If the first half-century of the Heritage Foundation was defined by former President Reagan, its president Kevin Roberts is setting up the powerful conservative think tank to be defined for the next 50 years by President Trump.

“You can have the principles along with the really bold action of Trump, who, frankly, is superior to Reagan in his willingness to upend the status quo,” Roberts told me in an interview. “If we put those two things together, then for the next 50 years of Heritage and in the conservative movement, I think that defines who we are.”

For this first official edition of The Movement, a weekly newsletter looking at the influences and debates on the right in Washington, I thought it appropriate to talk to the head of “the Parthenon of the conservative metropolis,” as the New York Times once described it — who has overseen Heritage accelerating toward Trumpism and becoming a national lightning rod with Project 2025.

“Trump is the conservative movement’s FDR, politically,” Roberts said. He said the president has awoken the right to be more aggressive tactically and argued that conservative principles need to be applied “in ways that use the full legal authority given to elected officials.”

Some of Heritage’s embrace of Trump has come in the form of grand gestures, like displaying not one, but two multi-story banners on the side of its headquarters: One congratulating Trump ahead of his inauguration, and another cheering his policies during his first 100 days in office.

But it has also rattled historical allies with some sharp changes in policy positions. Heritage was skeptical about sending U.S. aid to Ukraine. And some free-marketers are scratching their heads at Heritage's new stance on Trump’s tariffs.

Heritage’s scholars had long argued against tariffs, calling them “not conservative,” saying during Trump’s first term that they “will only punish Americans” and declaring as recently as 2021 that tariffs “are never a good idea.” But now, Roberts says Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariff move should be “applauded” as part of a negotiating strategy and broader economic agenda that includes extension of expiring tax cuts. Using tariffs constructively “is a fine art,” Heritage scholars wrote last year.

Asked about that shift, Roberts said that Heritage has realized that “the United States has gotten weaker, especially relative to China” — and “if, in fact, we want to become stronger as well as avert a military conflict with China, we have to upend the status quo.”

“We understand that if the tariff regime becomes truly reciprocal, if it's zealously focused on China,” Roberts said, and if “that 10% across-the-board tariff becomes a border adjustment tax …that's a tariff regime that we like because tariffs — at least if history is a guide — become more temporary than permanent.”

I asked........

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