The next American revolution is happening — will you be part of it?



These are remarks adapted from the closing keynote at the Heritage Foundation’s Annual Leadership Conference, which took place earlier in April in Naples, Florida.

Conservatives have been given a generational opportunity — a once-in-a-lifetime chance to shift our country’s trajectory back toward people and values that Washington has for too long left behind. The five values that Ronald Reagan espoused when he won the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 1980 are “family, work, neighborhood, peace, and freedom.” More than any time since Reagan, those values are making a comeback. “Rejoice in hope,” St. Paul tells us in his letter to the Romans. How could we not?

This is our moment to truly shape America’s future.

But this should be our rallying cry, not a victory lap.

Because the left’s counter-fight is coming, and our response will determine whether last November was the high-water mark of the new conservative movement or simply the first triumph in America’s greatest comeback — whether we squander this moment in history, or whether we seize it.

Conservatives have the opportunity, the mandate, and the plans to rise to the occasion. The only question is whether, in these turbulent days, we have the vision to put those plans into action and the grit to see them through despite doubts and adversity.

Mandates from the past

When I think about how the conservative movement should respond to this moment, I look for lessons from our past. And lately, I’ve found myself thinking a lot about one of my heroes from the founding era: Patrick Henry.

Two hundred and fifty years ago last month, Henry stood up at St. John’s Church in Richmond, Virginia, and delivered one of the great speeches in American history. Everyone remembers its most famous line: “Give me liberty or give me death.” That one always hits home.

But another sequence in that speech resonates even more specifically with us now. Henry’s speech was not just a call to revolution. In his mind, the colonies had already passed that point. “The war is actually begun,” he said, whether Americans realized it or not. He was calling for the courage to see it through — to push past fear in the face of a powerful adversary.

“They tell us, sir, that we are weak,” Henry said, “unable to cope with so formidable an adversary. But when shall we be stronger?”

The question still resonates: When shall we be stronger?

Six months from now, when the left throws everything it has in Virginia and New Jersey, or 18 months from now, when we head into the midterms, shall we gather strength while sitting on our hands? Will we stand by as our president weathers a hurricane of criticism? Shall we watch quietly as our majorities in Congress sidestep the most critical issues facing our country? Will we pass by the working families who wait for Washington to deliver them from a woke culture, a weaponized government, and a rigged economy?

Of course not. We have worked too long and too hard to squander this opportunity. Now is the moment conservatives can enact permanent policy change, not just half-a-loaf compromises: rebuild our economy, our military, and our local communities to answer the challenges of the coming generation.

This is our moment — not just to win elections or temporary 51-49 majorities — but to truly shape the future. This is our generation’s shot to secure a new birth of freedom. To write a new chapter in the American story — one that begins with courage and ends with victory.

The left is regrouping

But as extraordinary as this moment is, it will be just as fleeting. If we do not seize it now, it will slip through our fingers and won’t come back for a long time. And what comes next would be worse than anything we have yet endured.

The left hasn’t changed. Leftists may rewrite their talking points, but the writing on their hearts is the same. They’re still elitists who disdain the Constitution, globalists who scorn national sovereignty, and woke theocrats who reject religious liberty, parental rights, moral truth, and scientific fact.

They are already regrouping, re-funding, and reasserting their power. Their victory in the Wisconsin Supreme Court race was not a fluke. They still control the media and elite institutions, and they are going to weaponize both for as long as they can.

That is why conservatives cannot sit back. We must stay in the fight — and open new fronts in it.

Will we rise up?

Two hundred and fifty years later, Americans still face Patrick Henry’s question: When shall we be stronger?

At the Heritage Foundation, we have an answer.

We’ll be stronger every time we stand on principle — and for America and Americans. When we act with the urgency and courage this moment demands, when we realize the future is ours to win or to squander, when we understand that neither the left, China, media, nor any other adversary can defeat us, our only downfall is our own timidity and complacency.

Just consider: What do we think the other side wants us to be doing right now? What do Planned Parenthood, the teachers’ unions, George Soros, Hillary Clinton, Kamala Harris, and MSNBC want us to do right now?

Nothing. They want us complacent, fat, and happy — just like good establishment Republicans. They want us to think the last six months are all we need and all we can hope for. They want us basking in the success of 2024, eating popcorn, and watching Fox News while they storm the field.

Well, I’m sorry to disappoint them.

The Heritage Foundation is not sitting this one out. Donald Trump and JD Vance are not sitting this fight out. And I know you won’t either.

We can’t. The moment is too important. The stakes are too high. Last November’s historic victory was only the beginning. The next chapter in America’s history is ours to write. Whether we fight or not will be our generation’s story — what our children and grandchildren learn about us.

A time to act

I can’t help but think that if Patrick Henry were alive today, he would look at President Trump and his entire administration and be convinced that the American dream is still possible to revitalize. And that dream isn’t just about an idea, as noble as that idea is. It’s about a real place — where you were born and are likely to be buried. It’s a place our children and grandchildren and generations after us — God willing — will be born and buried.

This providential moment we’ve been given to save this republic and revitalize America gives honor to all those who came before us — wherever they were from — who, in their last moments, were as grateful as you and I are to call ourselves Americans.

Trump SLAMS Harvard for racial discrimination



The Trump administration has frozen over $2 billion in multi-year grants and contracts at Harvard University after its leaders refused to eliminate diversity, equity, and inclusion programs, ban masks at campus protests, enact merit-based hiring and admission reforms, and reduce the power of faculty and administrators.

“Harvard wants to have its cake and eat it too,” Dr. Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, tells Liz Wheeler on “The Liz Wheeler Show.” “It wants to allow anti-Semites on campus, their students, their faculty members, it wants to continue to implement DEI policies, which is against federal law.”

“But because Harvard is so special in the eyes of its own president, evidenced by his announcement yesterday, it also wants to continue to participate to the tune of billions of dollars in federal student loans and grants,” Roberts continues.


“My advice to my college president associate at Harvard University is you can’t have your cake and eat it too. Pick one or the other. Participate in the programs and abide by federal law, or decide that you don’t like what the federal government is telling you, and stop participating in those programs,” he adds.

The Trump administration is investigating Harvard further and considering freezing an additional $9 billion in student loans and research grants.

“You know, the ones that fund the labs and stuff that really the money that keeps Harvard open is what I would call it,” Wheeler says, adding, “They’d have to radically change if they lose this money.”

“For Harvard, the really big pot of money is the research grants,” Roberts chimes in. “I think the way that this is going to get resolved is that Harvard is going to be intransigent. They’re picking a fight with a president and a vice president and an administration that is ready for this fight.”

“I think the administration is going to prevail,” he adds.

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Why people are 'missing the point' on Trump's tariffs



The mainstream media have been in a state of doom and gloom over President Trump’s tariffs, but as usual, they’re missing the point.

And while the mainstream media fearmonger over the tariffs, Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts has faith that Trump’s plan will work.

“Just to be really objective about this, there will be an economic quarter or two where things are choppy. The treasury secretary has said as much, because what Trump is trying to do is reset the world economic order,” Roberts tells Sara Gonzales on “Sara Gonzales Unfiltered.”


“If I had to guess, as he gets into this negotiation with other countries and they recalibrate, because the administration is so good, they’re going to focus on the reciprocity part of this,” he continues, adding that alongside “deregulation, cutting the budget” and “making tax cuts” will get “America back on its feet.”

“There needs to be a zealous focus, a real target, on the worst abusers,” he says, noting that China and the European Union are among these abusers.

“The EU is the biggest protectionist racket in history, and they’re telling us we can’t place a tariff on them. That’s the kind of reset that Trump is doing. He deserves much more credit for it than he’s getting,” Roberts explains.

BlazeTV contributor Matthew Marsden is in full agreement.

“It’s just absolutely typical. Trump does something, the press loses their mind over it, and the problem is they’ve done this so much that people just don’t care any more,” Marsden says, adding, “If you just have reciprocal tariffs, then it’s very easy to say, ‘Well, hang on a second, the messaging is very easy. You have this, we have this,’ it’s just very simple.”

“But I think that Americans know now that we have to go through this, because we were being bled dry. We were going to go bankrupt, the country faced a very, very uphill battle to prosperity,” he continues.

“We know that we have to have some discomfort, and I think the majority of Americans that voted Trump in, we knew we were going to get that,” he adds.

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Trade should work for America, not rule it



This week, Kevin Roberts, president of the Heritage Foundation, announced his organization’s support for President Trump’s trade policy. That includes backing Trump’s use of tariff threats to secure better trade deals with foreign nations.

The announcement reflects a broader shift underway at Heritage. Once a pillar of the conservative establishment, the think tank has moved toward a more populist, "America First" approach that challenges the traditional Republican consensus on trade.

We are a nation, not just a market. The only test that matters is whether a policy puts Americans first.

Predictably, critics from the old guard — such as Jonah Goldberg and John Podhoretz — emerged from their irrelevant holes to denounce Heritage for its betrayal of “conservative principles.” But these men, who haven’t conserved a blessed thing, have lost sight of a foundational truth: Economies should serve nations — not the other way around.

In theory, free trade eliminates barriers to the flow of goods and services across borders. The promise is that open markets lead to greater competition, more efficiency, and lower prices for all. British economist David Ricardo developed the idea of comparative advantage to support this model, arguing that trade benefits both countries when each focuses on what it produces most efficiently.

As scholar Neema Parvini has noted, however, Ricardo’s theory rested on key assumptions — most notably that labor and capital would remain largely fixed. That assumption no longer holds.

Ricardo never imagined a world where illegal immigration surged across borders or where corporations moved profits overseas to build factories in lower-cost countries. In fact, he warned against detaching economic decisions from national loyalty.

Ricardo believed a man’s attachment to his country would lead him to accept smaller profits at home rather than seek higher returns abroad. He viewed that sense of national loyalty as a natural barrier against global capital flight — and a necessary one. It would be a tragedy, he warned, if that bond ever broke.

The economist most often cited by free trade absolutists understood that theoretical models only work when grounded in reality. In Ricardo’s view, trade made sense only if individuals valued their nations more than the pursuit of maximum profit.

In an ideal world, workers and corporations would prioritize national loyalty over global opportunity, and all countries would reduce trade barriers. But we do not live in that world.

Many nations — even U.S. allies — routinely use tariffs and subsidies to give their domestic industries an edge. They do this while benefiting from a global trading system that operates securely and reliably, largely at America’s expense.

These countries act unapologetically in their national interest. The United States should do the same.

Free trade is not a moral imperative or an inherent good. It is an economic policy rooted in a theory about how trade functions. Those who promote it without question often ignore both the historical context in which Ricardo developed the theory and the realities of today’s global economy.

If free trade benefits the American people, we should pursue it. If it does not, we should adopt a policy that does.

Political theorist Russell Kirk argued that conservatism should never become ideological. Its first obligation is to the well-being of a particular people. Conservatism isn't about abstract ideals or academic formulas — it’s about preserving a way of life, grounded in real communities and traditions.

Those who champion theory over lived experience are not conservatives. They are ideologues cloaked in the language of the right, often more interested in intellectual posturing than in preserving American life.

This is why rigid, neoconservative approaches to trade have so often failed. They claim to “conserve,” but in practice, they have eroded the very institutions and livelihoods they were meant to protect.

These ideas have been tested — and failed. For decades, the United States has acted as the only major economy fully committed to ideological free trade. The results have been disastrous.

Other nations talk about free trade but act in their own interest. They impose tariffs, protect key industries, and prioritize their citizens. They live in the real world — not in an academic simulation. It’s long past time for the United States to do the same.

Economists and other academics play an important role in society, but — as the COVID-19 catastrophe made clear — they should not have the final say in public policy. Experts offer valuable insights, but their knowledge often applies narrowly to specific fields. They tend to struggle when asked to apply that knowledge in broader, real-world contexts.

That’s why nations are governed by statesmen, not scientists or economists.

An economist may point out that producing antibiotics in China reduces costs. But that same economist cannot weigh the national risk if China, the sole supplier, becomes the source of a disease that only those now-imported antibiotics can treat. In that scenario, no amount of economic efficiency will save American lives.

Shifting U.S. trade policy to protect American interests does not betray conservative principles — it affirms them. The first duty of conservatism is to preserve the American people and their way of life.

Conservatives should adopt economic policies that serve that goal, but we must never treat those policies as ends in themselves. The economy is a tool, not a purpose.

Neoconservatives may mourn the loss of ideological purity, but their abstractions should not define national policy. We are a nation, not just a market. The only test that matters is whether a policy puts Americans first.

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The truth about Project 2025: Will Trump take your birth control away?



Donald Trump has officially been sworn in as the 47th president of the United States of America — and Allie Beth Stuckey of “Relatable” couldn’t be more thrilled.

“Trump is going to overhaul America’s most corrupt institutions and turn them back into institutions that serve the American people. Truly, hopefully, by the grace of God, making America great again,” Stuckey says.

President of the Heritage Foundation, Kevin Roberts, is hopeful as well, and excited that elements of his foundation’s Project 2025 will be coming to fruition — despite the left-wing fearmongering surrounding the set of policy proposals.

“I was not surprised that the radical left overreacted, because that’s what they do, you know, their performance theater about anything that conservatives do that might actually be conservative is guaranteed,” Roberts says.


“What did surprise me, to be completely candid with you Allie, is the scale and scope of their overreaction. And clearly, they thought, particularly at one point in the summer, that this was going to be the Achilles heel for President Trump,” he continues.

And the left is still shaking in their boots.

“They believe that what is in Project 2025 is that you personally are going to go to their house, open their drawer, steal their birth control, and run away. That seems to be like this crazy fear that has been stirred up in a lot of people on the left,” Stuckey says.

While most conservatives aren’t a fan of the left's obsession with sex, abortion, and pregnancy prevention, Robert’s can put their delusional fears to rest.

“Project 2025 is this election cycle’s version of something that Heritage has done since 1980 for President Reagan, and it is just a menu of conservative policies. It’s actually on one level, Allie, really boring. It’s what think tanks and public policy organizations do,” Roberts explains.

“So the advice that I would give, and I really do intend this to be friendly for people who are in the political center or maybe on the political left, is that whatever you’ve heard about Project 2025 is unlikely to be true,” he adds.

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