Dismissing the Heritage Foundation as an extremist organization belies its actual influence on conservative politics and Trump in particular. Trump's initial list of judges to consider for SCOTUS had considerable overlap with Heritage's own list. And the Trump Administration was composed of a lot of Heritage people, and when Trump was out, other Trump Administration officials then moved into Heritage.
The Heritage Foundation has had significant
influence in U.S.
public policy making, and has historically been ranked among the most influential public policy organizations in the
United States.
Following Trump's victory in the 2016 presidential election, the Heritage Foundation obtained influence in his
presidential transitionand
administration.
[61][47][62] The foundation had a say in the staffing of the administration;
CNN reported during the transition that "no other Washington institution has that kind of footprint in the transition."
[61] One reason for the Heritage Foundation's disproportionate influence relative to other conservative think tanks, CNN reported, was that other conservative think tanks had "
Never Trump" staff during the
2016 presidential election, while the Heritage Foundation ultimately signaled that it would be supportive of him.
[before Trump was even the nominee in 2015] a Heritage Foundation economic writer,
Stephen Moore, criticized Trump's policy positions, saying, "the problem for Trump is that he’s full of all of these contradictions. He’s kind of a tabula rasa on policy."
The Heritage Foundation has been uniquely successful in writing on that blank slate.
The alarm is that they have become more extreme; and they will certainly do the same in a second Trump term as they did in the first.
