this about

[[71:02]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4262s)
history doesn't repeat itself but it does rhyme and so this Trump Vance realignment which is unique in certain ways from the three examples I'm about to mention also has some similarities obviously most recently Reagan before that the mckenley Teddy Roosevelt realignment rather similar to this it's interesting that it happened in contrast to wilsonian progressivism and then very VI example of Andrew Jackson perhaps the closest I would say particularly is it related to the education credentialed Elites just despising Jackson but there

[[71:35]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4295s)
isn't it is an open question about whether this political realignment can endure past the man himself but if history is a guide it it likely can if those of us on the outside who run and work at important institutions whether they be policy organizations like Heritage or media kind of Institutions like yours K12 schools whatever it is understand that our job is if we agree with this and we certainly do at Heritage is to make this permanent to

[[72:05]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4325s)
make the arguments now which are basically reminders about the constitutionality of diminishing the administrative state but also never ever ever again to trust someone who says I'm an expert so listen to me especially if they have an office in Washington DC that is such a quintessentially Amic American understanding of our politics Will more Kindle got this right it known the most famous populist conservative philosopher political philosopher I'm a someone who I think is is uh very much

[[72:37]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4357s)
in that vein of what I call the new fusionism of populism and conservatism this is part of our political inheritance as conservatives Trump has reminded us of it he's Amplified it he has enlarged it no one else in this generation will be capable of that and God bless him for it I just see it as our dut now because of the political and policy success we've seen as a result of him to institutionalize this for the

[[73:02]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4382s)
next couple of generations it does seem very uniquely American going all the way back to the founding that our cultural on average relationship with um credential Elites has always been very different you like you know whether it's um Alexis to to for pH coming and seeing the way we just roll up our sleeves and get things done while in France and and and Europe they would wait for the king's court and they

[[73:34]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4414s)
would wait for the aristocratic class to deliver a solution while while while everyone just waits around you know you know you know thank you sir can I have enough that seems very profoundly American um as a historian how do you understand the root of that because we because the country's inheritance began a as Europeans and then expanded with waves of immigration throughout our history and yet that the fact that that seed first of all was

[[74:08]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4448s)
planted here and survives to this day I find incredibly interesting and strange like how do you understand where that came from and why it survives because most channels of migration voluntary migration to the United States in the 16 and 1700s were people who you and I would recognize as middle class there were certainly very well-healed highly propertied High netw worth people particularly on the coast and in in in the South but the preponderance of

[[74:38]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4478s)
people who migrated here were somewhere between what today we would call lower middle class or upper middle class and what that meant was the reason they migrated the very reason they left their homelands was because they didn't have access to the class structure of the old world or they couldn't benefit fully from that doesn't mean that there weren't class systems in the United States but even to this day as we sit here so much less so than in Great

[[75:01]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4501s)
Britain and as a result the institutions that were created whether they were churches political professional were institutions that almost always had the perspective of the everyday man even think about the ivy colleges that we were decrying rightfully so earlier in our conversation when they were created in the 16 and 1700s though there were plenty of rich people who went there you could be a poor person and go there and and and so therefore it reflected not this old

[[75:30]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4530s)
world Elite but this emerging New World Elite now a couple hundred years into our experiment we get to create new institutions like the University of Austin like other institutions in its in its mold that will continue to challenge that it is not only distinctly American in history maybe uniquely so I can't think of another Society with that profound sense of looking at these institutions using common sense as the president likes to say and institutionalizing that so much in

[[75:57]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4557s)
our politics um the next time we get together we can we can dive into some of the other issues at hand with where there's maybe even more disagreement on in in our in our team like trade and and um immigration and other stuff but as we wrap up I know your time is limited I I ask this question of every guest you know the show is called Dad Saves America because I first of all it it

[[76:21]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4581s)
originated with a concern for my son's generation gen Z and this closing down this anxiety um these signs of mental health distress which they are very very clearly under and and a worry how can we preserve a free Society if if the Next Generation doesn't understand what to do with freedom or why it needs to be preserved so um I think that's where dad can come in in a big way um that is a

[[76:52]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4612s)
role we get to play that's heroic and it filters all the way out to the country how do you think about your role in the American story the most important thing we can do as dads if we want to save this country is to do the Small Things in excellence wake up with a heroic minute get up get going bring your wife coffee pray if you're not a Praying type start and what that does is develop in

[[77:24]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4644s)
US us particularly as men because we can be arrogant jerks by our nature a sense of gratitude a gratitude for our wife and children or for younger men or unmarried men a gratitude for wanting that but also a gratitude for the people around us the people we work with the people who service at a restaurant that might seem kind of hokey but doing the Small Things in excellence being on time being precise in what we mean also having the spine to stand up

[[77:57]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4677s)
for what's right especially when Elites say that we're wrong that's not a political difference they hate us and perhaps we ought to summon the spirit of knights to be willing not every day not every hour to go out and fight you can't do that all the time you got to hit some bunt singles to use a baseball metaphor but every once in a while we're going to be called to come to the plate with the game on the line and we will better be

[[78:25]](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Tv-x_c3gJM&t=4705s)
ready Kevin Roberts thanks for being on Dad Saves America this is awesome thanks John