WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats have denounced it in hundreds of ads and billboards, printed it in oversized book form as a convention prop, and mentioned it in seemingly every speech and press statement.
Now, they will take their campaign against the conservative Project 2025 blueprint, written by allies of Republican Donald Trump, to the skies above college football stadiums in key swing states.
Democratic National Committee -sponsored banners pulled by small airplanes are flying Saturday over Michigan Stadium, where the defending national champion Wolverines have a marquee matchup against Texas, and at home games for Penn State and Wisconsin. A banner set to fly over Georgia's home game might be affected by weather.
Vice President Kamala Harris and her allies have spent months warning about Project 2025, betting that the initiative makes Trump seem especially extreme. More than 900 pages and produced by the conservative Heritage Foundation, the plan lays out how Trump in his second term might do everything from firing tens of thousands of federal workers to abolishing government departments to imposing new restrictions on abortion and diversity initiatives.
Trump has rejected a direct connection to Project 2025, though he's also endorsed some of its key ideas.
Saturday's gambit is putting Democratic messaging over stadiums with a total capacity of 380,000-plus, with tens of thousands of fans more in the vicinity of each game.
“JD Vance ‘hearts’ Ohio State + Project 2025,” reads the message going over Michigan Stadium, suggesting Trump's running mate loves the project as much as he famously does Michigan's hated archrival.
In Wisconsin, which is hosting South Dakota, the message is “Jump Around! Beat Trump + Project 2025," a nod to fans jumping with enough ferocity to shake Camp Randall Stadium when House of Pain’s “Jump Around” plays between the third and fourth quarters.
Georgia, hosting Tennessee Tech, and Penn State’s Bowling Green matchup are getting more general messages urging fans to “Beat Trump, Sack Project 2025 — though weather patterns along the flight route made it uncertain whether the Georgia banner would fly.
Banners will start flying around four hours before kickoff and could continue into the games, depending on air marshals’ decisions in each location, said DNC deputy communications director Abhi Rahman.
The aerial blitz follows Harris’ campaign and party bring up Project 2025 multiple times each day, often unprompted.
The DNC marked Labor Day by arguing that Project 2025 would undermine overtime rules and “hard-fought” worker rights. It also paid for internet ads on the initiative that flashed up for users searching “back to school." Democrats have further pointed to Project 2025 in seemingly incongruous places, while highlighting Vance getting booed at a recent firefighters convention or slamming Trump for laying into his perceived political enemies in online posts.
“We want people to know exactly what Project 2025 is, what the ties are to Trump,” Rahman said. “Finding creative avenues to get the message out is something that we’re always trying to do.”
Democratic strategist Brad Bannon warned that Harris’ focus on Project 2025 “can’t overwhelm her positive message about the changes she wants to make.”
“She can’t afford to go overboard," he said, “if it interferes with her establishing her own personal profile.”
A large portion of Saturday's game crowds, meanwhile, may support Trump. Many college football fans hail from rural, more Republican areas, well beyond the confines of reliably Democratic college towns.
“One of the really interesting things when political candidates try to leverage sports is that they’re putting themselves at risk,” said Amy Bass, who is a professor of sport studies at Manhattanville University in Purchase, New York.
She pointed to Trump being surprised to get booed while attending Game 5 of the 2019 World Series — though the former president also made largely successful stops at tailgates before the Iowa-Iowa State football game in 2023 and when South Carolina hosted Clemson after last Thanksgiving.
Sports crowds have “a propensity to get loud, also have the added layer of alcohol and tailgating and all kinds of things pregame, and they haven’t curated that crowd,” Bass said.
Rahman, though, shrugged off such concerns.
“They can get rowdy all they want at a banner," he said. "But the message is definitely there. It’s there for a reason.”
FILE - Colorado Gov. Jared Polis holds up a copy of Project 2025 as he speaks during the Democratic National Convention Aug. 21, 2024, in Chicago. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite, File)
GENEVA (AP) — Two former Olympic champions are in the race to be the next IOC president. So is a prince of a Middle East kingdom and the son of a former president. The global leaders of cycling, gymnastics and skiing also are in play.
The International Olympic Committee published a list Monday of seven would-be candidates who are set to run for election in March to succeed outgoing president Thomas Bach for the next eight years.
Just one woman, IOC executive board member Kirsty Coventry from Zimbabwe, entered the contest to lead an organization that has had only male presidents in its 130-year history. Eight of those presidents were from Europe and one from the United States.
Coventry and Sebastian Coe are two-time gold medalists in swimming and running, respectively. Prince Feisal al Hussein of Jordan is also on the IOC board.
Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr. of Spain is one of the four IOC vice presidents, whose father was president for 21 years until 2001.
David Lappartient is the president of cycling’s governing body, Morinari Watanabe leads gymnastics, and Johan Eliasch is president of the International Ski and Snowboard Federation. Coe is the president of track’s World Athletics.
All seven met a deadline of Sunday to send a letter of intent to Bach, who must leave the post next year after reaching the maximum 12 years in office. Bach declined at the Paris Olympics last month to seek to change IOC rules in order to stay in office longer.
A formal candidate list should be confirmed in January, three months before the March 18-21 election meeting in Greece, near the site of Ancient Olympia.
Only IOC members are eligible to stand as candidates, with votes cast by the rest of the 111-strong membership of the Olympic body.
The IOC is one of the most exclusive clubs in world sports. Its members are drawn from European and Middle East royalty, leaders of international sports bodies, former and current Olympic athletes, politicians and diplomats plus industrialists, including some billionaires like Eliasch.
It makes for one of the most discreet and quirky election campaigns in world sports, with members prevented from publicly endorsing their pick.
Campaign limits on the candidates include a block on publishing videos, organizing public meetings and taking part in public debates. The IOC will organize a closed-door meeting for candidates to address voters in January in its home city Lausanne, Switzerland.
The IOC top job ideally calls for deep knowledge of managing sports, understanding athletes’ needs and nimble skills in global politics.
The president oversees an organization that earns billions of dollars in revenue from broadcasting and sponsor deals for the Olympic Games and employs hundreds of staff in Lausanne, Switzerland.
Coe has been widely considered the most qualified candidate. A two-time Olympic champion in the 1,500-meters, he was later an elected lawmaker in Britain in the 1990s, led the 2012 London Olympics organizing committee and has presided at World Athletics for nine years.
However, he has potential legal hurdles regarding his ability to serve a full eight-year mandate. The IOC has an age limit of 70 for members, while Coe will be 68 on election day. The rules allow for a special exemption to remain for four more years, but that would mean a six-year presidency unless those limits are changed.
Coventry, who turned 41 Monday, also has government experience as the appointed sports minister in Zimbabwe.
The only woman ever to stand as an IOC presidential candidate was Anita DeFrantz, a former Olympic rower from the United States. She was eliminated in the first round of voting in a five-candidate election in 2001, which was won by Jacques Rogge.
Lappartient also is president of France's national Olympic body and has carried strong momentum from the Paris Summer Games. He leads a French Alps project that was picked to host the 2030 Winter Games and was picked by Bach to oversee a long-term project sealed in Paris that will see Saudi Arabia hosting the Esports Olympic Games through 2035.
Eliasch is perhaps the most surprising candidate after being elected as an IOC member in Paris less than two months ago. The Swedish-British owner of the Head sportswear brand got 17 “no” votes, a notably high number in Olympic politics.
AP Olympics: https://apnews.com/hub/2024-paris-olympic-games
FILE - International Olympic Committee (IOC) Vice President Juan Antonio Samaranch Jr. speaks during a press conference at the headquarters of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics Organizing Committee in Beijing, Tuesday, Sept. 18, 2018. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein, File)
FILE - IOC member and former swimmer Kirsty Coventry smiles on the arrival for a press conference after the executive board meeting of the IOC, at the Olympic House, in Lausanne, Switzerland, Thursday, Jan. 9, 2020. (Laurent Gillieron/Keystone via AP, File)
FILE - World Athletics President Sebastian Coe holds a press conference at the conclusion of the World Athletics meeting at the Italian National Olympic Committee, headquarters in Rome, Nov. 30, 2022. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia, File)
FILE - IOC President Thomas Bach addresses the audience during the 2024 Summer Olympics closing ceremony at the Stade de France, Aug. 11, 2024, in Saint-Denis, France. (AP Photo/Ashley Landis, File)
