Ahead of presidential debate, Democratic state officials reiterate focus on threat of Project 2025

Ahead of Tuesday evening’s presidential debate, Democratic state officials contrasted what they expect to see on the debate stage and in the possible presidencies of Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Donald Trump. 

“On the one hand, we have Vice President Harris’ vision for a new way forward that will protect our freedoms, that will strengthen our democracy, that will uphold the rule of law, that will cut costs for families and ensure that everyone cannot just get by but get ahead,” Maine Attorney General Aaron Frey said. “On the other hand, you have a vision from Donald Trump, who is running to make himself the most powerful president ever and to give himself virtually unchecked power and control over Mainers’ daily lives.”

Frey joined state Rep. Jessica Fay of Raymond and interim CEO of Planned Parenthood of Northern New England Nicole Clegg in Portland on Monday for a press conference hosted by the Harris campaign in Maine to amplify Democratic leaders’ concerns ahead of the debate. 

These concerns centered on the implications of Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s conservative transition plan, whose authors have longstanding ties to Trump, though the former president has denied any involvement with the plan. 

The Maine GOP did not respond to a question about whether they support the policies of Project 2025.

Maine House Minority Leader Billy Bob Faulkingham (R-Winter Harbor) called Maine Democrats’ Project 2025 claims “just another campaign boogieman.” 

“I’m the Leader of the House Republicans, and I had to Google Project 2025 to find out what it is,” Faulkingham told Maine Morning Star. “I know TikTok probably says otherwise, but if Project 2025 was the national Republican agenda the leaders of the party would know about it.”

Harris and Trump will take the stage Tuesday night for the only planned debate between the two presidential candidates ahead of the November election. 

The debate will be hosted by ABC News at 9 p.m. Eastern Time at the National Constitution Center in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania — a battleground state that has narrowly flip-flopped in recent elections. It will run 90 minutes and include two commercial breaks, according to ABC.

The rules will be similar to the last presidential debate in July between Trump and president Joe Biden, before Biden dropped his re-election bid and endorsed Harris.  

Harris and Trump will each have two minutes to answer questions and two minutes to give rebuttals. They will have one additional minute to provide clarifications or follow ups. Microphones will be muted when it’s not a candidate’s turn to speak. 

On Monday, the Democratic state officials focused on threats to reproductive healthcare, the U.S. Justice Department’s independence, Social Security, Medicare and Maine’s middle class in Project 2025.

Calling the plan Trump’s Project 2025, Frey said, “it is all about power, about giving him virtually unprecedented power to do whatever it is that he wants now to do it.” 

Frey specifically spoke about Project 2025’s plans to overhaul the Justice Department as well as Trump’s previous actions in regards to the January 6, 2021 attack on the U.S. Capitol. 

The former president is currently facing charges that he tried to subvert the 2020 election and knowingly spreading false information that whipped his supporters into a violent attack that day. He has also said he would pardon Jan. 6 defendants on the first day of his presidency if re-elected.

“Now this isn’t just some empty threat,” Frey said. “Trump has threatened to terminate the Constitution and to imprison his political enemies and even rule as a dictator on day one.”

The latter refers to a comment Trump made during an interview with Fox News last year, where Trump vowed to be a dictator on his first day back in office. 

“We love this guy,” Trump said of host Sean Hannity. “He says, ‘You’re not going to be a dictator, are you?’ I said: ‘No, no, no, other than day one. We’re closing the border, and we’re drilling, drilling, drilling. After that, I’m not a dictator.’”

Fay, who is also a small business owner, said she is concerned about how Project 2025, if implemented, would hurt Mainers’ abilities to make ends meet, particularly older Mainers. 

“When we watch the debate tomorrow, we’ll see two very different visions for the future of our country, one held by Vice President Harris and Governor Walz, which builds up the middle class and lowers costs for many families,” Fay said, “and one held by Donald Trump and J.D. Vance, which raises costs for working families while helping billionaires and big corporations.”

Fay also raised concern about Trump possibly rolling back the Inflation Reduction Act and increasing the cost of prescription drugs, also a focus of the broader Harris campaign in Maine. Harris proposed expanding the drug savings in the IRA to everyone in her first detailed economic policy.

Another consistent focus of the Harris campaign in Maine, and previously the local Biden campaign, has been abortion. Reproductive rights were the center of Harris’ husband, Doug Emhoff’s, first official campaign stop in July, when he joined Democratic state Sen. Stacy Brenner of Cumberland and reproductive health patients for a roundtable in Portland. 

On Monday, Clegg from Planned Parenthood of Northern New England echoed many of the points Emhoff made during that visit, including Trump appointing the U.S. Supreme Court justices who cast the deciding votes to overturn Roe v. Wade and bragging about killing Roe. 

“As we’ll see on the debate stage tomorrow, Vice President Harris knows that women have the ability to make their own decisions and she’s been fighting for our freedoms for years,” Clegg said. 

Abortion had been viewed as a weak issue for Biden, a point that was underscored during his performance in his presidential debate with Trump in July where the president had vague and sometimes incoherent messages on the issue. 

Following that debate, Maine Gov. Janet Mills said it was difficult to watch but affirmed that she would continue to back the president, warning that Democracy is at stake in the November election. Mills has since thrown her support behind Harris and is expected to be in attendance at a Harris campaign watch party in Portland on Tuesday evening. 

Trump has not had a campaign event in Maine during this election cycle. The National Republican Congressional Committee opened a “battle station” at the Auburn Mall in early August to serve as headquarters for the volunteers working on Republican campaigns, such as Maine 2nd Congressional District.