Conservative-backed group is creating a list of federal employees it suspects could resist Trump’s plans

WASHINGTON – From his office in small-town Kentucky, an experienced political operative is quietly investigating dozens of federal officials suspected of being hostile to Republican Party policies. donald trumpan effort that is articulated with conservative preparations for a new White House.

Tom Jones and his American Accountability Foundation are investigating the backgrounds, social media posts and comments of top high-ranking public officials, starting with the Department of Homeland Security. They rely in part on tips from their network of conservative contacts, including even the workers themselves. In a move that alarms some, they are preparing to publish the findings online.

With a $100,000 donation from the influential Heritage Foundationthe aim is to publish 100 names of public officials on a website this summer to showcase a potential new administration that may be preventing the a Trump agenda for the second term – and ripe for scrutiny, reclassifications, reassignments or dismissals.

“We need to understand who these people are and what they do,” said Jones, a former aide to Republican senators on Capitol Hill.

The concept of compiling and releasing a list of government officials shows how far Trump’s allies are willing to go to ensure that nothing and no one blocks his plans for a potential second term. Jones’ Sovereignty 2025 Project emerges as Heritage 2025’s own project is laying the foundations, with policies, proposals and personnel ready for the first day of a possible new White House.

The effort, which focuses on senior career government officials who are not appointed within the political structure, has surprised democracy experts and shocked the civil service community, in what they liken to the “red scare” of mid-century McCarthyism.

Jacqueline Simon, policy director for the American Federation of Government Employees, said the widespread language — the Heritage Foundation’s announcement praised the group for uncovering “anti-American bad actors” — is “very shocking.”

Civil servants are often former military personnel and all are required to take an oath to the Constitution to work for the federal government, not a test of loyalty to any president in the White House, she and others said.

“It appears their goal is to try to threaten federal employees and sow fear,” said Simon, whose union supports the president Joe Biden for re-election.

Like Trump, who has been convicted of criminal charges in a hush money case and is under a four-count federal indictment accusing him of working to overturn the 2020 electionsfaces a likely rematch with Biden this fall, far-right conservatives have vowed to deliver a demolition blow to what they call the deep state bureaucracy.

Trump’s campaign has repeatedly stated that outside groups do not speak on behalf of the former president, who is the only one establishing his own political priorities.

Conservatives believe the federal workforce is overstepping its role to become a center of power that can drive or thwart a president’s agenda. Particularly during the Trump administration, government officials came under fire from both the White House and Republicans on Capitol Hill, as their own office frequently raised objections to some of the former president’s more unique or even illegal proposals.

While Jones’ group does not necessarily recommend firing or reassigning any of the federal employees listed, the work is in line with Heritage’s long-range Project 2025 blueprint for a conservative administration.

Patrimony Project 2025 proposes reviving Trump’s “Annex F” policy, which would attempt to reclassify tens of thousands of federal workers as political appointees, which could allow mass layoffs — although it is a new Biden administration rule seeks to make this more difficult. The Heritage Project is working to recruit and train a new generation to come to Washington to hold public office.

In announcing the $100,000 “Innovation Award” last month, Heritage said it would support the American Accountability Foundation’s “investigative researchers, in-depth reporting and educational efforts to alert Congress, a conservative administration and the American people about the presence of anti-American organizations.” bad actors penetrated the administrative state and ensured that appropriate actions were taken.”

Heritage President Kevin Roberts said in a statement that the “weaponization of the federal government” was only possible because of the “deep state of entrenched leftist bureaucrats.” He said he was proud to support the work of American Accountability Foundation workers “in their fight to hold our government accountable and drain it of bad actors.”

The federal government employs around 2.2 million people. That includes those in the Washington, D,C, area, but also workers who unions say many Americans know as friends or neighbors in communities across the country.

About 4,000 government positions are considered political appointees that routinely move from one presidential administration to another, but most are career professionals — from landscapers at Veterans Administration cemeteries to economists at the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The public drawing up of lists, for some, evokes the era of Joseph McCarthy, the former senator who conducted exhaustive hearings on alleged communist sympathizers during the Cold War. They were orchestrated by a senior official, Roy Cohn, who became a confidant of a young Trump.

Skye Perryman, CEO of the advocacy group Democracy Forward, said it was all deeply disturbing and reminiscent of “the darkest parts of American history.”

“This is part of a general trend that is highly concerning and alarming,” she said.

Publicly naming public officials is an “intimidation tactic to try to chill the work of these public officials,” she said, and part of a broader “retribution agenda” underway in this election.

“They seek to undermine our democracy, they seek to undermine the way our government works for the people,” she said.

Jones, from his table overlooking the rickhouses that store barrels in Bardstown’s “Bourbon Capitol,” scoffed at the comparisons to McCarthyism as “absurd.”

He is a former staffer for former Sen. Jim DeMint, the conservative South Carolina Republican who led Heritage and now runs the Conservative Policy Institute, where the American Accountability Foundation has a mailing address. Jones also worked for Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin, and provided opposition research for Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas’ 2016 presidential bid.

With six investigators, Jones’ team is operating remotely across the country, poring over information on federal officials at Homeland Security, the State Department and other agencies dealing with immigration and border issues.

Its focus is on the highest echelons of public servants — so-called GS-13, GS-14 and GS-15 employees and those in senior executive positions who could pose obstacles to Trump’s plans for tighter borders and more deportations.

“I think it’s important for the next administration to understand who these people are,” he said.

He dismissed the risks that could be involved in publicly publishing names, salary information and other details of federal employees who have some level of privacy, or the idea that his group’s work could be putting employees’ livelihoods at risk.

“You can’t make policy and then say, ‘Hey, don’t vet me,’” he said.

He acknowledges that part of the work is often a “gut check” or “gut feeling” about which federal officials would be suspected of trying to block a conservative agenda.

“We’re looking at, ‘Are there the wrong people on the bus right now who are, you know, openly hostile to efforts to secure the southern border?”’

His own group came under scrutiny when it first investigated Biden’s nominees.

Biden revoked Trump’s Schedule F executive order in January 2021, but a Government Accountability Office report in 2022 found that agencies believed it could be reinstated by a future administration.

Since then, the Biden administration issued a new rule this would make it more difficult to fire workers. A new administration could direct the Office of Personnel Management to undo the new regulation, but the process would take time and be open to legal challenges.