Part 2—Defying darkness: Anticipating the year ahead abroad and the new triumvirate

*The triumvirate of our time: President Vladimir Putin of Russia, President-elect Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping of China.*

Jan. 2, 2024 by David Silverberg

In the year 60 before the common era (BCE), the three most powerful men in Rome conspired to divide the world between them.

Gaius Julius Caesar, Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, and Marcus Licinius Crassus, having reached the pinnacle of military and financial power and unable to overcome each other for complete dominance, agreed on an accommodation that gave each of them mastery over a piece of what was then the known world.

This arrangement came to be known as the First Triumvirate and the only reason we know about it was that Caesar exposed it when he became consul the following year.

Today we are living in the age of what can be called the first Global Triumvirate: President Xi Jinping of China, President Vladimir Putin of Russia, and when he takes office on January 20, Donald Trump of the United States.

This is not an alliance of countries, it is a personal arrangement between three powerful men. Thanks to modern communications they don’t have to work through national bureaucracies or layers of ambassadors to conspire together; they can each pick up the phone as circumstances demand and carve up the world as they please.

Seen in this light, Trump’s recent threats to annex Canada, re-take the Panama Canal by force and buy Greenland make sense. After all, the Western Hemisphere is his fiefdom now to loot, plunder and exploit as he sees fit. In his mind no Canadian, Panamanian or Dane should have the temerity to stop him. Likewise, Putin should be able to do whatever he pleases in Europe and Xi in Asia.

Xi (71 years old) and Putin (72 years) are already effectively presidents-for-life. Both changed their countries’ constitutions, first to extend their terms, then to lift term limits. Trump (78 years) may try to do the same this year, likely by attempting to change the US Constitution. Should that fail, when his nominal term ends in 2028, he may try overriding it altogether as he did in 2021.

In these circumstances it becomes difficult to forecast actions and policy in the year ahead. Traditional analysis is an attempt to rationally think through possible courses of action and outcomes based on national interests, countervailing forces, government policies and other factors. But when governance is personal, the question becomes the mood of the monarch at any given moment and his possible responses to whatever stimuli tickle his perception.

And make no mistake: Whatever happens abroad will affect every American, even those as far from central government as in Southwest Florida.

That said, the year begins with certain basic questions based on objective reality.

Will the United States remain in NATO and will the alliance survive under Trump?

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is the most powerful alliance in history and now includes 32 countries, which are pledged to come to each other’s assistance should any one of them be attacked.

It has been a force for international stability since its founding in 1949. Then, it was intended to counter Soviet expansionism, ensure US engagement in international and specifically European affairs, and aid the integration of Europe to prevent the kind of hyper-nationalism that led to World War II.

It has been spectacularly successful in all its aims. Today it stands as a bulwark against Putin’s aggression and it continues to attract new members who are fearful of Russian designs.

Trump, as a friend and admirer of Putin and an America First isolationist (whose title echoes the pre-World War II isolationist movement), puts America’s NATO leadership—and the entire alliance—in jeopardy.

In his first term Trump was contemptuous of NATO, viewing it as a scam that cost the United States money to protect allies who didn’t do enough for their own defenses. He called it obsolete, aimed at a Soviet Union that no longer exists.

His most recent statement about NATO is perhaps the most alarming one to date. During a South Carolina campaign rally in February, he told the audience that when he was president, a NATO head of state asked him if he would defend that country if Russia attacked.

“I said, ‘You didn’t pay. You’re delinquent. No, I would not protect you. In fact, I would encourage [Russia] to do whatever the hell they want,’” he told the crowd.

Given Russian actions, NATO has never been more important.

And given Trump’s attitudes and past statements, the question in the year ahead is whether Trump can or will break the alliance and whether NATO can survive with an America that is insular, isolationist and possibly no longer a member.

This brings up the next big question for the year ahead:

Will Ukraine survive as an independent country?

For Vladimir Putin, the road to Kiev runs through Washington, DC.

Putin’s gamble on a lightning conquest of Ukraine has been a near-complete disaster. What was to have been a two-week coup has turned into a two-year war of attrition that has killed anywhere between 300,000 to 500,000 Russian soldiers. Putin has had to turn to North Korea for replacements and even these troops have reportedly suffered severe losses. The Russian economy has been crippled by western sanctions, especially those emplaced by the United States. The Russian Navy has suffered heavy losses including the sinking of its premier flagship. Even if he succeeds in conquering Ukraine he will take possession of a land that he himself devastated.

Even worse for Putin have been the strategic geopolitical costs of the war. While one of his war aims was trying to stop the expansion of NATO into Ukraine and elsewhere, instead NATO gained two new, well-armed NATO allies, Sweden and Finland, which were alarmed by Russian aggression. In the Middle East Putin’s Syrian ally ignominiously fell and its president fled to Russia. It was not just a blow to Russian prestige and influence in the Middle East; the Russian Navy was denied a warm water port it had come to count on in the Mediterranean.

The losses have even been personal. Putin’s friend, fixer and the leader of the fearsome mercenary Wagner Group, Yevgeny Prigozhin, mutinied against the Russian Army leadership and had to be put down, which he was with a plane crash in August 2023.

Russia can theoretically still win and experts have said that a war of attrition favors Russian superiority in resources and personnel.

But from Putin’s perspective the war has become a costly ordeal with a very uncertain outcome—unless Putin can turn the United States against Ukraine, or at least neutralize Ukraine’s most important ally.

Such is the usefulness of Trump as an anti-Ukrainian US president who may take Russia’s side, cut off the arms flow to Ukraine and withdraw from NATO, or at least cripple the alliance.

Putin could see the utility of Trump and that’s why he supported him in his 2016 campaign. Despite Trump’s calling it the “Russia, Russia, Russia hoax,” that Russian support was extensively documented in the report by Robert Mueller, former director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. Even if Mueller’s conclusions were neutered by Trump’s attorney general, they still detailed a damning connection between Trump’s campaign and Russian efforts (which included considerable activity in Florida).

Russian interference on Trump’s behalf in the 2024 campaign has not been authoritatively detailed but the Russians themselves alluded to it in November when Nikolai Patrushev, a member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and former Secretary of the Security Council told a Russian newspaper that “To achieve success in the elections, Donald Trump relied on certain forces to which he has corresponding obligations. And as a responsible person, he will be obliged to fulfill them.”

What were these “forces?” What are the “corresponding obligations?” The public doesn’t know and as long as Trump is president it is unlikely to find out, certainly from official US sources.

Whatever the “forces” and “obligations,” the question this year will be whether the United States remains the arsenal of democracy and the primary backer of an independent, western-oriented, democratic, anti-Putin Ukraine or if Trump chooses to end aid and hand Ukraine to Putin.

Trump said on the campaign trail that he could solve the Ukraine crisis in 24 hours. That doesn’t bode well for subtle or nuanced negotiations. Russia has already explicitly dismissed an early Trump proposal for a peace deal that would have delayed Ukrainian membership in NATO for 20 years and deployed European peacekeepers to the border.

“We are certainly not satisfied with the proposals sounding on behalf of representatives of the president-elect’s team,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told Tass on Dec. 29.

If frustrated with negotiations, there exists the possibility that Trump may try to impose a diktat on Ukraine that Ukraine would almost undoubtedly reject.

It needs to be remembered that Trump betrayed a US ally before, in 2019 abandoning Kurdish forces after he had phone call with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, who wanted to invade their territory. That betrayal led to displacement and massacres of people who had bravely fought off the Islamic State in Syria in cooperation with US forces.

Given Trump’s past adoration of Putin, Putin’s seeming grip on Trump, and Trump’s choice of the pro-Putin Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence, as the year dawns the indicators for Ukraine are grim.

Who will win the BRICS versus bucks battle?

However, on a different front a rift has already opened between Trump and Putin and the issue is, perhaps unsurprisingly, money.

The United States dollar is the standard currency of world trade and that has proved a problem for a sanctions-burdened Russia.

In October, Putin hosted a BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia. BRICS stands for Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa and it is a Russian-created international economic organization. First convened in 2009 as BRIC, it has come to include a variety of countries outside the US-Western orbit.

From the beginning, Putin advocated finding an alternative to US dollar dominance. With the Ukraine war and Putin’s need to evade sanctions, the search has taken on greater urgency. This was the theme of the 2024 BRICS summit in the Russian city of Kazan.

But in a rare show of dissent from the Putin line, on Nov. 30, Trump issued a direct cease and desist order via a posting on X:

“The idea that the BRICS Countries are trying to move away from the Dollar while we stand by and watch is OVER. We require a commitment from the Countries that they will neither create a new BRICS Currency, nor back any other Currency to replace the mighty U.S. Dollar or, they will face 100% Tariffs, and should expect to say goodbye to selling into the wonderful U.S. Economy. They can go find another ‘sucker!’ There is no chance that the BRICS will replace the U.S. Dollar in International Trade, and any Country that tries should wave goodbye to America.”

While the posting was uncharacteristically long and coherent for Trump (so it was likely drafted by someone else) it sent an unmistakable warning shot in Putin’s direction.

The Kremlin responded on Monday, Dec. 2.

“More and more countries are switching to the use of national currencies in their trade and foreign economic activities,” observed Dmitry Peskov, a Kremlin spokesman. “If the US uses force, as they say economic force, to compel countries to use the dollar it will further strengthen the trend of switching to national currencies” for international trade.

The fight over international currencies may seem wonky and obscure, especially for Trump who finds serious policy matters boring, but this is a major issue and a test of whether Trump will actually stand up for American interests when the conflict is with Putin. It will also determine whether the United States remains the mainspring of world trade in the future, given Trump’s tariff infatuation.

The fate of bucks versus BRICS is more than likely to be a key issue in the year ahead and one that bears close watching.

What will be the fate of Gaza, Syria and the Middle East?

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu knows that the way to Trump’s heart is flattery.

“That’s the art of the deal,” he joked in 2017 as he troweled on praise for Trump’s “clarity” and “courage” even as he privately discounted Trump’s diplomatic proposals. He even named a planned city for Trump (Ramat Trump) on the Golan Heights.

Although Netanyahu briefly fell out of favor with Trump for daring to congratulate Joe Biden on his victory three weeks after the 2020 election, Trump’s depiction of himself during the campaign as Israel’s “protector” and his extreme pro-Israel positions indicate that the United States will support any actions Netanyahu takes in the year ahead.

Those actions would appear to include killing every single member of Hamas, even if each one requires a 500-pound bomb to do so.

As the year dawns there are some indications that what is left of the Hamas leadership might be willing to release the remaining hostages they hold and bend on their demands in order to stop Israeli operations.

But the likelihood of an end to the Gaza war still seems distant. After the slaughter of Israelis on Oct. 7, 2023, Netanyahu set the destruction of Hamas as the Israeli war aim and he will stick to it until it is achieved thoroughly and completely, even if a cease fire is called in the interim.

Meanwhile, the non-combatant population in Gaza will continue to suffer, used as shields by the remaining Hamas fighters and viewed as impediments by the Israeli military. Perhaps if the shooting dies down a bit more humanitarian aid will be able to get through this year. But the suffering is likely to continue for generations. The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development, in a report issued in October, estimated it would take 350 years for Gaza to get back to its prewar economy. That’s not an unthinkable timeframe in the context of the Middle East but it does speak to the devastation of the conflict.

Netanyahu appears to have expended all of Israel’s “soft power;” the power of its values, its humanity and its unique moral authority. But when it comes to “hard power” at the outset of the year, Israel appears to be in an overwhelmingly strong strategic position: while some Hamas elements remain, Gaza appears eliminated as a threat; Hezbollah in the north has been decapitated and its military capabilities virtually neutralized; Iran lost its president during the year to a helicopter crash, is crippled by sanctions and facing a United States that is already antagonistic but likely to become actively hostile under Trump; and when the Syrian regime of Bashar Assad fell the Russians lost a client and their presence in the region.

Of all the questions in the Middle East, at the outset of the year Syria appears the most problematic for all concerned because it is a major source of uncertainty: how will whatever emerges as a new government govern the country? Will the Islamic State revive? What will the new Syria’s relationship be with Israel, Iran, Russia, the United States and the rest of the world?

And over it all: will all the fighting ever stop?

As the mother says in the Adam Sandler movie You Don’t Mess with the Zohan: “They’ve been fighting for 2,000 years. It can’t be much longer.”

Triumvirates’ end

The first Roman triumvirate didn’t make the ten-year mark.

Crassus led a disastrous military campaign into Parthia (modern day Iran) and was defeated in battle at a place called Carrhae in 53 BCE. The story is that he was captured and his captors, knowing his infamous greed for gold, killed him by pouring molten gold down his throat.

Pompey and Caesar maintained friendly relations for years (Pompey had married Caesar’s daughter) but over time their relations strained. Ultimately, Caesar went to war against the Senate and Pompey was sent to crush Caesar militarily. Instead, Caesar defeated him and Pompey was murdered after fleeing to Egypt. Caesar became Rome’s dictator-for-life until he was assassinated on the Ides of March, 44 BCE.

None of today’s triumvirs are likely to lead an army from the front as Crassus did but the dynamics and rivalries of men pursuing power and glory are much the same and likely to yield the same results.

As noted above, signs of personal and national rivalry are appearing, as evidenced in the BRICS versus bucks battle. Also, Trump tried to reorient US trade policy against China in his first term and seems likely to try the same again.

But also militating against the survival of this triumvirate is Trump’s inveterate lying and his lifetime record of welching on commitments and contracts. Just as a Mafia loan shark doesn’t take kindly to a deadbeat borrower, Putin and his mafia-like siloviki won’t take kindly to Trump reneging on whatever agreement they had that put him in office. The embers of this conflagration already seem to be sparking.

What does all this mean for the everyday Southwest Floridian—and all Americans?

At least initially, this year, it’s likely to result in higher prices across the board and scarcity of goods as these men’s rivalries take the form of trade wars. In particular, Trump’s hostility to China and his infatuation with tariffs may result in a decline in the amount and availability of manufactured products to which Americans have become accustomed. Far from a promised reduction in inflation, the cost of everything is likely to climb.

In a broader context, the rise of the new triumvirate marks an authoritarian reaction against the wave of democracy that swept the world from the 1990s onward. Whether it was Tienanmen Square, the end of the Berlin Wall, the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the fall of the Soviet Union, or the Arab Spring, people saw the example and success of the United States, and aspired to greater freedom, democracy and human rights.

This was the movement that Putin saw and despised from his perch as a KGB agent in East Germany. It was the movement that threatened to topple China’s Communist government in 1989 and no doubt alarmed Xi. And it is a form of government for which Trump has no use except when it ratifies his own proclivities for domination and control.

As in domestic politics, the year ahead promises to be a hard one for Americans.

The United States is built on the premise that power flows upward from the people, the “consent of the governed.” The rule of the triumvirate is premised on exerting control downward from the top. It’s a conflict that goes back to the days of Athens versus Sparta and seems baked into human nature.

For most of its history, the world looked to America as an example of democracy and freedom. But now, under Trump, Americans need to look for their inspiration to the people who smashed the Berlin Wall, the protesters who took to the streets in the Arab Spring, and the dissidents who stood up to the Soviet Union and Putin.

But there is value in persistence, especially on a matter as important as this. As the writer Thomas Paine put it at one of the darkest and direst points in the American revolution: “Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as FREEDOM should not be highly rated.”

*The first triumvirate: Pompey, Crassus and Caesar. (Photo: Wikimedia Commons)*

_________________

Yesterday: Part 1—Defying darkness: Anticipating the year ahead in domestic politics

Tomorrow: Part 3—Defying darkness: Southwest Florida politics and the year ahead

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Part 1—Defying darkness: Anticipating the year ahead in domestic politics

Jan. 1, 2025 by David Silverberg

This will be a dark and tragic year—unless a miracle intervenes

It will be chaotic, disruptive and stressful.

Make no mistake: it will be a year of assault on freedom, democracy, the rule of law and the Constitution.

America is not facing a mere change of administrations; it is facing a revolution from above and one so sweeping and comprehensive that firm and confident predictions are almost impossible to make.

More relevant than attempted predictions are the questions that will arise as the year unfolds.

The key one will be: as darkness descends, how can light be kept alive?

After all, what once passed for “politics” is no more.

In the past, “politics” was generally understood to mean the interplay of power, policy and personalities, along with popular participation. Governance, representation and elections were its essence and informed voting citizens were its foundation.

Now American politics—or more accurately, governance—will revolve around the whims, urges and rages of a single individual.

It is exactly the situation that the Founders rebelled against and sought to avoid. But Donald Trump 2.0 will ultimately affect every aspect of American life. No place or person will be unaffected.

The story of the year is going to be the interaction between the Trump regime (this goes beyond an “administration”) and the American public and the country’s constitutional institutions.

Ultimately, the question will be whether the Constitution survives the pressures and efforts to change, ignore or destroy it and whether American democracy can withstand his assaults.

Trump and his legions can be expected to hit hard and move fast. There will be sweeping disruptions, especially in the first 100 days of the regime, indeed probably even announced in the inaugural address on Jan. 20. Even on his first day, Trump has said he will be a dictator and issue an avalanche of executive orders to—at the very least—encourage fossil fuel exploration and usage, round up migrants and pardon January 6th insurrectionists. But numerous other orders are likely to go much further.

Aside from executive actions, people can expect the norms that ensured civility, rationality and decent conduct at the highest levels of government to face constant assaults and efforts to overthrow them—and they are likely to crumble.

What is more, they are likely to see the breakdown in civility and decency at street level, in their neighborhoods, and in their everyday interactions. After all, presidents have always served as role models. Donald Trump will turn the presidential bully pulpit into a pulpit for bullying.

The shooting and killing of Brian Thompson, chief executive officer of UnitedHealthcare in New York, no matter how unrelated to electoral politics, is likely a precursor of more violence to come.

But even short of physical violence, personal conduct is likely to become nastier, more uncivil, more entitled, more insulting and more arrogant in imitation of Trump’s example.

Will the American public accept and approve of this disruption and will public opinion count at all in making national policy?

Will there be any consideration of the needs of ordinary Americans as the Trump regime’s roster is filled with billionaires? How long will Elon Musk stay in Trump’s good graces before he’s jettisoned? How far will the American tax structure be altered to favor the very rich while putting the burden of supporting the state on those least able to afford it?

Economically, will measures like extreme tariffs so drive up the cost of goods that the life to which Americans have been accustomed becomes unsustainable? Will Trump hurl the United States into a Venezuelan or Zimbabwean economic fiasco?

For those who do not buy into the Trump personality cult the overarching question will be how to respond. Is resistance the answer and what form it will take? Is it still worthwhile to work through existing institutions, which will increasingly be assaulted and weakened? Is it principled civil disobedience, with all its dangers and penalties? Is the answer personal withdrawal from the public arena and a quest for inner tranquility? Or just leaving the country altogether?

As official delusion and deception become the norm and independent media is beaten down and intimidated, how will people find the truth, share it and act on it? As government actions become increasingly immoral and inhumane, how can people respond in an ethical way?

In purely practical, everyday terms, how can the average grassroots citizen thrive or even survive under a government and in an economy in constant turmoil and subject to unpredictable and unforeseeable changes caused by the whims of one man?

As previously seemingly solid social safety nets like Obamacare, Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid are attacked how will Americans who depend upon them survive?

What will be the consequences of a US government pursuing a policy of isolationism, anti-immigration, withdrawal and xenophobia? To what degree will a draconian anti-immigrant effort driven by extremists creep over the line into “ethnic cleansing?” And to what degree will those states, cities and citizens that resist these efforts suffer for their dissent?

It will be a year when Donald Trump attempts to dominate all thought, action, law, media, policy, and government and where he fails to do this personally, his cultists, followers and enablers will work on his behalf and toward his ends.

This regime will be characterized by pettiness, cruelty, hatred, prejudice, rage, disparagement, racism, misogyny, and criminality. It will rule through threats, intimidation and defamation. It will be corrupt to its very marrow.

Americans will know a new emotion from their government: fear. They will go from the most fearless people in the world to among the more fearful, a much more common sensibility among the governed of the world.

Perhaps the best way to think of what is coming is to think of Donald Trump, not as a president but as a Mafia don, like Don Corleone in The Godfather, with his Make America Great Again (MAGA) followers as his accomplices.

The Don is all-powerful, mercurial, demanding complete obedience and submission. There is no loyal opposition or legitimate differences of opinion; there are only believers and heretics, loyalists and traitors—and heretics and traitors must be punished and eradicated.

This is already in evidence. Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) told a political conference on Dec. 12, that when it came to approving Trump’s appointments, he and his allies had essentially sent a message that: “We got you here. And if you want to survive, you better be good.”

Or as Florida pundit and Lincoln Project co-founder Rick Wilson put it in an essay titled The Administration from Hell: “Trump is the Prince of Darkness in this particular drama. He wants nothing more than to destroy everything in his path. It’s not always coherent, but it’s always him.”

Southwest Florida, for all the noisy, fanatical Trumpism of some of its residents, will not be spared the consequences of the chaos, incompetence and misrule that will likely characterize this year and every year that Trump is in office.

Indeed, the Trump transformation appears at its outset to be so sweeping and comprehensive that perhaps it is best to concentrate on its impact on Southwest Florida to get a sense of its effects both locally and nationwide.

The new trail of tears

The first big action being promised by the Trump regime will be roundups and deportations of undocumented migrants.

These roundups will hit Southwest Florida hard, particularly in the agriculture sector, which relies extensively on seasonal migrant workers for harvests of crops such as strawberries, citrus and tomatoes. But it will also impact the construction, hospitality and service trades, which are also highly dependent on migrant labor.

In 2023 the Florida legislature passed, and Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed, Senate Bill (SB) 1718, which aimed to crack down on undocumented migration by punishing employers and transporters of undocumented migrants.

While implementation of SB 1718 was uneven due to court challenges, the Florida Policy Institute estimated that the law would cost the state’s economy upwards of $12.6 billion in the first year alone when all the accounting was done. Employers saw an immediate impact. For example, in Fort Myers, the locally well-known firm Crowther Roofing lost 10 percent of its workers in 2023 as a result of the law, its owner, David Crowther, told National Public Radio.

For everyday consumers, anti-immigration measures will mean higher prices and harsher inflation and with national anti-immigrant measures coming on top of the ones that Florida has already enacted, the price at checkout is likely to be steep—to say nothing of the human suffering that will underly it.

Trump, his followers and his executive branch nominees are stating that their roundups are only aimed at purging the country of violent offenders and proven criminals.

In fact, the administration of President Barack Obama pursued a policy of detaining and deporting criminal, undocumented migrants and deported 1.18 million people in its first three years. But that effort was relatively quiet. It was meant to be effective and actually accomplish its mission of making American streets safer and enforcing the law. President Joe Biden followed a similar course, deporting 1.1 million people in the fiscal years from 2021 to 2024. Furthermore, these efforts were accompanied by reform efforts aimed at giving undocumented aliens a chance to “get right with the law” and find a path to legitimate citizenship.

But the Trump roundup can be expected to be spectacular, very public and as harsh as possible. It will likely be conducted as a television spectacle, a reality show intended to send a message of mercilessness to the world that discourages all immigration, legal and otherwise.

Unlike previous immigration reform efforts like those made in 2007, 2014 and most recently the bipartisan effort in the Senate that sought a border solution providing security and smart enforcement while also providing labor and economic benefits, this crackdown will likely be driven more by hatred of all immigrants than policy goals. It will likely be infused with rage and racist rhetoric by both Trump and his loyalists as they seek to make America white again.

For the first time there will be concentration camps on American soil and Americans will see them on their television screens. The state of Texas has already offered land for their construction. Even as Trump himself expressed sympathy for “dreamers,” people brought illegally into the United States as children, his would-be implementers like prospective Border Patrol chief Tom Homan, have stated that any leniency on dreamers would be contingent on Democratic support for harsh border measures.

These roundups and deportations will likely be fought in the courts but with its placement of obedient judges, the regime will probably plow through the court system the same way Trump plowed through his criminal cases. Those cases that reach the Supreme Court will be adjudicated by a Trump-appointed majority of justices—and he may gain more appointments as sitting justices retire.

Ultimately, the anti-migrant effort will be aimed at cutting off the influx of people seeking to live, work and contribute to the United States, to isolate the nation, and “cleanse” it of all races and ethnicities that come from what Trump in 2018 termed “shithole countries.”

Trade wars and tariffs

One of America’s greatest blessings is that it shares borders with two countries with which it is at peace and who constitute its largest trading partners.

That trade is massive: $908.9 billion with Canada in 2022, according to the US Trade Representative. US exports were $427.7 billion and imports were $481.2 billion. Trade with Mexico was similarly robust: $855.1 billion with in 2022 with exports of $362.0 billion and imports of $493.1 billion.

Trump is promising to upend this happy situation with a completely unnecessary and unprovoked trade war as he seeks to impose crippling tariffs.

In Trump’s mind tariffs are cost-free sources of revenue and he’s justifying these by saying he wants to force Mexico and Canada to take stronger border measures against undocumented migrants and contraband.

In fact, free North American trade benefits all countries and the kind of 25 percent tariffs Trump has floated would land squarely on the American consumer who would see prices skyrocket, especially for items like durable goods, car parts and food, which make up much of North American trade.

Both Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum have made their cases personally to Trump in an effort to dissuade him from this course of action.

But this is a perfect example of the perversion of American government by the Trump regime. Any policy decision will not be reached by reasoned analysis and debate; instead it will depend on the mood of the monarch, backed by a subservient Congress and his political base.

If Trumpflag-waving Southwest Floridians think they will be spared crippling inflation and a scarcity of goods, they should think again. At the very least the prices for the Canadian-made replacement parts for their sticker-covered pickup trucks are going to rise to the point where they’ll have to jury-rig their swamp buggies like Cubans keeping their 1959 Chevvies on the road.

The war on women

The 2024 election was a setback for women politically.

Trump’s record on women is nauseatingly long and detailed and needs no recounting here. His initial nominees for high office—Matt Gaetz for Attorney General and Peter Hegseth for Secretary of Defense—faced well-documented allegations of harassment, trafficking, underage sex and even rape. Once upon a time, these charges would have been automatically disqualifying for high office. But now it is as though attacks on women are a criterion for nomination.

It all spoke volumes about the regime’s attitude. Only true MAGA believers like former governor Kristi Noem and White House Chief of Staff Susan “Susie” Wiles will have a say in the regime, while independent voices like Nimarata “Nikki” Haley, who challenged Trump in the primaries, will be excluded.

When it comes to abortion, Trump has stated that he will leave it up to the individual states—i.e., where it stands right now. However, the anti-choice movement is likely to push for a national ban. A big question in the year ahead will be how much resistance anti-choicers meet, how effective that resistance proves to be, and whether Trump changes his mind.

Florida is already a petri dish for this (as will be covered in detail in a future posting).

The war on truth, science, health and learning

The accession of Donald Trump to the presidency will mean the return of what has been called “Trumpality,” the Trump worldview or mindset in which objective truth has little to no value.

This could be seen from the very day after he took office in 2017 when he had his spokesman, Sean Spicer, insist that he’d had the largest inaugural crowd in history despite clear and obvious evidence to the contrary. It was so absurd an assertion that it led to one of the greatest sketches in the history of Saturday Night Live.

Trump is aggressively taking legal action against media reporting he dislikes. He sued ABC News for erroneously reporting that he had been liable for rape rather than the correct “sexual abuse” and won a $15 million settlement. On Dec. 17 he announced a lawsuit against Iowa pollster J. Ann Selzer and the Des Moines Register for reporting that he was down in their polling prior to the primary caucuses.

He is promising many more such lawsuits in the future. But in a broader sense, the imposition of Trumpality in the coming year will be pervasive and likely crippling to a United States whose whole success has been built on determining and responding to reality.

For over 200 years, virtually from the moment Benjamin Franklin scientifically determined that lightning was electricity, the thrust of American thought was to clinically understand the world in as realistic a way as possible in order to effectively respond to it.

But in the first Trump administration the world was treated to the spectacle of a president who tried to change the course of a hurricane with a Sharpie, who dismissed as hoaxes anything he disliked, from a COVID outbreak to climate change, and who ultimately denied the reality that he had lost the 2020 election.

That delusional thinking will not only likely be evident this year, it will be imposed from above. It will likely affect everything from public health to weather forecasting. It will pervade the media whether mainstream, social or ideological as they both report what he asserts no matter how false and acquiesce to his version of events to avoid retaliation or retribution.

The opposition to vaccines and public health measures as evidenced by the nomination of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., as Secretary of Health and Human Services, has the potential to wipe out a century of medical progress and scientific advancement in promoting public health and replace it with a brew of conspiracy theories, disbelief and even outright superstition.

A Trump war on science and even the notion of climate change will likely have a devastating impact on Southwest Florida, which in recent years has found itself even more reliant on accurate weather forecasting in the face of multiple hurricanes and dependent on support from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to rebuild and recover from the storms.

Trump and his minions have vowed to eliminate the Department of Education and there is a strong possibility that they will find a way to do it this year—with extreme prejudice.

What that will likely mean is a loss of grants and funding to promote education and educational initiatives.

In the 2024-25 fiscal years, Collier County, Fla., received $7 million in direct federal education grants and an additional $80 million in federal funding through the state. The Lee County School District received $154 million or 5 percent of its budget in federal funds. Both will feel a severe impact if federal funding is cut off because the Department of Education and its grant programs are eliminated.

Every other school system throughout the country will face the same.

The war on equality

“We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal… ,” states the Declaration of Independence.

While more modern usage might change that sentence to “all people are created equal,” the fact remains that idea of human equality is the cornerstone, the fundamental bedrock on which all American government, law and society is built. Advancing equality is what defines the American notion of progress. All the social and political advances in American history—emancipation, women’s suffrage, civil rights, integration, non-discrimination—were based on advancing equality to all.

The idea of equality pervades all American law; on the lintel of the US Supreme Court is the motto: “Equal justice under law.” It means that the law applies equally to absolutely everyone and that it will be administered impartially to all.

But that is no longer the case. The anti-equality movement has now established that there is one person who is officially above the law. Donald Trump is the living embodiment of it.

He has plowed through every application of law, every enforcement action, every civil proceeding, every impeachment effort and through a jury’s criminal verdict. He will likely never be sentenced for the 34 felonies of which he was convicted. He has been handed immunity by the Supreme Court. In his own mind he is and will forever be guiltless for any action he has ever committed and now that will be the case in fact, likely encouraging new crimes.

For the first time in its history since it threw off the shackles of a distant king, Americans are led by one person who is above the law. He is a de facto monarch, a single source of power. The Declaration’s truth is no longer self-evident. All people under the Constitution of the United States are not created equal.

As of right now, only that one person is officially above the law. But in the coming year and in all the years subsequent in which this situation continues, others will claim or attempt to attain this elevated status. Over time the idea of equality before the law will face disintegration. Those who are clearly guilty of crimes will walk free and defiant—imitating and citing Donald Trump—and the majesty, dignity and most of all, authority, of the law will crumble down to the lowliest courtroom and street cop.

In this Trump will be aided and abetted by a subservient, all-Trumpist Congress, hand-picked, blindly loyal judges, and an avalanche of propaganda justifying it all.

The war on equality is already under way in Florida, where in May, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) signed Senate Bill 266, a law banning the pursuit of diversity, equity and inclusion in state college hiring decisions. This comes on top of the Stop WOKE (Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees) Act passed in 2022 that prohibited discussion of the impact of racism and gender inequality in state schools and businesses.

Although the Stop WOKE Act is still subject to court proceedings and parts of it have been ruled invalid, it remains in force in Florida. In the year to come versions of it are likely to be passed in other state legislatures and nationally, with encouragement from the White House.

The war on equality in all forms is almost certain to take place on many fronts this year.

The opposition

For Democrats and the 75 million Americans who opposed this state of affairs at the ballot box, this will likely be a year of introspection, healing, reorganizing, reassessing and most of all, learning to endure.

For the Democratic Party and its caucus in Congress, it is clearly time to pass the torch to a new generation, just as Biden (82 years old) had to pass the torch to Vice President Kamala Harris (60 years). In 2022 then-House Speaker Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-12-Calif.) (84 years) stepped aside in favor of Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-8-NY) (54 years). But the transition will not be smooth or even. For example, Rep. Gerry Connelly (D-11-Va.) (74 years) bested Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-14-NY) (35 years) for the ranking position on the House Oversight Committee in what was seen as an early test of generational change.

There may be handings off of batons to younger politicians. But it will take time for the next generation to consolidate, find its footing and build political capital. As they do this they will be under extreme pressure from the Trump regime and its party to thwart their every effort. Nor will the pressure only be national; it will be at the state level too and it will all be very personal.

The most obvious possible Democratic presidential candidate to challenge Trump in 2028 (if there’s an election and if Trump runs again) is Gov. Gavin Newsom of California.

The world can expect a massive Trumpist war against Newsom and the state of California starting this year and every year that Trump is president.

California will no doubt be denied federal disaster benefits (in 2020 Trump said it could avoid wildfires by raking up leaves and threatened at the time to withhold disaster aid). That Trump will use the full force and power of the federal government against a potential rival was demonstrated in 2019 when he tried to get Ukrainian help against Joe Biden, for which he was impeached, although acquitted.

But it won’t just be Trump attacking California, it will be the entire regime and the Trumpist movement because California is the most obvious target for anti-“woke” crusading.

Also, California has Hollywood, which has been a target of conservatives since movies started being made there over a century ago. The world’s entertainment celebrities, having overwhelmingly endorsed Harris, can expect retaliation this year and beyond. Once again, Florida provides a good example of this kind of warfare, where DeSantis went to war against the Disney corporation for its “woke” heresy.

Indeed, throughout the country expect attacks aimed at denying Democrats any possibility of ever winning any election again at any level, whether through ballot access denial or election interference in Democratic districts and cities, especially, in response to opposition to anti-migrant roundups and deportations and possible “sanctuary” cities.

This will be more than just competition. The regime will attempt what has been called “politicide”—the political destruction of a party, movement or belief system.

Responding, persisting and surviving

How can non-Trumpers of all stripes and parties respond to this onslaught and prevent it from succeeding?

One answer is from Rick Wilson who argued that all of Trump’s appointments should be fought tooth and nail: “Every one of them. Stop the worst. Expose the rest.”

Moreover, he argued: “Attack the disinformation infrastructure. MAGA thrives on lies. Cut off their supply.

“Brand the MAGA GOP. Chaos, corruption, and crisis—they own it. Make it stick.

“Prepare for 2026 and 2028. The battle for America’s soul didn’t end on November 5th.

“Lead with courage. Fear and apathy are their weapons. Fight back with strength.”

A similar response came in an answer to a question from a reader who expressed despair and hopelessness in The Washington Post. Jennifer Rubin, a Washington Post columnist, responded: “It is a common sentiment these days, but giving way to hopelessness ensures the triumph of cruelty and authoritarianism. We owe it to our more vulnerable fellow Americans to continue to fight for our democracy. Every day, civil servants trying to hold the line, judges committing to the rule of law and activists struggling on behalf of immigrants and other at-risk people will get up, do their work, and try to move the needle in the direction of justice, fairness and freedom. The least the rest of us can do is not surrender. No single person can fix everything, but there is something everyone can do, even if it is just buying one subscription to a quality local newspaper, writing one letter to a lawmaker, attending a school board meeting, volunteering in your community, or supporting a decent person’s candidacy for local, state or federal office.”

There is no doubt, though, that 2025 will be a year of defense for all who oppose Trump’s absolutism. It will be a year to protect the Constitution—and all the rights it enshrines—from an unconstitutional onslaught and even efforts to change it by, for example, ending birthright citizenship or prolonging the presidential term.

Trump and his regime have the momentum going into the year but that momentum and whatever victories they score are unlikely to last forever.

The past historical record shows that authoritarian regimes can succeed for a time but then usually make a major miscalculation or face an overwhelming crisis that the supreme leader is unable to overcome, usually as a result of overweening ambition: for example, Adolf Hitler invaded the Soviet Union; Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait; Vladimir Putin invaded Ukraine.

In the case of Trump, when faced with the COVID outbreak in 2019 he initially dismissed it, wished it away, derided it, then prescribed absurd responses like fake drugs and injecting bleach. It exposed his unfitness, incompetence and belief that his delusions could become reality. It was a major factor in his 2020 defeat—another setback he tried to imagine away.

In the second Trump presidency, after a period of irrational exuberance and the complete deregulation of commerce and industry, an economic crash on the order of 1929’s looms as the most the probable disaster. That may not occur until after Trump’s first year.

“Monarchy is like a sleek craft, it sails along well until some bumbling captain runs it into the rocks,” said Fisher Ames, one of the earliest members of Congress. “Democracy, on the other hand, is like a raft. It never goes down but, dammit, your feet are always wet.”

Historically, authoritarian regimes have also been riven and sometimes brought down by factional differences. As political differences cease to be expressed in open, multi-party forums and through elections, they appear as internecine battles within the ruling regime.

An early expression of this was evidenced last month in an argument over continuation of H-1B visas for highly skilled foreigners, with Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy of the nascent Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) arguing to continue the program and anti-immigration MAGAs like Laura Loomer, Charlie Kirk and Steve Bannon calling for its elimination.

The DOGE brothers appear to have won that battle but it is indicative of the kind of infighting to be expected from the Trump regime, that will have echoes at the grassroots.

A climate change-related natural disaster along the lines of 2005’s Hurricane Katrina is also a strong possibility.

The horrible irony of all this is that for all the conservative bleating about “American exceptionalism” and Trump’s past rants about an America in decline that only he can save, the policies he and Musk seem determined to pursue will firmly and irrevocably put America on the same path of decline and decrepitude that has afflicted every great nation and empire throughout history. Moreover, Trump seems determined to lead the nation over this cliff while blinding the public with lies, delusions, and emotional chest-thumping nativism and hyper-nationalism.

There’s no doubt that it will be a long and difficult year. Friends of democracy need to prepare for a lengthy marathon. The sprint is over.

However, like the jewel at the bottom of Pandora’s box, there’s still hope and the unlikely inspiration for it is provided by, of all people, Donald Trump.

After being defeated in 2020, after a delusional and fruitless effort to overturn the election, after impeachment, disgrace, Florida exile, investigations, derision, trial, and criminal conviction, Trump came back from political Hell to win the presidency.

If Trump can make such a comeback on behalf of selfishness and greed, then surely those who oppose him can also come back from defeat and disaster, loss and setback. With persistence and determination they can rebuild and renew themselves and take the first steps on a road that, no matter how long and hard it may be, will truly make America great again.

____________________

Tomorrow: Part 2—Darkness descends: Anticipating the year ahead abroad and the new triumvirate

Coming Jan. 3: Part 3—Defying darkness: Southwest Florida politics and the year ahead

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Prophetic or pathetic? Grading the political projections of the year past

*What could be more Southwest Floridian than looking to the future through a crystal ball on the beach?*

Dec. 30, 2024 by David Silverberg

The end of 2024 has come and with it the usual lazy media roundups looking back at the events of the year.

Far more productive and important are looks ahead, although these are necessarily speculative—and they will be coming in these pages. But first, it seems sensible to see how well The Paradise Progressive was able to foresee the events of 2024, one of the most momentous years in American history.

In the past, we’ve graded our projections on an A through F scale. This year, though, we’ll grade some of the key ones as “prophetic” or “pathetic.”

From Part I – A democracy, if you can keep it: Anticipating the year ahead in politics in America

Prophetic: “It will be an interesting year but not a fun one. Indeed, it will be dangerous, stressful and frightening.”

Well, that was certainly true. Not much further explanation is needed there.

Prophetic: “…the outcome of the 2024 presidential election will determine whether America stays a democracy or becomes a dictatorship.”

While this remains to be seen, all indications are that America is heading in a dictatorial direction under Donald Trump.

Prophetic: “Throughout the year expect court rulings to drop like bombs, with Supreme Court rulings making the biggest explosions of all.”

This was certainly the case. In January, in a civil case first brought by writer E. Jean Carroll in 2023, Trump was found liable for sexual abuse and ordered to pay $83.3 million in damages for defamation. On May 30 in the New York falsified business records case, Trump was found guilty of 34 felonies, a verdict that seemed a major blow to his presidential candidacy. However, in a decision announced on July 1 in the case of Trump vs. United States, the Supreme Court granted presidents—i.e., Trump—immunity for “official acts,” a decision that now hands him virtually unchecked power.

Prophetic: “If he wins he becomes dictator, he pardons everyone who committed a crime on his behalf, and he attains absolute, unrestricted power. If he loses, he forfeits his life, his fortune and his own freedom.”

The situation is certainly set up for this prophecy to be fulfilled and the likelihood is that he will evade justice altogether once he takes the presidency.

Pathetic: At the outset of the year, a movie called Civil War, which imagined armed domestic conflict in the United States, was being promoted and threatened to “encourage those thinking of civil war and political violence to actually take up arms and make this fiction real.”

Civil War was released in April and while garnering $126 million at the box office, essentially sank like a stone, making little to no impression across the country. In its 2023 promotions, it was unclear whether the movie’s villain was President Joe Biden or not. Once released, however, the movie posited a revolt against a president who had overstayed his two terms and was clearly Trump. But the movie’s fictional California forces and especially the “Florida coalition,” that took up arms in revolt was wildly off the mark. Overall, this movie didn’t seem to have any impact at all on the election or domestic politics.

Prophetic: Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ (R) presidential candidacy would be “do or die” in New Hampshire and “that is likely to fall on the ‘die’ side of the equation.”

Indeed, DeSantis dropped his bid on Jan. 21, just before the New Hampshire primary after falling steadily in the polls.

Prophetic: “The Republicans will be throwing everything they can at Biden, like a baseless impeachment proceeding that is unlikely to go anywhere, and attacking him through his son, Hunter.”

That certainly came to pass. Hunter Biden was found guilty of firearms-related felonies in June and pled guilty to tax charges in September. However, by then his father had dropped out of the race and Hunter’s crimes had no political impact. Ultimately, he was pardoned by his father on Dec. 1.

More relevantly, Republicans in the House of Representatives continued a feeble effort to impeach Biden. However, without an actual crime, this blatantly partisan payback scheme went nowhere.

Pathetic: “Biden would also likely crush Trump in any one-to-one debate.”

This was one of the biggest surprises of the year. On June 26, Biden proved weak, incapable and almost senile in his debate with Trump. It was probably the most consequential debate in American history and led to Biden dropping his re-election bid on July 21 in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris.

Prophetic: “The possibility of one—or even both—of the candidates dropping out or dropping dead must be considered.”

Biden dropped out and Trump was nearly felled by an assassin’s bullet on July 13.

Prophetic: “If either man falls the entire political calculation will fundamentally change.”

That’s exactly what happened when Biden dropped out and Harris took his place.

Prophetic: “In Florida questions that loom for 2024 are: will pro-choicers get their amendment on the ballot? Can the DeSantis administration suppress it through the courts? Will Florida officials invalidate the signatures? And if it is on the ballot, will it receive the 60 percent approval from voters to pass?”

Pro-choicers got Amendment 4 guaranteeing a woman’s right to an abortion on the ballot and sure enough, the DeSantis administration tried to suppress it through the courts and invalidate the signatures. Ultimately, it failed to get the 60 percent of votes needed to pass.

From: “Part II – A democracy, if you can keep it: Anticipating the year ahead abroad

Prophetic: On the war in Ukraine, “there’s no end in sight right now and the war seems set to continue in its current state for at least another year.”

Indeed, the war continues and The Paradise Progressive was further prophetic when it noted that as long as Russian President Vladimir Putin was alive, “the course of Russian policy and warmaking will likely remain as it has since the invasion.”

Prophetic: On the war in Gaza: “All Hamas has to do in the year ahead to win its war is simply survive since [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu set the Israeli war goal as destroying it. Israel seems unlikely to achieve its goal before the year is out.”

Even with the death of its leader, Yahya Sinwar, Hamas fights on and the war in Gaza is active. But as was also predicted: “If all other factors remain the same Netanyahu will continue Israel’s current course no matter how long it takes or what it costs in blood, treasure, or prestige.” That was certainly prophetic.

Prophetic: Continuation of the war meant the possibility that “yet another front opens or a third major war suddenly breaks out somewhere during the year.”

Israel pre-emptively opened another front against Hezbollah in Lebanon and conducted a virtually separate war there. Then, suddenly in December, in Syria the regime of President Bashar al Assad fell to rebels.

Pathetic: “Given the tensions, stakes and desperation in so many theaters there will undoubtedly be terror and mass casualty events in the United States this year, some of them severe.”

This did not come to pass, in large part thanks to the vigilance and professionalism of federal counter-terror agencies and personnel.

Prophetic: “There may be efforts to stop voting or scare people away from polling places.”

This came true when 67 bomb threats were called in to polling places in 19 counties in five battleground states, all of them in mostly Democratic counties. It was a tactic that has caused critics to question whether these were deliberate efforts by a foreign power to skew the voting results.

Prophetic: “Some lone shooters, random crazies and violent extremists will get through.”

That’s what happened in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13, although Ryan Wesley Routh’s staking out of a sniper position on the Trump golf course in West Palm Beach, Fla., on Sept. 15 was caught before any shots were fired.

Prophetic: “As Russia has interfered in US elections ever since 2016, so it can be expected to attempt to interfere in the 2024 election.”

As noted previously, there are suspicions of Russian interference in the election and the Putin government seemed to reference these in November when Nikolai Patrushev, a member of Vladimir Putin’s inner circle and former Secretary of the Security Council told a Russian newspaper that “To achieve success in the elections, Donald Trump relied on certain forces to which he has corresponding obligations. And as a responsible person, he will be obliged to fulfill them.”

However, with Trump declared the winner, the disbanding of the cases against him and the dropping of investigations by prosecutor Jack Smith, the American people may never know the full extent and nature of Russian intervention in America’s 2024 election—and the public will certainly not learn it from any official body of the US government under a Trump administration.

Pathetic: “Migrant flows to the US southern border are already at record levels. They will likely skyrocket as the year proceeds.”

Instead, the exact opposite occurred; border apprehensions and encounters with US authorities fell sharply. As a Pew Research Center analysis put it on Oct. 1: “After reaching a record high at the end of 2023, the monthly number of U.S. Border Patrol encounters with migrants crossing into the United States from Mexico has plummeted so far in 2024.”

According to the Pew analysis, the Border Patrol recorded 58,038 encounters with migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border in August 2024, a 77 percent decline from 249,741 encounters in December 2023, the most ever recorded in a single month.

And why this sudden plummet in crossings and encounters? “The decline in encounters has come amid policy changes on both sides of the border,” stated Pew. “Authorities in Mexico have stepped up enforcement to prevent migrants from reaching the U.S. border. And U.S. President Joe Biden issued an executive order in June that makes it much more difficult for migrants who enter the U.S. without legal permission to seek asylum and remain in the country.”

So Biden administration changes made a big difference in border crossings but not in time or with the fanfare to stave off wild Republican charges that the border was “open” and unpoliced.

Prophetic: “…The surge at the border will no doubt be a major headache and vulnerability for Biden this year.”

While there was no surge, it was still a headache—but largely because Trump prevented consideration and passage of a bipartisan border security bill that addressed many of the problems. As the article predicted, he and Republicans “can be expected to exploit the situation to the full,” which they did.

Prophetic: “There is virtually no prospect for any real progress being made on immigration or border security in 2024.” Further, “the prospects for the year ahead are for Trump’s rhetoric on immigrants to keep getting uglier, Republican exploitation of the situation to increase and get more apocalyptic, numbers of migrants and their suffering at the border to keep growing, strains on border security mechanisms to keep expanding and the rewards of finding practical consensus solutions to stay elusive.”

That proved absolutely prophetic.

From: “Part III – A democracy, if you can keep it: Collier County, Fla., and the war on competence”

Collier County, Fla., faced critical elections for its Board of Commissioners and School Board in 2024.

But the biggest surprise came in June when Francis Alfred “Alfie” Oakes III, the outspokenly conservative and pro-Trump farmer, grocer, activist and major Collier County power broker, missed the deadline to file his candidacy papers for State Committeeman and lost his official position on the Collier County Republican Executive Committee. The Paradise Progressive certainly did not foresee that.

Prophetic: “So going into 2024, Collier County voters are faced with seasoned candidates with experience, knowledge and proven competence in their fields or unseasoned MAGA amateurs running on grievances, conspiracies and blind belief.”

Ironically enough, in the Aug. 20 party primary, Collier County Republicans rejected, as one piece of campaign literature put it, “angry, inexperienced individuals” for critical positions in county government and instead voted for seasoned, proven candidates. In particular, Melissa Blazier retained her position as Supervisor of Elections, despite two challengers.

At least in this corner of Florida, as prophetically predicted, the result was “a county that is run on behalf of its residents with effectiveness, efficiency and integrity.”

Summing up

By and large, when it came to broad trends, The Paradise Progressive’s projections for 2024 were strikingly prophetic.

But lest that seem too self-congratulatory, it must be pointed out that it made no firm predictions on outcomes: it never stated who would win at the ballot box, whether locally or nationally, or which side would win the wars in Ukraine and Gaza, or how the Florida constitutional amendments would turn out.

Further, it did not foresee the dramatic, abrupt turns of the year in domestic politics: Biden’s dropping out; Trump’s near-assassination; the Harris candidacy.

Locally, some of the biggest unforeseen developments were Alfie Oakes’ disqualification from Republican Party candidacy; the massive search of his properties by federal law enforcement agencies on Nov. 7; and, in Lee County, the allegations and investigation into corruption by Sheriff Carmine Marceno.

The consequences from these events will play out in 2025.

Indeed, what will 2025 bring the nation, the world and especially Southwest Florida? Informed and humbled by its record from 2024, The Paradise Progressive will be looking ahead at likely developments in days to come.

And that, at least, is a prophecy on which you can count.

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Unchecked and unbalanced: Red flags to look for in the coming Trump regime

Nov. 11, 2024 by David Silverberg

“Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard,” the writer HL Mencken once observed.

Having elected Donald Trump to a second term in office, Americans are going get the Trump agenda “good and hard:” Project 2025 will be implemented whether Trump knows what it is or not, mass roundups of migrants and even legal immigrants are likely starting on day one and Trump will rule—not govern, rule—with absolute immunity and without any checks or balances whatever.

There is no sugarcoating this: it is an absolute catastrophe. It has no redeeming aspects. It is a disaster for America and the world.

That being the case, it may be useful, if not exactly comforting, to get a sense of what the second Trump presidency will be like for everyday Americans. (To read an early exploration of this, see: “Staring into the nightmare: What would life be like under a Trump dictatorship?”)

Two models suggest themselves as possible precursors for Trump’s governance. One is what we’ll call the “Florida model” and the other is the Vladimir Putin model.

The Florida model

In 2022 Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) won re-election with a 20 percent margin, giving him an ironclad mandate, a super-majority Republican legislature in both houses and a Supreme Court of his own choosing. What this effectively meant was that there were no checks or balances on executive authority or scope of action.

It was largely the same situation in which Trump finds himself today, although final disposition of the US House of Representatives remains uncertain as of this writing.

(Regarding the judicial branch, DeSantis has appointed five of the seven justices currently on the state Supreme Court. In Florida, state Supreme Court justices are appointed to six-year terms by the governor from Judicial Nominating Commission recommendations. There is no advice or consent by the state Senate but judges are subject to retention votes after one year in office and must retire at age 75.)

Also similar to Trump’s situation, DeSantis aggressively promoted an ideological agenda and imposed it on the state. In large part, this was driven by his 2023 run for president against Trump, his previous mentor and patron. Essentially, DeSantis sought to offer an alternative to Trump but still promoted Trumpism. As his campaign slogan put it, he sought to “Make America Florida.” That meant promoting measures that in some cases were even more extreme than Trump’s. (Ultimately, it didn’t work as a campaign strategy.)

With a subservient legislature that was in his corner ideologically and whose members sought to be even more extreme, the state government of Florida proceeded to pass and enact the 2022 Stop WOKE (Wrongs to Our Kids and Employees) Act that outlawed mandated diversity, equity and inclusion in both public and private spheres. It sought to reshape education by banning discussion of sexuality. It encouraged widespread book bans. It enacted one of the most severe anti-abortion laws in the United States. It stripped towns and localities of autonomy whether in responding to climate change or, in perhaps the most notorious instance, enacting employment regulations prohibiting heat breaks for workers. It clamped down on academic freedom and replaced seasoned university educators with ideological loyalists. It reshaped local school boards at the elementary and secondary levels to ensure ideological conformity. During the COVID pandemic it defied science and sound public health practices, with its surgeon general denouncing vaccines and protective measures. The governor attacked the media verbally and his officials threatened lawsuits and prosecution to stop coverage. It passed draconian measures against migrants and discouraged immigration. It went to war against the Disney corporation that criticized its decrees.

In all, the second DeSantis term provided the model of a regime that was unchecked by any kind of effective opposition in its ideological crusade but still worked through an existing constitutional and legal framework. Although it made for a chaotic and sometimes jerky patchwork of actions and laws that occasionally ran afoul of judicial judgments, it succeeded in clamping down on free expression of ideas in the public square, in schools and academia, as intended. Culturally, it went a long way toward imposing a sclerotic, regressive official culture on the state that brooked no dissent, independence—or creativity.

Given that Trump is a Floridian and much of his administration is likely to be staffed by loyalist Floridians, these ideas and practices will probably provide much of the policy and legislative framework for the entire country when the new regime takes power.

Presumably, as in Florida, the incoming Republican regime will work through already standing procedures so proposals will have to be considered and approved by Congress and signed by the president, providing some space for debate and dissent rather than outright rule by decree.

One disturbing trend that emerged in Florida under DeSantis that could manifest itself nationally under Trump is the inclination to ban political parties and make the Republican Party the only allowed political organ. In 2023 there was one legislative proposal to decertify the Democratic Party but it wasn’t seriously pursued or considered. However, Christian Ziegler, who was chair of the Florida Republican Party before being deposed in a sex scandal, once said that: “For the Republican Party of Florida the work continues as our job is not done until there are no more Democrats in Florida.”

This extremist rhetoric and legislative activity in Florida bespeak an absolutist mentality that has been a critical aspect of authoritarian regimes throughout history and could be extended to the entire United States.

The Putin model

There are many possibilities in trying to think through the future course of a Trump dictatorship. Another preview is not Trump’s previous presidency but the reign of Russian President Vladimir Putin, whom Trump idolizes, likely obeys, and is highly likely to emulate.

Putin came to power, not with a tsarist bang or as some kind of television star, but during the chaotic but democratic administration of President Boris Yeltsin. After a career in the Soviet spy service, the KGB, he served as an obscure bureaucrat working in the St. Petersburg municipal government. He steadily rose through various government agencies, founding a liberal political party along the way that would provide him a popular base. He entered Yeltsin’s inner circle, ultimately replacing him in return for issuing a pardon that exonerated Yeltsin and members of his family for alleged corruption. Throughout Putin’s career he was also promoted by elements of the old Soviet security community, known as the siloviki, which pushed his advancement.

Since first becoming president in 2000 Putin has tightened his grip on Russia using techniques Trump is likely to imitate. (More below.)

Putin’s increasingly repressive and absolute hold on power was gradual, and faced opposition from people who worked through legal, constitutional means. However, he brought economic order and stability to what had been a wrenching transition to capitalism from communism, building a genuinely supportive following.

An increasingly subservient parliament or Duma passed gradually more repressive laws at Putin’s direction. The Constitution was amended to enhance his powers. The initial generation of billionaire oligarchs was murdered, prosecuted, bullied or co-opted into obedience. Russian law was weaponized to return desired verdicts in cases against Putin’s targets. What was briefly a freewheeling, independent media was brought to heel. Numerous political parties were banned. Elections were increasingly subverted and became decreasingly free or fair, resulting in, for example, an 88 percent return for Putin in the 2024 election.

Some measures stood out as especially Putinesque: one was the outright murder of opponents, critics and journalists whether in Russia or abroad, often through exotic poisons or elaborately staged assassinations.

Another was his ability to alter the Constitution to extend his terms in office until today he is in this fifth term and effectively president-for-life.

Given Trump’s scorn for elections and his refusal to accept adverse electoral outcomes, the Putin model, or at least elements of it, is highly likely to be followed in the coming Trump administration.

Red flags and red lines

Based on these models and the historic course of dictatorships, Americans who value a pre-Trump democratic society and government under the Constitution should regard some developments as red flags marking the imposition of outright despotism.

What are these red flags?

Changing the Constitution

Every dictator who came to power through democratic means made changing the country’s Constitution a priority; thereby ensuring that he would never jeopardize his control again.

Putin oversaw several changes to the post-Communist Constitution. This also applied in Nazi Germany. Once he legally entered parliamentary government as chancellor, Adolf Hitler pushed through an “Enabling Law” that allowed him to govern without parliamentary approval.

The probability that Trump and what is likely to be a rubber-stamp Congress will attempt to alter the US Constitution or do away with it altogether is very high and Trump has said that the outcome of the 2020 election, which he falsely called fraudulent, justified “termination of all rules, regulations, and articles, even those found in the Constitution.”

While the existing process for amending the Constitution is long and arduous, a regime that ignores rules and procedures may attempt to dispense with them and make the changes by decree, with the support of followers in the legislative and judicial branches.

Extending the presidential term

One of the reasons for changing the Constitution is to eliminate limits on the presidential term. Putin did this several times, first extending the presidential term from four to six years and then allowing him to run multiple times. He is now effectively president-for-life. In China President Xi Jinping did the same and is also effectively a president-for-life.

It seems almost certain that Trump will also attempt to alter the two-term presidential limit either through a constitutional amendment or by outright fiat or coup. He did not accept constitutional or legal limits when he was defeated in 2020 and tried to overturn that election. If he is not felled by ill-health or natural causes by 2028, there is a high likelihood that he will seek to stay in office for the duration of his natural life. In this he will likely be enabled by obedient supporters in Congress, loyalists in the executive branch, a hand-picked judiciary—which may expand with additional Supreme Court appointments—and his cultists among the public.

Postponing, canceling or rigging elections

The pillar of American constitutional government has been the absolute commitment to holding elections at their constitutionally determined times. This has held throughout American history.

(To the best of this author’s ability to determine, the only postponed election in all of American history occurred on Sept. 11, 2001 when the terrorist attack disrupted a scheduled New York City primary election. In the aftermath of the attack, when Mayor Rudy Giuliani wanted to extend his term by three months to deal with its consequences, the New York legislature refused on the principle that keeping to an election schedule was greater than the exigencies of the moment no matter how grave. President Abraham Lincoln too refused to postpone the election of 1864 in the midst of the Civil War.)

A red flag marking a major move toward tyranny would be any attempt by Trump or his allies to postpone, reschedule or cancel the regularly scheduled elections for 2026 or 2028.

Putin’s path to power included regularly scheduled elections. However, as previously noted, these elections became increasingly less free and fair.

From the beginning of his political career Trump has denounced elections with unfavorable outcomes as “rigged” (although he always accepted the results of elections when they were favorable). Given his propensity for projection, there is a high likelihood that future US elections will be rigged the way they are in Russia or in other dictatorships throughout history, to ensure a favorable outcome for Trump.

Murdering opponents

Throughout his political career Trump has fostered and encouraged an atmosphere of violence. This reached a crescendo on Jan. 6, 2021 but even that event will now likely be overshadowed. Violence, threats and intimidation are now likely to be institutionalized during his presidency.

In the early years of past dictatorships the outright murder of prominent opponents brought initial outcries and public reactions. In Italy in 1924 the murder of socialist politician Giacomo Matteotti by Fascist thugs created a huge outcry against Prime Minister Benito Mussolini. While denying direct involvement, Mussolini ultimately took responsibility. However, he then defied authorities to do anything about it and faced no prosecution. Some historians mark this murder and its aftermath as the true start of Mussolini’s dictatorship.

Despite the lack of evidence from a court of law, it can safely be said that Putin has used assassination extensively to eliminate opponents, with poisoning a favorite method. Most recently his foremost political opponent, Alexei Navalny, was first poisoned and then murdered in prison after returning to Russia from exile.

Trump murdered an opponent before, but it was a foreigner: Iranian general Qasem Soleimani. It was done as an official US act and occurred outside the United States but it was an assassination nonetheless and Trump acknowledged responsibility. Whether any other murders have occurred at his command has not been brought to public light.

There is the possibility that prominent American opponents of Trump, if not imprisoned, could be murdered. As Trump infamously noted, “I could stand in the middle of 5th Avenue and shoot somebody and I wouldn’t lose voters.”

Having been granted complete immunity for official acts by the US Supreme Court, the likelihood of domestic political violence, including murder, during the coming Trump regime is very high.

Crushing a free press

A free and independent press is an obstacle to tyranny as both tyrants and democrats have understood throughout history. As the Virginia Declaration of Rights stated in 1776, “…The freedom of the press is one of the greatest bulwarks of liberty and can never be restrained but by despotic governments.” In the modern era all dictators have moved to suppress the media.

In Florida, as noted above, the DeSantis administration threatened prosecution of television channels if they broadcast a pro-choice advertisement. In Russia, Putin cracked down on the media, even regulating bloggers. This last measure had an echo in Florida in 2023 when state Sen. Jason Brodeur (R-10-Seminole and Orange counties) introduced a bill that required bloggers to register with the state if they covered or commented on the governor, Cabinet officers or state legislators. (This bill did not advance.)

Trump has both loathed the media and loved its attention throughout his political career. More recently his threats have become more serious. He has threatened television networks with the loss of their licenses and repeatedly attacked print publications for their actions. These tactics bore fruit this year when both the Los Angeles Times and Washington Post declined to make presidential endorsements.

There is a high likelihood that during his presidency Trump will either actually close down major media outlets through the Federal Communications Commission or bully them sufficiently to prevent critical coverage of his regime and actions.

Bringing billionaires to heel

Putin inherited a number of mega-wealthy billionaires dubbed the “oligarchs,” who had an outsized influence on Russia in the wake of its communist collapse. At least one, Vladimir Gusinsky, owned Russia’s first, free-wheeling independent television station, which featured a satirical show Putin loathed.

Putin broke the power of the oligarchs or pre-empted them throughout the course of his career. Gusinsky was charged with fraud and tax evasion and fled overseas. In addition to Gusinsky, Mikhail Khodorkovsky, at one point the richest man in Russia and owner of the Yukos oil company, was arrested for economic crimes and imprisoned. It sent a chill throughout the Russian oligarchy and did much to break its power. Other billionaires have died under mysterious circumstances.

Trump has been backed by a large number of American billionaires who hope to profit from his election. Chief among them is Elon Musk, who has been promised a high position in the administration.

However, this situation is unlikely to last. Musk, ironically enough, is likely to be an early target when Trump becomes jealous or feels threatened by his prominence and power.

When American billionaires start dying from mysterious ailments or falling out of windows, the American public will know that the era of the billionaires is over and the triumph of Trump is complete.

Outlawing political parties

Outlawing opposition political parties has been a feature of all modern dictatorships. As noted above, there was one attempt to do this in Florida but it wasn’t seriously considered. Nonetheless, Americans should be alert to efforts to ban the Democratic Party, which Trump has called “the enemy within.”

This is a major red flag of encroaching dictatorship.

Personalizing law enforcement

Throughout his first presidency Trump was repeatedly frustrated by attorney generals who refused to commit crimes at his command or who countenanced the independent application of justice. Trump wanted to be above the law at all times and able to prosecute his enemies or other targets at will, without regard to legal or constitutional restraints.

In his second presidency, Trump will no doubt appoint an attorney general who will be completely subservient and will persecute his targets on command regardless of legal restraints, due process or probable cause—a situation akin to Putin’s Russia.

The arc of history

“First time tragedy, second time farce,” Karl Marx once said of the repetition of historical events. With Trump that saying is reversed: if Trump’s first presidency was a chaotic, criminal, corrupt farce, his second presidency will be a directed, deadly, destructive tragedy that will leave the United States vastly diminished and its people oppressed.

Americans may think that a Trump presidency will come to a close in 2028 when Trump’s term theoretically ends in accordance with the Constitution. However, given Trump’s refusal to accept defeat in 2020, his extralegal and even violent efforts to stay in power and his expressed regret that he left office at all, the greater likelihood is that he will, like Putin and Xi, find ways to extend his reign to the end of his natural days and become, effectively, President-for-Life.

He will also be ruling with complete legal immunity, with a completely subservient Congress, a completely compliant Supreme Court and a law enforcement establishment and military that he will not hesitate to deploy to physically crush any opposition.

He is as absolute and unchecked a ruler as America has ever had since King George III.

By their votes the majority of Americans have determined that this is what they want. They chose to inaugurate an era of darkness and oppression.

But what can Americans who believe in the virtues of justice, constitutional government and democracy do?

When there is no formal path to change, there can only be resistance.

There have been other times when America seemed far from its ideals. During the slave era, when this oppressive, peculiar institution had legal, religious and governmental sanction, anti-slavery Americans resisted by forming the Underground Railroad, smuggling slaves to freedom. During Jim Crow, people resisted discrimination and racism any way they could and eventually succeeded in breaking its shackles. During the first Trump presidency, when Americans opposed administration efforts to target migrants, they resisted by forming sanctuary cities where they refused to comply with directives they felt were unethical.

It is a tragedy when law and government diverge from what is moral but it has happened in America before and America appears poised to do so again.

If Trump takes his governing principles from Putin, Americans might draw their inspiration from Russian dissidents. People like Boris Pasternak, Andrei Sakharov, Alexander Solzhenitsyn and Anatoly Shcharansky fought and struggled and pursued freedom, truth and dignity despite the overwhelming and seemingly invincible edifice that was the Soviet state. Then, as Putin’s presidency became more oppressive , people like Alexei Navalny, Vladimir Kara-Murza and Garry Kasparov followed in their footsteps.

Despite the vast odds against them, these people were driven by democratic visions and idealism. They persisted in their dissent over a long period of time without any promise of ultimate success or any prospective date for future victory.

The Rev. Martin Luther King once said that “the arc of history is long but it bends toward justice.” With the election of Donald Trump that arc will be far longer than it might otherwise have been. But unless people continue their efforts to bend it toward justice, it will not bend by itself.

As it was for the American founders and all those who have struggled since, the ultimate goal will remain, as always, justice, equality, dignity and freedom. As in the past, when success was uncertain and the outcome wasn’t guaranteed, people had to commit their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to their cause.

That time appears to have come again.

Liberty lives in light

Looming red tide highlights Rep. Byron Donalds’ legislative failure

*Rep. Byron Donalds at the Congress, Cognac and Cigars event in Philadelphia, Pa., on June 4. (Photo: Monica Herndon/Philadelphia Inquirer)*

Nov. 1, 2024 by David Silverberg

A red tide drifting toward Charlotte, Lee and Collier county beaches highlights the failure of Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.) to advance legislation that would aid Southwest Floridians in the event the algal bloom becomes a major disaster.

Red tide is a naturally occurring toxic microscopic algae that kills marine life and causes respiratory distress in humans. The current tide is drifting southward from the Tampa area following hurricanes Helene and Milton.

During his time in Congress, Donalds has done nothing to promote the Combat Harmful Algal Blooms Act (House Resolution (HR) 1008), which he introduced on Feb. 14, 2023. The bill would allow the federal government to declare harmful algal blooms (HABs) major disasters eligible for federal aid.

Since he has done nothing to advance the legislation, if the current red tide arrives at local beaches and persists, Southwest Floridians and businesses will not be able to receive any federal assistance if homes become unlivable or their businesses are hurt.

With a three-word addition, HR 1008 amends the Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act, the law that defines and determines what officially constitutes a disaster. It also sets out the authorities and responsibilities of different federal agencies in responding to disasters. HR 1008 would make a slight change to the existing law, striking the words “or drought” and inserting “drought, or algal blooms.”

The Big Bloom and aftermath

The need to include HABs as major disasters grew out of the “Big Bloom” of 2018. This red tide went on for roughly a year, first appearing in October 2017 and then intensifying and peaking in the summer of 2018, finally breaking up in the late fall.

The Big Bloom significantly damaged the area’s economy. Based on surveys filled out by area businesses, 152 or 92 percent of surveyed business owners stated they had lost business due to the red tide in the Gulf. Of them, 126 or 76 percent stated they had lost $500,000 or more. Others estimated losses between $20,000 and $2,000. It also resulted in adverse national publicity for Southwest Florida, dampening tourism.

In response, in 2019 then-Rep. Francis Rooney, who represented the 19th Congressional District, the coastal area stretching from Cape Coral to Marco Island, introduced the Combat Harmful Algal Blooms Act and a second piece of legislation, the Harmful Algal Bloom Essential Forecasting Act, which would ensure that HAB monitoring by federal agencies continued despite any government shutdowns.

Rooney’s legislation advanced to the point of committee consideration but went no further. He declined to run for another term in 2019 and his seat was won by Donalds.

Among his first actions in Congress, Donalds introduced the Combat Harmful Algal Blooms Act and the Harmful Algal Bloom Essential Forecasting Act upon taking office in 2021.

However, he never advanced either piece of legislation during his first two years in office and they died when the 117th Congress adjourned.

In 2022 Donalds was re-elected. Once again, he reintroduced both pieces of legislation. Again, he made no effort to advance the bills, which were referred to committees where they were not considered.

As a result, this year Southwestern Floridians and businesses will not be eligible for federal assistance if a red tide bloom damages lives and businesses.

Analysis: Donalds’ ineffectiveness and incompetence

Donalds has been hyperactive in introducing legislation during the current session of Congress. According to the official record of Congress, he introduced 81 bills and five amendments. None of the bills he introduced advanced beyond the introductory phase.

However, in the four years he has been in office Donalds has proven unable or unwilling to focus and do the hard work it takes to get legislation through Congress.

Donalds’ failure stands in stark contrast to the success of his neighbor to the north, Rep. Greg Steube (R-17-Fla.), who represents parts of Charlotte and Sarasota counties.

A hard-core Republican conservative and Trumper like Donalds, Steube nonetheless recognized the needs of constituents—and all victims—for tax breaks in the wake of disasters like hurricanes and wildfires. In October 2023 he introduced the Federal Disaster Tax Relief Act of 2023 (HR 5863) to provide these tax breaks and also extend them to victims of the East Palestine, Ohio train derailment and chemical release.

When HR 5863 didn’t move in the House, in large part because of the neglect of House Speaker Rep. Mike Johnson (R-4-La.), Steube chose to employ a rarely used tool called a “discharge petition.” This meant getting a majority of House members, 218, to sign a petition demanding the bill be brought to the House floor for a vote, no matter what the Speaker preferred.

It took a long effort to round up the members from both parties to sign the petition but Steube persisted. On May 15 he got the last signature needed, forced his bill to the floor and on May 21 it passed by an overwhelming bipartisan vote of 382 to 7. (Donalds did not vote on the bill.)

The kind of persistence, focus and effort that Steube made is the kind it takes to get legislation through Congress—but it is also the kind of effort Donalds has never made and seems incapable of or uninterested in making.

Instead, Donalds has concentrated on advancing himself in Republican ranks, unsuccessfully pursuing Republican Conference Chair, Speaker of the House and vice presidential running mate to Donald Trump.

Indeed, the past year Donalds almost entirely spent his time promoting Trump and bashing President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris. He has traveled around the country in the service of Trump, smoking cigars and drinking cognac in Atlanta and Philadelphia and making stump speeches and appearing on far right media outlets to regurgitate an unoriginal mix of accusations, insults and falsehoods when he wasn’t praising Jim Crow discrimination for its family values. At best he’s walked the beach for photo ops and signed a few letters with other members of Congress.

What he most emphatically has not done is attend to the needs of his district, which was hit by hurricanes Debby, Helene and Milton and now seems destined to suffer a red tide—and even another possible very late season storm.

The Southwest Florida coast is vulnerable, suffering and its people are in pain. They are getting no succor, sustenance or support from their current representative in Congress.

Election Day is Tuesday, Nov. 5.

Previous coverage of harmful algal blooms can be read here.

Previous coverage of Rep. Byron Donalds can be read here.

Liberty lives in light

Project 2025 denies climate change, strangles weather science, would cripple storm predictions

In this satellite view, two storms churn in the Atlantic Ocean at the same time that Milton spins in the Gulf of Mexico (lower left). This photo was taken about one hour before Milton was officially declared a hurricane. (Photo: NASA)

Oct. 8, 2024 by David Silverberg

Southwest Floridians know the drill when a hurricane is on the way: buy bottled water, stock up on batteries and canned foods, put up the storm shutters, fill the car and if necessary, get out of town.

But whether hunkering down at home or hitting the road, all eyes turn to news of the storm, whether on television, the Internet, mobile devices, weather apps or social media.

Much of the information on those media is the same—because it all comes from the federal government, which has the resources, the organization and the technology to provide it like no one else. And then there are the periodic updates from the National Hurricane Center, the National Weather Service, and the Hurricane Hunters who fly into the storms, that are treated like gospel from on high.

But if Project 2025 is implemented, all that information, which is now provided free to the public, would come at a price. The federal government agencies that collect and interpret the data would be broken up. And even the famous Hurricane Hunters would be shunted into a government agency that buys desks and manages the government’s real estate.

The fact that Project 2025 targets the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) for elimination has caused public alarm and prompted criticism.

But what is it that Project 2025 actually seeks to do? What does Project 2025 specifically say when it comes to meteorology and government research? And what would be the results for everyday Americans if Project 2025 was actually implemented?

For all Americans, especially those living on the vulnerable, hurricane-prone Gulf “Paradise Coast” of Florida, the future of government meteorology is no academic concern.

Increasingly, it’s a matter of life and death.

Project 2025’s denial of climate change

Project 2025 is the sweeping, 887-page volume of very specific policy recommendations for presidential and legislative changes to be made under a conservative president, in this case, upon the election of Donald Trump. Increasingly infamous, it is a continuation of the Heritage Foundation’s Mandate for Leadership program that has been issued every four years since 1980.

Project 2025’s weather and climate recommendations are contained in its chapter on the Department of Commerce, the agency where the weather services reside. The chapter appears under the byline of Thomas Gilman, who served as the Commerce Department’s chief financial officer and assistant secretary for administration during the Donald Trump administration. Prior to taking that position, which required Senate confirmation, Gilman worked for over 40 years in the automotive industry. There, he was employed by the Chrysler Corporation. He rose to be chief financial officer for its lending and financial arm, Chrysler Financial. In 2011 he oversaw Chrysler Financial’s sale to TD Bank Group.

*Thomas Gilman in 2019. (Photo: Dept. of Commerce)*

Most of the public’s attention—and alarm—has focused on Project 2025’s intention to do away with NOAA.

Project 2025 does indeed intend to eliminate NOAA and states so quite explicitly at the outset of the chapter (page 674): “The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories.”

But that is not where Project 2025 will have its most damaging impact.

Rather, it is the fact that Project 2025 views itself at war with what it calls “the climate change alarm industry” and sees NOAA as “a colossal operation” that is “harmful to future US prosperity.”

Throughout the document, Project 2025 proposals are clearly aimed at eliminating independent, science and data-based conclusions that investigate, measure or confirm climate change. Instead it seeks to ensure that government conclusions come into line with administration policy rather than scientific evidence.

Project 2025 holds that NOAA, as a main driver of the “climate change alarm industry,” has a “mission emphasis on prediction and management [that] seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable. That is not to say NOAA is useless, but its current organization corrupts its useful functions.”

But more than just eliminating NOAA, Project 2025 believes that science should bend to policy.

A key recommendation is that a new administration should: “Ensure Appointees Agree with Administration Aims. Scientific agencies like NOAA are vulnerable to obstructionism of an Administration’s aims if political appointees are not wholly in sync with Administration policy. Particular attention must be paid to appointments in this area.”

In another section it argues that NOAA’s office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research “is… the source of much of NOAA’s climate alarmism. The preponderance of its climate-change research should be disbanded.”

When it comes to the work of the National Hurricane Center and the National Environmental Satellite Service, Project 2025 admits that the offices “provide important public safety and business functions as well as academic functions,” but it argues that “Data collected by the department should be presented neutrally, without adjustments intended to support any one side in the climate debate.”

Project 2025’s organizational mandates

In addition to changing the entire focus, tenor and scientific independence of government climatological and meteorological efforts, Project 2025 recommends extensive organizational changes.

To understand these recommendations and their impact, it is helpful to be familiar with the current system.

NOAA consists of six main offices:

The National Weather Service (NWS);
The National Ocean Service (NOS);
Oceanic and Atmospheric Research (OAR);
The National Environmental Satellite, Data and Information Service (NESDIS);
The National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS); and
The Office of Marine and Aviation Operations and NOAA Corps.

Ironically, it was Republican President Richard Nixon who in 1970 consolidated the Coast and Geodetic Survey, the Weather Bureau and the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries into NOAA, which was made an office of the Commerce Department (although he wanted to make it a full-fledged Cabinet department). This occurred in the wake of 1969’s horrendous Hurricane Camille, which devastated the Louisiana Gulf coast and then—like Hurricane Helene—went north; ultimately dumping its accumulated moisture far from any coast in Nelson County, Va.

Since its creation, NOAA has evolved until it assumed its current form with different offices to deal with different aspects of weather, climate and technology.

Project 2025 sees this evolution in a negative light, especially from a budgetary standpoint.

“NOAA garners $6.5 billion of the department’s $12 billion annual operational budget and accounts for more than half of the department’s personnel in non-decadal Census years (2021 figures),” it notes. The offices, as noted previously, “form a colossal operation that has become one of the main drivers of the climate change alarm industry and, as such, is harmful to future US prosperity. This industry’s mission emphasis on prediction and management seems designed around the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable. That is not to say NOAA is useless, but its current organization corrupts its useful functions. It should be broken up and downsized.”

It continues: “NOAA today boasts that it is a provider of environmental information services, a provider of environmental stewardship services, and a leader in applied scientific research. Each of these functions could be provided commercially, likely at lower cost and higher quality.”

Project 2025 wants to make NWS (National Weather Service) a revenue-generating operation. It argues that since studies have found that consumer-oriented forecasts and warnings are better provided by local broadcasts and private companies like AccuWeather, NWS “should fully commercialize its forecasting operations”—i.e., charge for its products. This, it states, would bring in revenue, make it compete in a commercial weather marketplace and the profits could be invested in more research and data tailored to customers’ needs.

NWS would become a “performance-based organization,” which in management parlance means it would have measurable goals, set metrics and performance standards—i.e., it would take on the characteristics of a for-profit company rather than a scientific laboratory.

OAR (Oceanic and Atmospheric Research) would be reduced since Project 2025 views much of its work as duplicative of the National Hurricane Center. All of its laboratories, undersea research and other research efforts “should be reviewed with an aim of consolidation and reduction of bloat.”

NOS (National Ocean Service) would have its functions transferred to the US Coast Guard and the US Geologic Survey. While Project 2025 doesn’t say so explicitly, this would presumably result in its disestablishment.

The Office of Marine and Aviation Operations, which provides the ships, planes, drones and other hardware used by NOAA agencies, including the famous Hurricane Hunters, “should be broken up and its assets reassigned to the General Services Administration or to other agencies.”

Analysis: Organizational changes

Project 2025 decimates the current structure of weather science and reporting by the US federal government—as it’s intended to do.

The end of the Hurricane Hunters?

*The men and women of the NOAA Hurricane Hunters with a P-3 Orion, one of their primary aircraft. (Photo: NOAA)*

Ever since a pilot flew his training aircraft directly into the eye of a hurricane on a bet in 1943, hurricane-hunting pilots and air personnel have been taking up the challenge of measuring storms.

Today they’re known as the Hurricane Hunters and they’re the stuff of legend: the best pilots in the world flying in the most dangerous and challenging weather, bringing back precious, life-saving data.

Project 2025 does not explicitly state that it would abolish the Hurricane Hunters. However, it would break up the NOAA air fleet and reassign its assets to other agencies, most notably the General Services Administration, which oversees the contracting, purchasing and management of the civilian federal government—i.e., science and meteorology is not its main mission.

This would be tantamount to ending the Hurricane Hunters. The whole structure of the Office of Marine and Aviation Operations is designed around the NOAA mission and operates according to its needs. To disperse this elaborate, intricate—and effective—organization, its people and its assets, which include aircraft, vessels, drones, other technologies and their support network, would for all intents and purposes destroy or at the very least disrupt a vast swath of American scientific capabilities when it comes to weather and climate.

And when it comes to hurricanes and dangerous storms, it would create a gaping hole in the public’s awareness and preparedness that could prove deadly just at the moment the nation needs it most.

Crippling research and ignoring the oceans

Project 2025 takes particular aim at oceanic research. OAR and NOS would be broken up and OAR likely eliminated altogether. This targeting appears to be caused by more than just the expense of maintaining these institutions—it is likely the result of oceanic research being a major source of data proving the existence of climate change

This would not only eliminate a vital source of research about the state of the oceans in general, it would also likely eliminate data of critical use to the US Navy, Coast Guard, Merchant Marine and mariners of all types. It would harm national security and impact attempts to enforce maritime borders and provide coastal protection to say nothing of private boating safety.

For-profit weather

It is in Project 2025’s intention to turn the National Weather Service into a for-profit entity that everyday Americans who turn to their television stations and apps for weather information would be impacted.

Accurate, useful government-provided weather data accessible to all Americans is essentially something people have purchased with the tax dollars they pay to the federal government. Suddenly demanding payment for this data would be a form of robbery, taking from them vital information that they already purchased with their taxes.

Free access to government-gathered weather data has also made possible a robust industry of repackaging, interpreting and disseminating that data. It’s behind every weather broadcast and specialized media like the Weather Channel as well as countless apps, blogs and individual weather efforts.

All of this would now be jeopardized as the US government sold its products to the highest bidder.

That sale, or auction, would likely put government weather data in the hands of a few extremely wealthy corporations or individuals—like Elon Musk—who could then repackage it, resell it or withhold it at will. It would destroy the credibility of government-collected weather data and potentially give rise to warped or distorted reporting in the service of private political or commercial aims rather than objective reality.

It would also put a cost on weather data whose price could then be manipulated by the individuals or corporations that owned it. Further, it would create a fragmented and unequal view of the state of the weather and climate, reducing the credibility and reliability of information on which every human being on the planet depends.

Whatever husk of NWS that would remain after its dismantlement by Project 2025 would have to have profit goals, not scientific aims or objectives, as its priority. That would result in a warping and distortion of NWS’ critical, primary mission pursuing realistic, objective science, which it might no longer be able to meet.

Analysis: Climate change denial and the Florida model

Bryan Koon, Florida’s Emergency Management Director, tries to respond to state senators’ questions without mentioning the term “climate change” in a 2015 exchange. Then-Gov. Rick Scott had informally forbidden use of the term in state government. The entire discussion can be seen in a 2-minute, 12-second video on YouTube. (Image: Fox13)

At the core of Project 2025’s goals in re-engineering American meteorology is the intention to deny the reality of climate change.

In this, Americans can see a preview of a Project 2025’s end result in the state of Florida.

Over and over again, as concern over climate change rose nationally and its consequences impacted the state with increasing severity, Florida officials responded with increasingly vehement denialism.

In 2015 then-Gov. Rick Scott (R) informally banned use of the term in state government.

His successor, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R), initially reversed much of Scott’s anti-environmentalism. However, when DeSantis began a run for the presidency in 2023 on an “anti-woke,” anti-Green New Deal platform, he fully embraced climate denialism.

Ultimately, the state legislature, seeking to curry favor with DeSantis and add to their own denialist credentials, officially banned use of the term in official state documents. In March 2024 the legislature passed House Bill 1645, which struck the term “climate change” from Florida law and official documents.

“Radical green zealots want to impose their climate agenda on people through restrictions, regulations, and taxes,” DeSantis stated at the time he signed the bill.

All of this official denialism did absolutely nothing to stop the onslaught of climate-change induced weather, disasters and challenges. (As this is written, Hurricane Milton is advancing on the Florida peninsula as a Category 5 hurricane, immediately following the ravages of Hurricane Helene.) In fact, official state climate denialism has impeded local efforts to prepare and reverse the effects of climate change in communities’ own front yards, as can be seen in flooding, storms, eroding beaches and wild, unpredictable weather over a fragile and vulnerable landmass.

As DeSantis wanted to “make America Florida” as he put it in his campaign slogan, so Project 2025 would make climate denialism a pillar of American policy. Project 2025 views efforts to respond, reduce or resist climate change as “the fatal conceit of planning for the unplannable.”

When added together, it is clear that Project 2025 seeks to alter or censor government climatological and meteorological science and research in order to deny climate change. NOAA agencies would not be following the data and drawing conclusions from it; they would be following administration directives and tailoring their findings to accommodate political policy.

This should not be surprising given former President Donald Trump’s past dismissal of climate change as a “hoax,” his withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accords or his effort to alter the cone of a hurricane with a Sharpie. Nor should it be surprising given that Gilman, the chapter’s author, spent 40 years working in the fossil fuel automotive industry.

Project 2025 would leave the United States naked, vulnerable and at the mercy of climate change, without the research, resources or will to meet its challenges.

And that would result in countless devastated communities and potentially millions of dead Americans.

Science in service to the nation—or not

Since colonial days Americans have been concerned with weather. As a nation of farmers, they were at its mercy and they needed some way to predict its patterns.

Two of America’s founders were, in a way, weathermen. Benjamin Franklin provided long-range forecasts that farmers used for planting in his Poor Richard’s Almanack, a very popular bestselling annual book. Thomas Jefferson, a planter, regularly took weather measurements and recorded them. On July 4, 1776 he noted that the temperature in Philadelphia reached a high of 76 degrees Fahrenheit.

In 1870, seeking to create a national weather measuring system and communicate it by telegraph, Congress created a weather office in the US Army’s Signal Division “for the Benefit of Commerce.” In 1890, following a presidential request, Congress transferred weather reporting responsibilities to a civilian US Weather Bureau in the Department of Agriculture.

Ever since then the United States government has invested in and steadily expanded meteorological and climatological research and technology. The fruits of that steady, sometimes painful, 154-year investment and effort have resulted in the most scientifically advanced, accurate, and capable weather and climate establishment in the world.

The federal government has also organized and refined its weather and climate offices to reflect changing conditions and improve their capabilities.

And throughout this period, just as the weather and climate affected everyone in the territory of the United States, so the US government freely shared its findings and results with all its citizens and the world.

Today people ordinarily think of weather forecasting in personal terms: Will it rain tomorrow? Should I bring an umbrella? Or, more importantly: Where will the storm hit?

But beyond just tomorrow’s predictions, increasingly accurate and sophisticated weather reporting and forecasting has been an incalculably powerful force multiplier for the American military, which can plan operations around it. It has enabled American agriculture to become the most productive in the world. It has made transportation more efficient and it is absolutely essential for air travel and the movement of goods by all modalities. It has, as the first weather office intended, benefited commerce.

The products of American meteorological prowess are everywhere and pervasive. As a rising tide lifts all boats, weather awareness and knowledge benefits all recipients.

Government meteorological efforts have protected Americans from the ravages of the most extreme weather. They have helped to make cities more resilient and enabled planning, whether in agriculture, construction or trade. Indeed, entire commodities markets depend on weather information provided by government research and monitoring.

Right now America is in a crisis as the climate alters due to human influence.

One response is to adapt, take measures that build resilience and preparedness, try to slow global warming, and raise awareness so that every individual can make some small effort to protect and preserve human life on the planet.

The other response is to deny that climate change is happening, to outlaw mention of “climate change,” to twist science to meet preconceived notions, or to ignore it altogether. It’s a response as likely to be successful as the Inquisition’s attempt to stamp out the Copernican solar system by banning the books that explained it.

This is the approach of Project 2025, which puts it into detailed, specific bureaucratic recommendations. If implemented by a second Donald Trump administration, it would cripple science, make Americans vulnerable, destroy cities and accelerate the very processes it seeks to deny. It would also dismantle the greatest research and applied science endeavor in history, one that has been of incalculable benefit to the United States, its citizens and the rest of the world.

Just as they have a choice between two candidates and between democracy and dictatorship in this year’s elections, when they cast their votes, Americans have a choice between ignorance, denial and disaster or knowledge, realism and progress.

On that choice on every ballot hangs the fate of the federal government’s weather and climate enterprise—and arguably, the future of human life on this planet.

This is one of a series of examinations of the implications of Project 2025 for Southwest Florida and the nation. Other articles in the series are:

Project 2025 would end federal flood insurance, devastate Southwest Florida and coastal communities

Project 2025 remake of FEMA would hit communities hard after disasters

Project 2025 takes aim at education—and Collier County, Fla.

Liberty lives in light

Project 2025 takes aim at education—and Collier County, Fla.

*Like all American schools, Southwest Florida’s classrooms would feel the impact of Project 2025. (Image:* *First Focus on Children*)

Sept. 3, 2024 by David Silverberg

If it came to pass that Donald Trump won the election and his administration implemented Project 2025’s educational proposals, how would Florida’s parents, teachers, students and school staff be affected?

Project 2025 is the sweeping, 887-page volume of very specific policy recommendations for presidential and legislative changes to be made under a conservative president, in this case, upon the election of Donald Trump. It is a continuation of the Heritage Foundation’s Mandate for Leadership program that has been issued every four years since 1980.

This year Project 2025 includes recruitment of personnel, training for those people and a 180-day Playbook for immediate implementation should there be a change of administrations.

Donald Trump has disavowed any knowledge of, or familiarity with, Project 2025, although the Heritage Foundation organizers say that he implemented 67 percent of their recommendations in his first administration. Former Trump staffers have been heavily involved in Project 2025’s formulation, including Sen. James David “JD” Vance (R-Ohio), Trump’s running mate.

When it comes to education, the Project 2025 recommendation that has received the most attention is the disestablishment of the US Department of Education (ED).

The very first sentence of Project 2025’s education chapter states: “Federal education policy should be limited and, ultimately, the federal Department of Education should be eliminated.”

That proposal has alarmed parents, teachers and education experts. It has energized Trump’s opponents, whether Democrats, independents or traditional Republicans who value learning. It is the first thing that critics cite when they attack Project 2025’s education ideas.

“We are not going to let him eliminate the Department of Education that funds our public schools!” Vice President Kamala Harris declared in her speech to the Democratic National Convention on Aug. 23, to intense and prolonged applause.

Trump, despite his disavowals of Project 2025, has doubled down on ending the department.

During a rambling X interview with Elon Musk on Aug. 13 he pledged to “close the Department of Education, move education back to the states.” As recently as Friday, Aug. 30, he repeated his position at a Washington, DC conference held by Moms for Liberty—who also advocate eliminating the department.

Beyond the agency

Project 2025’s education recommendations go well beyond just ending the department.

They are contained in Chapter 11 (page 319), a sweeping chapter of 44 pages including citations, that covers a wide variety of education-related policies and proposals. It appears under the byline of Lindsey Burke, the Heritage foundation’s director of the Center for Education Policy. She has worked at the Heritage Foundation for over 16 years.

Project 2025 gathers up all the ideas that have been circulating in conservative circles, some of very long standing, and then puts them into tangible, concrete recommendations for action.

Among these ideas are many that are already in force in Florida, including expanding non-public school alternatives like charter schools, providing parents with vouchers to use in non-public schools, lowering accreditation requirements for non-public schools, passing legislation to prevent the teaching of critical race theory, and passing a “Parents Bill of Rights” that has led to practices such as book bans.

All of these would have significant consequences if implemented nationally.

But eliminating the Department of Education is Project 2025’s big idea, its headline and the one getting the most attention.

Looking ahead at the consequences of such an action is necessarily speculative, of course. But some results can be imagined—and the Collier County, Fla., public school district provides a microcosm that can give a sense of the impact at the grassroots level.

A quick history: the Department of Education

Republicans have sought termination of the current Department of Education ever since it came into being in 1980, when it was split off from the then Department of Health, Education and Welfare.

According to the department’s official history, a Department of Education was first created in 1867 to collect data about the nation’s schools. It had a budget of $15,000 and four employees. This happened in the midst of Reconstruction and the first wave of education for freed people and their children.

The next year the department was demoted to an Office of Education because of concerns that as a Cabinet department it would exert too much control over local schools.

However, starting in the 1950s public interest in education policy began to rise again along with the civil rights movement and the effort to end segregation. Segregated black schools in the South were woefully inadequate, underfunded, and discriminatory and along with the national effort to end segregation the nation made an effort to raise the general level of education for all students regardless of race.

In 1980, backed by the National Education Association, Congress passed, and President Jimmy Carter signed, the Department of Education Organization Act, making it a stand-alone Cabinet department again.

Project 2025 has a less benign view of the department’s creation. In its version, advocates of expanded education funding didn’t like the existing scattershot approach to education because “a single, captive agency would allow them to promote their agenda more effectively across Administrations. Eventually, the National Education Association made a deal and backed the right presidential candidate— Jimmy Carter—who successfully lobbied for and delivered the Cabinet-level agency.”

(Today, Project 2025 recommends rescinding the National Education Association’s congressional charter because it views it as “a demonstrably radical special interest group that overwhelmingly supports left-of-center policies and policymakers.”)

Ever since its establishment, Republicans have made ED a target and pledged to eliminate it. President Ronald Reagan, who took office immediately after Carter, was bent on ending it but the person he tapped to do the deed, Secretary of Education Terrel Bell, instead formed a commission that issued a report, A Nation at Risk, proposing reforms. Reagan liked the report so much he claimed it as his own and the department was saved, changing its focus to raising the quality of public education.

Ever since then abolishing the Department of Education has become part of the Republican mantra, an essential article of faith about which nothing has been done in actuality.

In 2016, during a campaign speech in—of course, Florida—then-candidate Donald Trump said “there is so much waste” at the department that he planned to cut it down to “shreds.”

When he became president he appointed Betsy DeVos to be secretary of the despised agency. Whatever else she did as secretary, she did not abolish the department—and as president, neither did he.

And so it stands today, a target of Project 2025.

Breaking the big bank

The US Department of Education has been described as “a big bank with a small policy shop attached.”

It’s an apt description. For all the rhetoric and misconceptions to the contrary, ED’s primary role is administering grants and financial aid to school systems and students around the country. While it tries to maintain and raise academic standards and eliminate educational inequities in school systems, it largely does this through the finances it administers.

Project 2025 would end the federal role in supporting education financially.

“To the extent that federal taxpayer dollars are used to fund education programs, those funds should be block granted to states without strings, eliminating the need for many federal and state bureaucrats,” it states. “Eventually, policymaking and funding should take place at the state and local level, closest to the affected families.”

Currently, federal funding can be a big boost to the school districts that receive it.

Collier County, Fla., illustrates this. In its tentative 2024-25 budget released on July 31, the Collier County School District estimated it would receive $7,243,150 in direct federal funding. Not all of this will come from ED; other federal agencies like the Department of Agriculture, which administers nutritional programs, also provide funding. However, it is a good indicator of the kind of federal support that primary and secondary school districts receive.

That’s not the only federal money Collier County receives. It also receives federal money passed on through state agencies and that’s much greater: $79,023,516. (Impressive as these figures might be, the vast majority of the district’s funding comes from local taxation: over $842 million.)

The funding goes for everything from salaries, to supplies, to services to furniture and more.

*Breakdown of special, non-tax revenues and expenditures for Collier County Public Schools. (CCPS)*

Below, where the money goes: Collier County grant recipients, amounts and officials overseeing the programs for the 2024-25 budget year. This includes grants from non-government, non-profit and philanthropic sources. (CCPS)

(Perhaps surprisingly, the federal Department has no local influence on curricula, which is entirely formulated at the local level.)

So assuming that Project 2025 was implemented as proposed and ED was terminated, the very first thing that would happen in Collier County is the school system would stand to lose up to $86 million in federal funding, whether directly or through the state.

It might make that money back, if the state—which would now have total control over all non-local educational funding—decided to be generous or at least maintain current funding levels.

The omens for this, however, are not favorable because DeSantis, i.e., the state, has a propensity and a preference for cutting appropriations for educational institutions.

A glaring illustration of this occurred in the 2025 state budget when DeSantis vetoed $98 million in higher education funding. Florida Gulf Coast University, the local institution of higher learning, had $16.3 million excised from appropriations the legislature had otherwise approved.

Collier County public schools were not spared either: $2 million in approved appropriations were cut from its pilot education program for pre-kindergarten children.

Collier lost 1,000 seats as a result of the pandemic and needed to ready young children from all backgrounds for kindergarten. The money would have been used for 10 new modular pre-kindergarten classrooms and modification of existing facilities so that 160 more 3 and 4 year olds and their parents could participate in school programs near their homes and elementary schools. Educators hoped it would establish strong bonds between the families and schools and prepare the children to enter the classroom. It would also train parents—from very diverse backgrounds, languages and cultures—to be school-ready, teach their children early literacy and prepare the children for schoolrooms.

The fact that the budget request was made by no less a personage than state Sen. Kathleen Passidomo (R-28-Naples), president of the Florida Senate, made no difference to DeSantis at all.

So on a practical level, terminating the Department of Education would at the very least inject great uncertainty into Collier County public schools’ cash flow. At worst it could result in a serious loss of revenue that would affect all aspects of school operations, resulting in a potentially significant reduction of capability and resources that would negatively affect students, teachers and staff. Furthermore, it would do this in a county that is rapidly growing and needs new school facilities and resources to handle the influx.

If Project 2025 were implemented these kinds of losses would apply across the country as all school districts lost federal funding.

Project 2025’s recommendation that money be provided to states “without strings” is also dangerous. The reason there are “strings” on federal money now is to ensure that the funds are used for their intended purpose and not misappropriated or diverted into private pockets. Project 2025 hates the “many federal and state bureaucrats” currently administering and overseeing federal education funds. However, the reason they’re there is to ensure that the money is spent properly. Without them there would be no oversight, regulation or enforcement.

Florida has already seen the fruits of this. The DeSantis “war on woke” in academia has also been a gold rush for favored politicians taking over academic positions for ideological reasons.

Nowhere was this clearer than at the state’s University of Florida, where former senator Ben Sasse, an outspoken conservative Republican, was appointed president in February 2023. Not only was he paid a million dollars in salary but he ballooned his office’s spending on favored consultants and provided high-priced remote positions for former staffers and Republican officials. When all this emerged, Sasse resigned and people he appointed were terminated.

Under Project 2025’s proposals, the removal of “strings” on federal funding would no doubt open the floodgates for a season of unrestrained corruption and turn ivory towers into feeding troughs.

Analysis: Going back?

More broadly than just money, Project 2025’s measures would subvert the entire educational effort of the past 70 years to make American quality education more expansive, equitable and accessible to everyone. After all, it was an educational case, Brown vs. Board of Education that ended legal segregation in the first place.

Eliminating the department “would shutter thousands of public schools, end supports for low-income students, divert taxpayer funds to the private education of wealthy students and, ultimately, destabilize public education altogether,” argues Lily Klam, director of education policy at the First Focus on Children advocacy group.

The reason that the federal government intervened in education in the first place was because the racial and economic disparities among different school systems, especially in the segregated South, were so great that only the federal government was capable of correcting them. Then, starting in the Reagan administration, it sought to improve public education’s quality and outcomes.

These have been the thrust of federal efforts, as embodied in the Department of Education, since its founding. It is premised on the idea that a uniformly educated, literate, thinking population benefits the nation, is essential for democracy, and makes the country stronger.

This is the notion that Project 2025 is challenging. Project 2025—and the whole anti-public education movement—whether consciously or not, would bring back the past disparities in education and make education uneven and uncertain. By undermining public education and putting the states entirely in charge, it would revive past abuses and disparities.

Ultimately, wrecking public education, as Project 2025 seeks, would lead, not just to racial inequalities, but to socio-economic and political ones as well. While the entire movement of American education since independence has been to make Americans more prosperous, educated and equal as citizens, Project 2025 would make them less prosperous, less educated and less equal. It would ultimately create an undemocratic class of literate masters ruling ignorant serfs.

When it comes to education, this is the “again” in the slogan “make America great again.”

And preventing this outcome is the “back” in the slogan “we won’t go back.”

This article is one of a series looking at the impact of Project 2025 on Southwest Florida and the nation. Others are:

Project 2025 remake of FEMA would hit communities hard after disasters

Project 2025 would end federal flood insurance, devastate Southwest Florida and coastal communities

Liberty lives in light

*Jessica Cosden, a teacher and Cape Coral councilmember, teaches a Cape Coral class in 2017. (Photo: Author’s collection)*

Has MAGA fever broken? America’s joy and Republican rebellion in Collier County, Fla.

Kelly Mason, chair of the Collier County School Board, displays a flyer from the county Republican Executive Committee accusing schools of ‘indoctrination’ at the Aug. 21 meeting of the Board. (Image: CCPS)

Aug. 26, 2024 by David Silverberg

Has the Make America Great Again (MAGA) fever broken?

That certainly seems to be the case in Collier County, Fla., a very conservative, very Republican, extremely Trumpist corner of the Sunshine State.

It’s too soon to say that where Collier County goes, so goes the nation. But last Tuesday, Aug. 20, Republican voters’ weariness and disgust led them to defeat the candidates endorsed by a Collier County Republican Executive Committee (CCREC, referred to here as REC) that they regarded as having grown increasingly authoritarian.

It seems to show that even in this Trumpist stronghold, MAGA madness has reached its limits.

It also seems that the majority of Americans have had enough—enough of MAGAism and Donald Trumpism.

Both Collier County’s revolt, a statewide repudiation of candidates endorsed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) and a national wave of enthusiasm for Vice President Kamala Harris and Gov. Tim Walz (D) appear driven by the same things: weariness, disgust, outrage and now, a determination to do something about it. Americans have been living with Donald Trump’s “hatred, prejudice and rage” and they’re clearly ready to move on.

But to see it erupt among Collier County Republicans is truly a revelation.

The rebirth of joy

The national shift in public attitudes was best put by Walz, when he was introduced as Vice President Kamala Harris’ vice presidential running mate on Aug. 6 in Philadelphia.

“Thank you, Madam Vice President, for the trust you put in me,” he said. “But, maybe more so, thank you for bringing back the joy.”

Joy. That’s not a word that has been used at all in American politics since 2015. Clearly, it’s something Americans like and it’s what’s giving the Harris campaign the giddy momentum it’s enjoying in the race for the White House.

The four-year presidential election cycle not only marks political eras but emotional ones as well, with leading political personalities shaping the behavior and attitudes of the public.

That was certainly true in Florida. From 2016 to 2020 during Trump’s presidency, aspiring Republican politicians aped his attitudes and behavior both in campaigning and governing.

This was extremely apparent among Southwest Florida Republican candidates at that time. It could be seen in their dark conspiracy theories and delusional lies, their threats and insults toward their opponents and perceived enemies and also in their embrace of violent rhetoric and gunplay.

“There are individuals who fire this thing up and the biggest one of all, I think, is Donald Trump,” observed Francis Rooney, the former ambassador and congressman for Southwest Florida, at a panel to Reduce the Rancor, this year. “He exerts a magnetic influence over an awful lot of Republicans.”

The COVID-19 pandemic, which broke out in 2020, also had a profound impact on public attitudes. With Trump at first dismissing the danger and then fighting the experts and scientists who were trying to protect the public, his denigration of expertise, knowledge and competence leached down to the grassroots.

Trump’s attitudes really took root in Florida, his adopted state.

In 2018 Ron DeSantis, a former congressman, had his primary bid for the governorship supercharged by Trump’s endorsement. He won and as governor pursued Trumplike policies. It worked for him; in 2022 he was re-elected to the governorship with a decisive 20 point majority.

Starting in 2023, though, DeSantis tried to out-Trump Trump in his own bid for the White House. He launched a comprehensive “anti-woke” crusade in every aspect of Florida culture and society, hoping to ride it nationally to the presidency and “make America, Florida,” to use his own slogan. In this he was aided by a completely subservient Republican super-majority in the state legislature that raced to the rim of reason in devising ever more radical measures both to curry favor with him and pander to their most extreme constituents.

Ultimately, it didn’t work. Trump treated DeSantis as a traitor, belittled and insulted him and put an end to his presidential candidacy before it even got to the state primaries. But the legacy of DeSantis’ anti-woke war and Trump’s dominance in the state lingers on in its politics.

With Harris at the top of the national Democratic ticket and a pro-choice state constitutional amendment on the November ballot that seems to have mobilized the state’s pro-choice voters, Florida Democrats now sense a chance to turn Florida from seemingly overwhelmingly Republican to Democratic.

“Ron DeSantis has lost his culture war,” said Nichole “Nikki” Fried, the state Democratic chair after Tuesday’s primary results. “What we saw last night is that Floridians across the state are tired of the divisiveness. They are tired of the culture wars.”

“Floridians are tired of extremism, and we’re ready to bring back some sanity, integrity, decency and true public servants,” agreed Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, the Democratic candidate for Senate.

Not everyone is sanguine about flipping the state. As political operative and Lincoln Project co-founder Rick Wilson put it in an Aug. 8 blog post: “I’m not saying Florida is in play. I’m not saying Florida is in play. I’m not saying Florida is in play. I’m not saying Florida is in play. I’m not saying Florida is in play. I’m not saying Florida is in play. But maybe you could see a sliver of a tiny edge of a glimmer on the horizon of Florida being in play, given the abortion rights and recreational weed ballot initiatives and a souring MAGA base.”

The case of Collier County, Fla.

This year Collier County Republicans rose in revolt against the official MAGA leadership of their Republican Party in the REC. It was a quiet revolt. There were no barricades in the streets. No one got shot. It happened in voting booths.

First, in the City of Naples on March 19, Republican voters defeated the REC-endorsed candidate for mayor, Ted Blankenship, who came in last in a three-way race.

Then, in the county at large, Republican voters defeated a whole slate of REC-endorsed candidates with the exception of one. With only a 25 percent turnout of the county electorate, it could hardly be said to be a wave. But make no mistake: it was a complete repudiation of MAGA directives and domination.

It needs to be emphasized just how remarkable this repudiation is because until now, Collier County has been dominated by its own mini-Trump and the dynamics of the electorate’s relationship to him reflects in microcosm the nation’s larger relationship to Donald Trump.

In Collier County, the mini-Trump is Francis Alfred “Alfie” Oakes III, a prominent farmer and grocer.

First gaining notoriety with his 2020 denunciation of George Floyd on Facebook, which brought accusations of racism, Oakes really rose to prominence in fighting public health measures and denouncing vaccines during the COVID pandemic. He gained fame among anti-vaccine and anti-mask activists, defied county health regulations and authorities and using his newly-opened store, Seed to Table, as a platform, began shaping local politics to his liking, which meant promoting the most extreme, Trumpist, MAGA candidates and policies.

The parallels between Oakes and Trump are truly striking. Both are businessmen and entrepreneurs. Indeed, it can be argued that Oakes at this point is more successful than Trump because his businesses, while suffering setbacks, are not mired in anything like the debt, litigation and criminal prosecution that face Trump’s.

Both men are loud, outspoken, mercurial, unpredictable, rebellious, litigious, bullying, insulting and petty. Both are extreme in their beliefs and language. Both have been accused of racism. Both have flirted with political violence. Both indulge in bizarre conspiracy theories. Both value fanatical loyalty over competence. Both cultivated an adoring personal following. Both are active politically, endorsing and boosting candidates who share their beliefs. Both verbally attacked scientific findings and public health officials during the COVID pandemic. Both denied the results of the 2020 election. Both were present in Washington, DC on Jan. 6, 2021. Both praised the rioters who attacked the Capitol. Both have been accused of lawbreaking: Trump has been convicted of 34 felonies; Oakes was issued citations for non-compliance with county regulations but never paid any penalties when Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) issued an executive order cancelling fines and pardoning violations of local COVID-related regulations.

And Oakes worships Trump. “I love our president and his family with every bit of my being!” Oakes posted on Facebook after a phone call with the then-President in December 2020. “I love all that he has given for our country and all that he stands for!”

Oakes was elected a state committeeman on the REC in 2020, which gave him an official Republican Party platform for his beliefs. He founded Citizens Awake Now Political Action Committee (CANPAC) to support candidates he favored.

It was effective. In the 2022 elections he won with a full house: he ousted a commissioner who voted for mask mandates against his wishes and two of his candidates won seats on the Collier County Board of Commissioners, giving it a MAGA majority. Three of his endorsed candidates won seats on the School Board of Collier County.

The victories paid off with governing successes at the county level: ordinances to exempt the county from federal law, to prevent future mask mandates or vaccine requirements (a duplication of state law), a resolution denouncing public health measures, a resolution opposing Amendment 4 to the state constitution guaranteeing reproductive rights, and termination of fluoridation of the county’s water.

While these measures had the willing support of Oakes’ MAGA followers, there was occasional defiance and that defiance was met with the full arsenal of litigation, denunciation, insult and rage.

When Kelly Mason (formerly Lichter), the Oakes-backed chair of the School Board, cast the deciding vote for a superintendent candidate against Oakes’ wishes, he denounced her as a “traitor.”

Then, this year, Oakes and his REC again backed a slate of candidates. These included a candidate for Board of Commissioners who would have ousted the incumbent Commissioner Burt Saunders (R-District 3), two school board candidates, and candidates for supervisor of elections and property appraiser. Oakes himself intended to run to keep his seat as Republican state committeeman but failed to file his paperwork on time and was disqualified.

It needs to be emphasized how unusual it is to have a county Republican Party endorse primary candidates. Most normal local parties—regardless of their partisan labels—are careful never to choose among competing local candidates; indeed, Party rules forbid it. But Collier County’s REC has ignored that.

What is more, Oakes and the REC employed a full arsenal of Trumpist weapons against what it perceived, not merely as fellow Republicans it opposed, but as full-blown enemies. These people, all Republicans of long standing and often very conservative, were blasted as Republicans in Name Only (RINOs) or—more terrible—as Democrats.

But even more galling to non-MAGA Republicans was the REC’s imperiousness in simply ordering Party members how to vote and employing what they regarded as lies and threats to get its way. In this it closely imitated Trump’s own wild and unfounded accusations against his perceived enemies. There was an actual threat of bringing criminal prosecution against the Collier County Citizens Value Political Action Committee (CCCVPAC), an independent Republican organization, for daring to defy the REC and endorse its own slate of candidates.

In assessing the results of the primary election for the county supervisor of elections race, Oakes himself posted on Facebook that, “The reason we lost EVERY single [Supervisor of Elections] race in the state of Florida is because our party will not unify.”

He concluded (as posted): “I pray that ALL of you learn from this and unite behind our party in the future should our father God even allows us to keep this Constitutional Republic in place after this election.”

(The Paradise Progressive reached out to Oakes for comment on this story but had not received a response as of posting time.)

School Board controversy

The most recent example of someone standing up against false REC accusations came the day after the election, last Wednesday, Aug. 21, at a meeting of the Collier County School Board.

Kelly Mason, the Board chair, complained that an REC-issued campaign flyer had accused the School Board of “indoctrinating” students.

The printed flyer from the REC included a quote from John Meo, the REC chair, accusing the School Board of indoctrinating students with believing the media, supporting President Joe Biden and advocating Communism and endorsing two opponents to incumbent School Board members.

*The REC flyer (front and back) referenced by Kelly Mason. The two candidates listed both lost their races for the School Board in the Aug. 20 primary election. (Flyer: CCREC)*

Mason challenged two members of the Board, Tim Moshier (District-5) and Jerry Rutherford (District-1), both of whom are members of the REC, to provide specific examples of student “indoctrination.”

“I think it’s an opportunity, with this indoctrination that’s going on that we need to be aware of, that the superintendent needs to be aware of, and we can address this head-on,” she said. “So, can you please provide the Board with the examples that this has been going on? And then after tonight I would like to be done with this conversation.”

Moshier fumblingly mentioned that there had been “a couple of little issues” and then an incident, which he could only vaguely recall, of a sticker in a classroom (there had been extensive controversy over “safe space” stickers in Florida classrooms in the past two years). A supposedly offensive image on the School Board website that he mentioned turned out to be a Planned Parenthood image entirely unrelated to Collier County that was used in local campaign propaganda.

Rutherford, for his part, wasn’t even capable of turning on the microphone on his desk. He did not provide any examples of “indoctrination.”

At the end of the discussion Mason said: “Since November ’22, we all got here at the same time, this [indoctrination] is not happening. So, I’m asking you tonight and Mr. Moshier, what examples [do we have] that this is going on because we need to address it—and it sounds like it’s not happening. Is that correct?”

Moshier replied: “I don’t know whether it is or not.”

The dialogue highlighted, not only the MAGA REC’s use of reckless and unsupported accusations and falsehoods but also the incompetence, incapability and inexperience of REC-endorsed candidates.

(The entire discussion can be seen in a 6-minute, 2-second video on YouTube.)

“Angry, inexperienced individuals”

The only criteria for a REC/Oakes endorsement has been fanatical MAGAism and personal loyalty and obedience to the REC; not qualifications, experience or education.

As Oakes himself put it at his Patriot Fest rally on March 19, 2022: “I don’t want to hear about what IQ someone has or what level of education someone has,” when it comes to candidate qualifications. “Common sense and some back is all we need right now.” As he also said before the Board of Commissioners on Feb. 13 in regard to science-based public health measures: “We don’t trust the white coats anymore.”

The result has been the election of glaringly unprepared and incapable people to county bodies. When this was going to be extended to technical positions affecting the operations of the county—the Supervisor of Elections and the Property Appraiser—even the most loyal Republicans had enough. Michael Lyster, endorsement chairman of CCCVPAC called the REC-endorsed candidates “angry, inexperienced individuals.”

This valuing of fanaticism over competence is a feature of Trumpism at the national level. It was an aspect of Trump’s term as president and it is an aspect of Project 2025, which is building a database of obedient loyalists to take on the nation’s most sensitive positions regardless of their qualifications, preparation or expertise—or lack thereof.

A tropical tremor

As this is written, there are 71 days to Election Day, Nov. 5. That’s an eternity in politics and a lot can happen that could change the entire political equation.

But what can be said with some certainty is that at the moment, Harris and Walz seem to be riding a wave of joy and enthusiasm that looks like it will carry them to the nation’s highest offices.

What’s also clear is that they’ve broken through the dark menace of what Trump in his 2017 inaugural address called “American carnage.” Americans are tired of that carnage and being threatened, lied to and intimidated.

And the depth of that weariness can be seen in Collier County where Republicans were fed up with being bullied and battered by their own leadership, which seemed to have ridden off the rails of normal political dialogue and entered a delusional world of dictates, threats and insults.

Collier County is a little place. What happens here usually stays here.

But sometimes, just sometimes, political tremors very far down in small, obscure crevices can join with other tremors and rise high enough to cause earthquakes— and those earthquakes can change everything at the surface.

Liberty lives in light

Kelly Mason, fourth from left, challenges Jerry Rutherford (second from left) at the Aug. 21 School
Board meeting. (Image: CCPS)

Project 2025 remake of FEMA would hit communities hard after disasters

Southwest Florida would face fiscal blow after nature’s damage

*A victim of Hurricane Ian in Venice, Fla., hugs a federal officer in gratitude for his help as part of the national response after the storm in 2022. (Photo: CBP/ Glenn Fawcett)*

Aug. 1, 2024 by David Silverberg

Updated Aug. 2.

While the head of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 has departed, the ideas his Project proposes for completely remaking the federal government remain and could be implemented if Donald Trump is elected president a second time.

These changes would directly affect Southwest Florida in the event of a disaster like a hurricane—and one may be on the way as this is written. Today, Aug. 1, Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) declared a state of emergency in 54 of Florida’s 67 counties in anticipation of a storm coming from the Caribbean Sea.

Among Project 2025’s proposals are changes to the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), which would impose new and heavily burdensome costs on local governments and reduce federal support.

Changes at Project 2025

Project 2025 is a sweeping, 887-page tome of recommendations for presidential and legislative changes to be made under a conservative president, in this case, upon the election of Donald Trump. It is authored by the conservative, Washington, DC-based Heritage Foundation think-tank. The proposals were accompanied by a drive that included recruitment of personnel, training for those people and a 180-day Playbook for immediate implementation should there be a change of administrations.

As people become familiar with its contents, it is increasingly a target for Democrats and critics alarmed by its radical proposals.

Although Trump campaign operatives repeatedly called on the Heritage Foundation to stop promoting Project 2025 as part of the campaign, the Heritage Foundation did not do so, leading to a rift between the camps.

On Tuesday, July 30, Paul Dans, head of Project 2025 stepped down from his position under pressure from Trump and his campaign.

“Friends and patriots: to every thing there is a season. We completed what we set out to do, which was to create a unified conservative vision, bringing together over 110 leading organizations united behind the cause of deconstructing the administrative state,” Dans wrote in an email to Heritage and Project 2025 staff.

“This tool was built for any administration dedicated to conservative ideals to utilize. The work of the project was due to wrap with the nominating conventions of the political parties. Our work is presently winding down, and I planned later in August to leave Heritage. Electoral season is upon us, and I want to direct all my efforts to winning bigly,” Dans wrote.

Despite Dans’ departure, the work of Project 2025 is expected to continue, as confirmed by Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation.

“Project 2025 will continue our efforts to build a personnel apparatus for policymakers of all levels—federal, state, and local,” Roberts stated in an X posting.

While Trump has denied and dismissed Project 2025, much of it was written by former officials in his administration and it is endorsed by Sen. James David “JD” Vance (R-Ohio), his vice presidential running mate. Vance wrote the foreword to an upcoming book written by Roberts based on Project 2025.

Moreover, if Trump is elected, his army of loyalists, enablers and aspirants will no doubt use Project 2025 as their policy roadmap regardless of what he says—and therein lies its potential impact on Southwest Florida.

Targeting FEMA

If changes proposed by Project 2025 are made to FEMA, Southwest Florida cities and towns would incur a far heavier financial burden for disaster preparedness, response and recovery than at present.

The proposals would especially impact this region vulnerable to hurricanes, algal blooms, wildfires and other natural disasters. This is especially relevant in the midst of what is expected to be a very active hurricane season.

Under Project 2025’s proposals, Southwest Florida communities—and all American communities—would have to bear a far larger proportion of the expense of a disaster or meet deductibles, as in the private insurance market.

Lee County communities just went through the trauma and uncertainty of retaining a discount for flood insurance, which if lost would have been extremely costly to local homeowners. The Project 2025 proposals would be similarly costly to local governments, which would have to pass on the costs to residents in new taxes to provide the funding for recovery.

A quick primer on the current system

To fully understand the impact and nature of Project 2025’s proposals, it helps to be familiar with the existing FEMA system of disaster response and support for individuals and communities.

The current FEMA system is fundamentally based on the belief that the American government has a duty to assist its citizens and communities when disasters occur that are beyond their immediate ability to handle. While it regards this as an integral role for the federal government, it relies on states and localities to first respond to the degree they can before relying on federal help.

The Robert T. Stafford Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance Act is the law that defines and determines what officially constitutes a disaster. It also sets out the authorities and responsibilities of different federal agencies in responding to disasters.

The law was first passed by Congress as the Disaster Relief Act of 1974 and then substantially amended by then-Sen. Robert Stafford of Vermont in 1988. It has been amended further as definitions were refined and different forms of disaster added.

(Of relevance to Southwest Florida has been the effort, started under then-Rep. Francis Rooney in June 2019, to include harmful algal blooms as officially designated disasters. Rooney’s successor, Rep. Byron Donalds (R-19-Fla.), although reintroducing the bill as the Combat Harmful Algal Blooms Act (HR 1008), has not pursued it with any effort during his time in office.)

When a disaster strikes, state and local officials determine if they need federal assistance. If they do, they put in a request for aid and the President (actually, FEMA and the Office of the President) approves the request and makes a disaster or emergency declaration. A major disaster declaration allows a wide variety of assistance, while an emergency declaration provides federal supplements for local efforts, for example to stave off a worse disaster or protect property and public health.

There are three types of federal assistance:

Individual Assistance helps individual survivors with immediate needs like shelter and repairs.

Public Assistance is a government-to-government program. It provides federal grants to state, local, tribal and territorial governments. It helps with a wide variety of activities like restoring public infrastructure and providing life-saving emergency protection.

Hazard Mitigation helps with the rebuilding of communities to be stronger, more resilient and prepared for future hazards.

Of great importance to Southwest Florida is federal assistance for debris removal, which has been a major expense for all communities hit by hurricanes.

After the immediate response, FEMA aids communities with their rebuilding and recovery. This is guided by the National Disaster Recovery Framework.

The Lee County experience

The impact and importance of federal support can be seen in Lee County in the aftermath of 2022’s Hurricane Ian.

The Lee County government put the estimated cost of Hurricane Ian in the county at $297.3 million. Over half of this was for debris removal, whose cost came to $156.3 million.

According to Lee County, FEMA approved $477.7 million in Individual Assistance. That included $299 million for repair and replacement assistance and $6 million in rental assistance for 23,704 households. Moreover, 775 households were approved for direct housing assistance.

When it came to Public Assistance, Lee County received $293.9 million in funding. This aided in repairing the Fort Myers Beach Water Reclamation Facility, lift stations for sewage flow, repairing the Lee County Sports Complex and Jet Blue Park, and the Bonita and Lover’s Key beaches.

Looking toward the future from 2023 when Lee County’s report was written, it was estimated that improving and rebuilding Lee County communities would cost $293.9 million, which would be covered under the FEMA Hazard Mitigation Grant Program.

These were substantial funds provided to Lee County by FEMA. They have made the rebuilding of communities like Fort Myers Beach possible at a much faster pace than would be otherwise possible.

Project 2025 would change that.

What Project 2025 would—or wouldn’t—do

The changes to FEMA are contained in the section of Project 2025 that covers homeland security, since FEMA is part of the Department of Homeland Security.

This section appears under the byline of Ken Cuccinelli.

Project 2025 observes that while FEMA is the lead agency for preparing and responding to disasters, “it is overtasked, overcompensates for the lack of state and local preparedness and response, and is regularly in deep debt.”

Project 2025 blames the Stafford Act for a shift in disaster response from the states and localities to the federal government and complains that FEMA is too “state-friendly.”

In particular, it takes aim at a “per capita indicator.” The indicator gives FEMA the authority to set a threshold below which states and localities are ineligible for public assistance, i.e., the level under which a community won’t get FEMA assistance if its damages are too small.

FEMA, argues Project 2025, sets the indicator so that most communities will get FEMA assistance.

What is more, it states, the indicator has “failed to maintain the pace of inflation and made it easy to meet disaster declaration thresholds. This combination has left FEMA unprepared in both readiness and funding for the truly catastrophic disasters in which its services are most needed.”

Project 2025’s solution is to make it tougher to get federal aid.

“FEMA should raise the threshold because the per capita indicator has not kept pace with inflation, and this over time has effectively lowered the threshold for public assistance and caused FEMA’s resources to be stretched perilously thin,” it states.

If the indicator can’t be raised there’s another option: “Alternatively, applying a deductible could accomplish a similar outcome while also incentivizing states to take a more proactive role in their own preparedness and response capabilities.”

“In addition, Congress should change the cost-share arrangement so that the federal government covers 25 percent of the costs for small disasters with the cost share reaching a maximum of 75 percent for truly catastrophic disasters.”

In other words, states and localities should bear the greatest financial burden for disaster preparation, response, recovery and resilience and that’s where Project 2025 would put it.

For Southwest Florida, this would be…well, in a word…a disaster.

The impact

Under Project 2025 communities already reeling under the devastation of a disaster would be hit with far higher costs and financial burdens for response and recovery than at present. They could look to FEMA for assistance but that assistance would be much lower and more grudging than at present.

FEMA would go from “state-friendly” to “state-stingy.”

Imagine Lee County in the wake of Hurricane Ian under Project 2025 guidelines.

Lee County would have had to bear the cost for most of the $297.3 million in damages from the hurricane. It would have been a staggering burden; in fact, it could have driven the county into bankruptcy—or at the very least the recovery would be even slower and more painful than at present. People would suffer longer. As it is, Lee County’s recovery has been agonizingly slow for some people. Under Project 2025, it wouldn’t recover for decades.

The other Project 2025 alternative, having communities pay deductibles, would be equally burdensome. At a time when their communities were flattened by hurricanes or tornadoes and digging out, towns and cities would be ineligible for aid at the very moment they need it most unless they met arbitrary deductible thresholds.

Lastly, imagine a system in which “small” disasters get only 25 percent in federal support. Was Hurricane Ian a “small” disaster or a “truly catastrophic disaster?” Anyone on the ground knew it was truly catastrophic—but in the full spectrum of disasters handled by FEMA it might not be considered such and so would not have gotten the support for a full recovery. Every new disaster would leave devastated populations wondering: was this “a truly catastrophic disaster” that will get federal help?

The evolution of caring

In 1927 President Calvin Coolidge included this in his annual message to Congress:

“The Government is not the insurer of its citizens against the hazard of the elements. We shall always have flood and drought, heat and cold, earthquake and wind, lightning and tidal wave, which are all too constant in their afflictions. The Government does not undertake to reimburse its citizens for loss and damage incurred under such circumstances. It is chargeable, however, with the rebuilding of public works and the humanitarian duty of relieving its citizens from distress.”

Coolidge was writing in the midst of a truly horrendous Mississippi River flood that devastated the states along its banks and displaced millions of people.

Throughout that disaster, which lasted over months, he refused to visit the site of the floods, wouldn’t request additional appropriations from Congress, wouldn’t make any appeals for voluntary donations and for all intents and purposes ignored the whole event.

It’s a response unthinkable today. But he was reflecting the attitudes of the time. People were on their own, he was saying, and so were their towns, counties and states.

That attitude changed with the Great Depression and the New Deal.

The Great Depression was a natural disaster only in that evoked natural feelings of panic and fear. But it was a disaster that overwhelmed people and even their best individual efforts had virtually no effect.

President Franklin Delano Roosevelt altered the national attitude. For the first time the federal government felt an obligation to aid its citizens in their times of need, when they couldn’t cope with a disaster with the tools at hand. (For a full history, see the author’s book, Masters of Disaster: The Political and Leadership Lessons of America’s Greatest Disasters, available on Amazon Kindle.)

More specifically, each natural disaster has led to greater federal involvement to help people crushed by overwhelming events.

In 1950, Congress passed the Federal Disaster Relief Act authorizing federal assistance if a governor requested help and the president approved by declaring a major disaster.

In 1968 the National Flood Insurance Act was signed into law to aid people afflicted with flooding (and which is another program that Project 2025 proposes ending. For more details see “Project 2025 would end federal flood insurance, devastate Southwest Florida and coastal communities.”)

In 1974, after tornadoes struck across 10 states resulting in six federal disaster declarations, Congress passed the Disaster Relief Act.

Then, in 1980, after Mount St. Helens erupted and blanketed parts of the West in volcanic ash, for the first time the federal government assumed 75 percent of the cost of the recovery.

The capstone was the 1988 passage of the Stafford Act, which has been updated since.

Commentary: Project 2025 makes Americans vulnerable again

Project 2025 is critical of FEMA from a banker’s perspective. It correctly points out that FEMA’s emergency fund sometimes gets low. In the Project’s view, that is because FEMA is overly generous to states and localities.

But when this last happened, in August 2023, it was because FEMA was handling multiple disasters including Hurricane Idalia—which especially hit Florida—and wildfires in Maui, Hawaii. As a result its funding had to be replenished by an emergency appropriation of tax dollars.

(It should also be noted that Southwest Florida’s congressman, Rep. Byron Donalds, has consistently voted against appropriations bills that would replenish FEMA funding.)

What the Project 2025 analysis neglects is that FEMA is not a bank. It does not operate a profit and loss balance sheet. It doesn’t charge interest.

FEMA’s mission is to “help people before, during and after disasters.” That means assisting them when they’re in need and usually at the worst times of their lives. It’s not a loan or a handout.

Federal disaster assistance is one of the greatest benefits of being an American citizen.

What’s more, it is what a citizen’s taxes buy. As has been said in these pages before, taxes are a two-way street. A citizen pays into the general pot but gets appropriate benefits as needed.

In this case people’s taxes buy them help when they need it as a result of a natural disaster.

There’s nothing wrong with that, nor is there anything wrong with replenishing FEMA’s emergency funds when there are so many disasters that those funds run low.

Lastly, as for FEMA failing to promote state and local preparedness and response, as Project 2025 charges, the Project’s authors might ask the city officials of Cape Coral, Bonita Springs, Fort Myers Beach and Lee County whether FEMA insists on local preparedness, readiness and resilient rebuilding.

Project 2025 wants to leave American citizens, states, territories, tribes, counties, cities and towns financially naked and vulnerable to natural disasters. It wants to go back to Calvin Coolidge’s cold indifference to Americans’ suffering and return to a time when there was no federal help of any kind.

Moreover, it wants to do this at a time when climate change is making disasters of all sorts more frequent, more intense, and more devastating—and there is no longer any reversing this, it is the new normal. The state of Florida may think it can eliminate climate change by banning mention of it in textbooks and official documents but that’s not the way reality works, as its current state of emergency demonstrates.

Project 2025 is correct in one assertion: FEMA is indeed “overtasked.” But far from gutting FEMA and its capacity to help Americans and their towns and cities, FEMA needs buttressing and support. It already has a big mission and that mission is only going to get bigger.

If Donald Trump is elected and Project 2025 implemented by his sycophants, enablers and loyalists, when it comes to disasters they won’t make America great again.

Instead, they’ll make it weaker, more vulnerable and more devastated— and they’ll do it in Southwest Florida just as much as they’ll do it everywhere else they can.

That is, unless the American people stop Project 2025 at the ballot box this November.

To subscribe to FEMA’s Daily Operations Briefing, click here. This free service provides a daily overview of American disasters, hazards and FEMA responses. (It’s especially informative during hurricane season.)

Liberty lives in light

Sleaze, slime and slander in Collier County: Accusations, falsehoods split Republicans as primary looms

*Supporters of Collier County Supervisor of Elections Melissa Blazier march this year in the Naples, Fla., July 4th parade. Blazier has been the target of disinformation from opponents. (Photo: Author)*

July 28, 2024 by David Silverberg

Updated July 30 with full image of CCREC posting.

As the days count down to the August 20 primary election in Collier County, Fla., the campaigning is getting uglier, nastier and more unforgiving.

In this overwhelmingly Republican county (139,305 Republicans, 52,342 Democrats and 66,915 others as of July 27) the Republican primary will serve as the general election for a number of important races.

As a result, the outcome is more unpredictable than usual in what is normally a quiet and sleepy tropical corner of the Sunshine State—and as the stakes rise, the discourse sinks.

In particular, there is a rift between many longstanding Republicans who say they are in the majority versus Make America Great Again (MAGA) Republicans on the official Collier County Republican Executive Committee (CCREC, henceforth referred to here as the REC).

The REC is dominated by Francis Alfred “Alfie” Oakes III, the extremely conservative grocer and farmer, and chaired by John Meo, a Naples financial manager.

The dissenting Republicans are expressing themselves through a variety of means and organizations, most notably the Collier County Citizens Values Political Action Committee (CCCVPAC, henceforth referred to here as the PAC). (For previous coverage see “Collier County, Fla., Republican PAC breaks with Alfie Oakes and Party Exec Committee; cites ‘authoritarian stance,’ slams ‘angry, inexperienced individuals.’”)

The battle has become bitter, personal and in some cases, overtly fraudulent.

False flyers and fake texts

The Collier County Supervisor of Election race is a key contest. After all, as Josef Stalin once said: “Those who vote decide nothing. Those who count the vote decide everything”—so the battle is on to be the one who counts the votes.

The race pits current Supervisor of Elections Melissa Blazier against challengers Tim Guerrette and David Schaffel. (For a more complete discussion of the race, see: “This is what integrity looks like: Melissa Blazier for Supervisor of Elections.”)

All are Republicans. In particular, Blazier is a member of the Naples Republican Club, Republican Women of Southwest Florida Federated, and the Women’s Republican Club. Guerrette has been a Republican for over 30 years.

But that hasn’t stopped the REC, which backs Schaffel, from sending out a text messsage accusing Blazier of being a Democrat and Guerrette of being a RINO (Republican in name only).

*The REC-issued text message putting false labels on Supervisor of Elections candidates it opposes. (Image: CCREC).*

The false labeling story was covered by Dave Elias, political reporter for NBC2 News in Fort Myers in a July 18 report, “Collier County voters receive election text messages with false information.”

“Tens of thousands of Republican voters received confusing and fraudulent messages meant to dupe voters,” Elias reported.

In the report both Blazier and Guerrette denied being anything other than Republicans.

However, “The attacks don’t stop there,” Elias pointed out. “Another flier went out to voters, making it appear that the Republican Party endorsed Guerrette instead of Schaffel.”

When the PAC sent out its list of endorsements on June 27 and denounced REC-endorsed candidates as unqualified for the positions they were seeking, REC Chair John Meo sent out his own text message to Republicans on July 17.

In it he denounced the PAC and another conservative political action committee, Collier First PAC, which endorsed Guerrette in the Supervisor of Elections race. He also alleged that the dissident PACs were violating the law by making endorsements without REC approval.

“While these clear violations are under investigation by law enforcement and the Republican Party of Florida, I feel it is imperative to remind you that you should ONLY trust messages coming directly from the Collier County Republican Party,” he wrote.

“Unfortunately, these Never-Trump dark money groups are pushing candidates who have NOT been endorsed by the Republican Party,” he stated.

This message prompted a blistering response from Diane Van Parys, a Naples resident, president of Republican Women of Southwest Florida Federated and the immediate past president of the Florida Federation of Republican Women.

“Last time I checked, John, neither you nor the CCREC control who Republican’s vote for,” she wrote in an e-mail that was copied to 300 other local Republicans. “In the United States the ballot and the Democratic process of elections takes place. A primary is the process of vetting all the Republican Candidates and many of us are able to make a decision on who we choose as the best candidate(s) and vote accordingly without the CCREC’s assistance.

“The fact that you libeled yourself by labeling a Collier County Constitutional Officer /Supervisor of Elections a Democrat is reason enough to request you to resign your position as Chairman of the CCREC. You have proven once again that your lack of knowledge and blatant lies should not be tolerated by the CCREC any longer. Labeling another candidate a RINO who is a 30 year registered Republican is disgraceful.”

She made a particular point of contesting Meo’s point that the independent PACs had somehow broken the law.

“Chairman Meo, the fact that you are threatening fellow Republicans –‘We trust that law enforcement will bring the perpetrators to light and expose the frauds that have been posing as our party.’Exactly who do you think you are? You must be a liar, prove me wrong and produce the evidence of your filings on behalf of the CCREC with Law Enforcement.”

Parys also questioned the funding for the REC messages and the fact they were sent out during the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee, when many of the county’s top Republicans were away from Florida.

She pointed out that in neighboring Lee County, in contrast to Collier, the party executive committee was careful not to endorse candidates in contested intra-party primary elections, although other organizations were free to do so.

Meo’s allegation that “dark money” was being employed and that possible crimes were committed also opened up a whole other area for new allegations and investigation by law enforcement. Van Parys questioned the legality of REC’s spending money to promote its endorsed candidates against other Republicans legitimately seeking Party members’ approval. She also noted that while the REC was threatening the independent PACs it said nothing about Oakes’ Citizens Awake Now (CAN) PAC, which is backing the REC-endorsed candidates.

As of this writing there is less than a month to go until the primary. When it comes to the Collier County Republican Party, activities to watch are whether there will be new potential falsehoods, fraudulent propaganda, accusations, and whether law enforcement investigates possible illegal activity.

The sin of Pride?

The political bitterness has also infected the increasingly heated race for two seats on the Collier County School Board.

In this non-partisan race, incumbents Stephanie Lucarelli (District 2) and Erick Carter (District 4) are being challenged by Pamela Shanouda Cunningham and Tom Henning, both of whom have been endorsed by the REC.

Cunningham, 49, who is running against Lucarelli, 50, in District 2, is advocating traditional educational principles. “I am committed to moving CCPS [Collier County Public Schools] away from its progressive educational framework and implementing a traditional educational model,” she states on her campaign website.

An earlier version of the website stated that she was an “unapologetic conservative” and claimed that Collier County children’s futures are “being sold out to big government bureaucrats who want to indoctrinate, not educate; career politicians who want to teach them what to think, not how to think.” She wanted to put “parents in classrooms, not the liberal elite” and “restore greatness to the American classroom.”

In a recent campaign newsletter Cunningham targeted two Collier County parents who had received awards for their volunteer work from Naples Pride, a volunteer-based grassroots nonprofit organization supporting the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transsexual and questioning community.

Megan Titcomb and Amy Perwein had posted a photo of themselves holding awards to their Facebook page.

*Megan Titcomb and Amy Perwein display their Naples Pride awards in the photo used by Pam Cunningham. (Image: WINK News)*

Cunningham used the photo in her campaign newsletter, stating “my opponent and her supporters on the radical left are fighting to fundamentally transform our schools into centers of progressive indoctrination, meanwhile allowing true education to wither.”

Both women were outraged and alarmed by the newsletter and reached out to local media.

“Naples Pride has no affiliation with Collier County public schools,” Titcomb told Naples Daily News reporter Ellessandra Taormino. “The event where the picture was taken was not a school event, and it most certainty had nothing to do with Pam’s opponent, Stephanie Lucarelli.”

“I do not post often on social media and rarely publicly, but I could not remain silent,” Perwien said. “I spoke out because I do not want any other parents to be put in this situation; I sincerely hope that Cunningham reconsiders her campaign tactics.”

Cunningham belatedly responded to the parents in an interview with WINK TV’s Jillian Haggerty.

Of the two women, she said: “One of them was at the Naples Pride Fest this year on stage making a speech specifically naming me and my platform and asking the people at the Pride Fest to get out to vote for School Board.”

She said the two weren’t just ordinary parents but were “left-wing activists and are active volunteers for my opponent’s campaign.” Cunningham said she was sent the photos by another party, whom she did not name.

Titcomb and Perwein told WINK TV that they had filed an incident report with the Collier County Sheriff’s Department.

Cunningham’s action sparked a furious backlash in the community as reflected in letters to the editor in the Naples Daily News.

“In political contests these days, many of us believe in the phrase, ‘When they go low, we go high,”’ wrote one county resident, Lisa Freund, in a letter. “Well, in this year’s school board election, incumbent Stephanie Lucarelli’s opponent Pam Cunningham has gone lower than low in attacking two friends of mine who are parents and community advocates for equality and education, all in the service of advancing her candidacy. Attacking parents who work with and for the children of CCPS is no way to run an election campaign.”

Analysis: Don’t trust and be sure to verify

As the campaigning clock ticks down to primary Election Day, it seems clear that MAGA REC Republicans are on the defensive and increasingly relying on outright falsehoods, innuendo, intimidation and insults to achieve their ends since a significant, perhaps majority, of county Republicans are rejecting them.

This was put very clearly by PAC Republicans when they issued their own endorsements on June 27 and stated: “While Collier County enjoys competent local governance, replacing experienced officials with angry, inexperienced individuals to address national issues could undermine our community’s standards.” They also rejected the REC’s “authoritarian stance”—i.e., its insistence that Republicans vote only for REC-backed candidates.

This is not the first pushback against REC dictates. In May 2023 School Board Chair Kelly Mason (formerly Lichter), whose election had been supported by Oakes and his CAN PAC, voted to install Leslie Ricciardelli as school superintendent despite Oakes’ opposition. He called her a “traitor” for her vote and sued the school board. This year, the Collier First PAC, whose registered agent is Lauren Maxwell, wife of Commissioner Kowal who was elected with Oakes’ endorsement and support, is supporting Guerrette for Supervisor despite the Oakes endorsement of Schaffel.

The REC is clearly basing its endorsements on loyalty to MAGA ideology rather than proven competence, experience or education. As Oakes put it on the Alfiespatriots.com website and in campaign flyers: “These are the only true patriots I trust to protect Collier County and get America back on track.”

Oakes’ pursuit of ideological loyalty overrides all other considerations and he most directly stated this at his Patriot Fest on March 19, 2022 when he told the assembled crowd: “I don’t want to hear about what IQ someone has or what level of education someone has,” when it came to candidate qualifications. “Common sense and some back is all we need right now.”

In the 2022 election cycle, ideologically loyal candidates were elected: Chris Hall on the Collier County Board of Commissioners in District 2, Dan Kowal in District 4 and Kelly Mason, Jerry Rutherford and Tim Moshier on the School Board.

The result has been a flurry of ideologically-driven legislation from the Board of Commissioners, introduction of religion into the deliberations of the School Board and a variety of outlandish and bizarre notions like introducing corporal punishment in the schools.

Now the REC is trying to further install inexperienced, ideologically-driven candidates in positions that could deeply disrupt the effective functioning of Collier County government, elections and schools.

The use of false allegations, innuendo, intimidation and insults appears to be a reflection of a growing desperation by the MAGA-dominated REC. It’s very unsophisticated campaigning that seems impulsive, emotional and even childish.

It also imitates tactics debuted by Republican nominee Donald Trump in the past.

However, while these were novel tactics when Trump used them in his 2016 and 2020 presidential campaigns, this year traditional conservative Collier County Republicans appear to be rejecting them at the local level. This rejection may also reflect simple weariness with the constant barrage of lies, paranoia and authoritarianism that has come to characterize MAGAism.

Ultimately, primary voters will have to exercise rigorous skepticism, discernment and alertness in trying to determine the truth of the candidates, their statements, policies and endorsements. And of course, the real test of the contest between truth and falsehood, and the strength of MAGAs versus traditional Republicans, will be rendered at the ballot box on Aug. 20.

Liberty lives in light