IIt’s a cold day in Washington DC, late January 2025. Although Donald Trump has lost the census for the third time in a row, his narrow victory in the Electoral College has given him the presidency.

During the campaign, Trump made a series of symbolic gestures to distance himself from Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation-led policy plan for the next Republican administration, coupled with a database of conservative staff to execute it. “Staffing is political,” they explained.

But now that Republicans have narrow majorities in both houses of Congress, the gloves come off. As Trump recites the final line of the oath of office — “so help me God” — the first phase of what Project 2025’s authors call “the playbook” begins.

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First come the layoffs. Thousands of nonpartisan federal employees—environmental and food safety regulators; disaster response coordination officials; advocates overseeing antidiscrimination policies in housing, education, and employment; medical and scientific researchers—are receiving immediate layoff letters. Many will not be replaced, as entire federal programs and agencies are shuttered. The new hires are coming from conservative think tanks or are right-wing activists who applied through the Project 2025 application database. Political cronyism is now the official hiring policy of the U.S. federal government.

Then come the raids. As outlined by Maga nativist-in-chief Stephen Miller, a wide range of law enforcement, from the National Guard to state and local police, are deployed in a new deportation army. Raids on neighborhoods and businesses target blue states and cities, but general terror is their intended goal. Detention centers are established on military bases and federal facilities with quick access to airports to carry out mass deportations. Nearly a million legally present immigrants are stripped of their legal protections, forcing them to be immediately deported. An end to Daca and a return of the Muslim ban follow.

In the months that follow, other parts of the agenda unfold. Corporate tax cuts so generous they would make robber barons blush. An end to federal funding for public television and radio, forcing many local stations to close. The defunding of Head Start programs will leave hundreds of thousands of parents and caregivers without preschool or child care. The abolition of the Department of Education and programs like Title I will eliminate funding and many protections for students with disabilities, English language learners, and students from low-income families.

Pornography is criminalized. So are abortion rights, emergency contraception, and many reproductive health programs. Byeeither also for most public sector unions, labor rights and anti-poverty programs.

It can sometimes be hard to separate Trump and the Maga movement’s hyperbole from the government’s actual plans. “Build the wall” was always more of a campaign performance and fundraising stunt than a policy blueprint. But after attending several right-wing conferences and research gatherings over the past year, I have little reason to doubt their intentions this time around.

I’ve heard Miller describe the deportation plans in chilling detail at CPAC. I’ve heard speaker after speaker at a Turning Point USA conference promise violence and retaliation against political opponents, the dismantling of nearly all public goods, and plans to place a shrill Christian nationalism at the center of government and civic life. I’ve listened to unabashed defenses of eugenics and scientific racism on right-wing media outlets with millions of followers.

And perhaps most frighteningly, I’ve seen more and more young people, people of color, and others outside the traditional conservative base join the ranks of the Maga faithful and embrace the cynicism and demonization that is the heartbeat of the contemporary right.

Conservatives often celebrate the unity of their governing philosophy, rooted in small government, entrepreneurship, faith, and family. But there is nothing coherent or rational about this policy. Looting is the governing principle.

And these ideas aren’t limited to the Heritage Foundation or Trump alone. They’ve been embraced by a network of right-wing groups, some of which have even more extreme agendas than Project 2025.

Nor can this agenda be described as populist. Polls show that large majorities of the American public are vehemently opposed to the Project 2025 agenda. Corporate giveaways, drastic cuts to public services, and legalized discrimination against queers will not alleviate any of the very real crises facing masses of people in the US and around the world.

What can be done in the face of this looming calamity? The material consequences of this agenda must of course be exposed. Maga supporters often suggest that Trump should be taken “seriously but not literally.” Project 2025’s 920-page policy document is not political theater, and its threat to the daily lives of hundreds of millions of people must be spelled out in no uncertain terms. These cracks must be exposed.

At the same time, we must not succumb to fatalism. Right-wing tacticians like Christopher Rufo have explained that they announce their strategies to deliberately demoralize their opponents. If we merely warn of the threat of fascism, we risk making people even more fearful and isolated, more cynical about the prospect of collective change or resistance.

And if the only alternative is to defend a decaying liberalism, a liberalism itself saturated with violence, uncertainty and premature death, then the reactionary threat will surely grow.

Instead, warnings about the authoritarian threat of Project 2025 and others like it must be coupled with clear ambitions to rebuild our emaciated public institutions, to protect people from the rapacity of a rigged economy. The fascist threat collapses when ordinary people are given meaningful opportunities for social connection and purpose, the bedrock of human dignity.

• Daniel Martinez HoSang is a professor of American studies at Yale and a Race and Democracy Fellow at the Roosevelt Institute. He is co-editor of the forthcoming book The Politics of the Multiracial Right