Local NAACP leaders and pastors gathered for a forum at St. Paul’s Baptist Church last Thursday evening to inform voters about Project 2025 and its potential impact on local Black communities.

The forum was organized by four local NAACP branches – Richmond City, Hanover, Chesterfield and Henrico – in response to the community demand to help inform voters for the upcoming presidential election. The panel discussion consisted of Virginia NAACP Youth and College Division President, TyLeik Chambers, former Virginia Education Association President James Fedderman, Senior Pastor and Founder of Impact Church E.J. Simpkins, Dr. Jerome Ross of Providence Baptist Church and Dr. Lance D. Waston of The Saint Paul’s Baptist Church.

The panel discussion was moderated by Amy Tillerson Brown, who is the history department chair at Mary Baldwin University and Virginia NAACP Education Committee chair.

In addition to the forum, the church also held voter information booths on registering to vote, as well as confirming voter registrations.

“People know about Project 2025 on a surface level, but they don’t know about Project 2025 with all the details in the 800 plus pages,” said Greta Randolph, director of outreach for Saint Paul’s Baptist.

Project 2025 is an 800-paged manifesto proposed in April 2022 by the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank firm based in Washington. The proposal offers a series of ideologically conservative plans for a Republican candidate if they win the presidency.

Some of the Heritage Foundation’s recommendations are years old and were used in former President Donald Trump’s first term. Project 2025 has been viewed unfavorably by the public, according to recent polling data. The proposal’s controversy revolves mainly on the authoritative structure of the executive branch, dismantling consequential federal agencies such as the Department of Education and Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“It is an attack on Black history,” said Waston, during the panel discussion on eliminating critical race theory. “Eliminating this educational tool from education will lead to a diminished focus on historical and contemporary experiences of Black individuals and communities – not just Black – but also brown, and by larger implication, minorities.”

The NAACP forum focused on Project 2025’s proposal on education and how it may locally impact the Black community.

“One of the things that a lot of college students that I talk to when they think about Project 2025, they’re thinking about their future, what it’s going to look like for them in the workforce and what’s going to be the expectation for them,” said Chambers, during the panel discussion on speaking on Project 2025’s proposed elimination of student loans. “I think we’re seeing a lot more activism and a lot more engagement politically than we have in – I would say – a long while.”

Trump has stated that he has no direct affiliation with Project 2025, but it has been reported that his former advisers worked on portions of the manifesto. While Project 2025 is a proposal, critics are concerned that Trump’s administration would implement most of these policies if he wins the presidential election.