As former President Trump faces backlash from Democrats over ties to the Heritage Foundation’s “Project 2025,” the Biden-Harris administration has been working hand in hand with a prominent liberal think tank through a revolving door of employees working to turn progressive policy recommendations into executive actions and legislation, which could come back to haunt the Harris campaign.

The Center for American Progress (CAP) has been labeled the “most influential” think tank in the Biden era, while the group publicly boasts that it has turned at least 10 policy recommendations into “executive action and policy legislation.”

Patrick Gaspard, the current president of CAP, has visited the Biden White House at least 20 times between December 2021 and January 2024, which included five solo meetings with high-ranking Biden officials.

CAP’s ties to the Biden White House go even deeper than Gaspard, as at least 60 alumni from the think tank have joined the administration, including Neera Tanden, who previously served as president of CAP and has served in multiple roles in the Biden administration, including senior adviser and staff secretary. 

PETE BUTTIGIEG REGULARLY CONSULTS DARK MONEY-FUNDED GREEN GROUPS, CALENDAR ENTRIES SHOW

She was promoted in May 2023 to the “Assistant to the President and Domestic Policy Advisor” titles, replacing Susan Rice, according to a White House press release.

President Biden also hired CAP founder and chairman John Podesta as a senior White House clean energy czar in 2022. Podesta was tasked with overseeing roughly $370 billion in climate spending appropriated by the Inflation Reduction Act. 

The former Hillary Clinton campaign chairman was then tapped by Biden earlier this year to serve as his top climate diplomat after John Kerry stepped down to help with campaign efforts, which received backlash from top Republicans due to concerns over his ties to China dating back to his CAP days. 

Fox News Digital first reported on his connection to top CCP official Tung Chee-hwa, who he repeatedly referred to as his “friend” and took several calls from.

CAP’s influence within the Biden White House began months before he entered office. In late 2020, a half dozen of the group’s employees joined Biden’s transition team in the Treasury, Federal Reserve, Labor Department, Interior Department, National Security Council and Office of the U.S. Trade Representative. 

White House clean energy czar John Podesta, left, was appointed to “continue to lead our global climate efforts,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said. Podesta effectively replaced climate envoy John Kerry, right. (Getty Images)

CAP’s organization appears primed to push a policy agenda on several key issues on the progressive wish list if the Biden administration, now led by Vice President Kamala Harris on the presidential ticket, were to continue into a second term. 

CAP has voiced support for both setting term limits for Supreme Court justices and packing the court, which are two efforts being pushed by Demand Justice, a left-wing dark money group that Harris’ senior campaign adviser Brian Fallon co-founded and left less than a year ago. 

The liberal think tank has signed onto multiple letters pushed by Demand Justice, which was reportedly planning a $10 million offensive against conservative Supreme Court justices this year “on a range of activities, from conducting opposition research on potential Supreme Court picks to advocating for ethics reforms for the high court,” Politico reported.

“The Supreme Court has taken off its mask this term by creating unconstitutional de facto immunity for future presidents who act illegally and by gutting the ability of public agencies and Congress to protect Americans from abuse by right-wing special interests,” CAP states on its website.

BIDEN OMB NOMINEE NEERA TANDEN RECEIVED $731G OVER 2 YEARS FROM LIBERAL NONPROFIT

President Biden listens during an event in the South Court Auditorium on the White House complex in Washington, Tuesday, Sept. 3, 2024. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)

CAP has pushed a variety of other left-wing efforts, which include censoring speech it believes to be “misinformation,” taxpayer-funded student loan bailouts, taxpayer-funded reparations, DEI mandates, federal taxpayer funds for abortion by eliminating the Hyde Amendment, and phasing out gas-powered cars.

“With skyrocketing profits and expanding domestic manufacturing, U.S. automakers have everything they need to help the country switch from fossil fuel-powered vehicles to electric,” CAP said in a 2024 post, despite multiple reports highlighting how consumers have complained about the cost and lack of charging stations.

CAP’s influence on Biden also spread to his messaging on the campaign trail before he dropped out of the race. In 2022, the Washington Post reported that Biden’s move to label Trump as “ultra MAGA” was the result of a six-month research project from the CAP Action Fund that was headed by his top aide Anita Dunn, who has performed consulting work for CAP.

CAP Action Fund’s president, Navin Nayak, has visited the Biden White House at least a couple dozen times, a Fox News Digital review of White House visitor logs found.

Biden’s former chief of staff Ron Klain, who was on the CAP Action Fund board for several years, has also repeatedly praised their efforts on his X account.

CENTER FOR AMERICAN PROGRESS SUPPORT COMES FROM ALL CORNERS, INCLUDING YOURS

Vice President Kamala Harris delivers remarks at a campaign rally in Savannah, Georgia, Aug. 29, 2024. (Reuters/Elizabeth Frantz)

VP Harris has worked with the Center for American Progress dating back to her time as California attorney general, when she joined the group for a press conference via telephone. She has also participated in several events hosted by the liberal think tank and her sister, Maya Harris, joined as a senior fellow, according to a 2013 press release. 

Tanden said, “Maya has worked tirelessly in many different arenas to ensure that the United States is a more inclusive country and that all Americans can live up to their potential” and looked forward to her involvement with CAP.

Despite its extensive connections to the Biden White House, CAP blasts Project 2025 on its website as a “far-right assault on America” that it claims will “serve as a road map” for a “far-right presidential administration.”

A CAP spokesperson dismissed the Heritage Foundation as “no longer a think tank” in a statement to Fox News Digital on Sunday.

“When it comes to the Heritage Foundation and their work, one needs to look no further than yesterday’s New York Times story exposing Heritage creating fake digital content and pushing lies about election integrity,” the spokesperson said. “Couple that with Heritage’s embrace of authoritarianism and their president threatening to launch a potentially violent ‘second American Revolution’ if it doesn’t get its way, and I think it’s safe to say that Heritage is on an island of its own. This is no longer a think tank.”

As a presidential candidate, Harris has repeatedly criticized Trump over Project 2025 as recently as last week when she ran an ad linking Trump to the project.

Former President Trump during a news conference at Trump Tower in New York, on Friday, Sept. 6, 2024. (Cheney Orr/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

While Project 2025 is staffed with several high-level individuals who have previously worked with Trump, he has strongly denied having any direct role with the group.

A Project 2025 spokesperson told Fox News Digital on Sunday that “Project 2025 does not speak for Donald Trump or his campaign” and is “continuing our decades-long legacy of preparing policy and personnel recommendations for the next conservative President.”

“The Heritage Foundation has been producing its Mandate for Leadership since 1980, and President Reagan handed out copies of the book to his cabinet at their first meeting,” the spokesperson continued. “The Left always prepares recommendations for liberal presidents, and they are simply upset that two can play this game.”

“The only reason that the Left is in a tailspin over Project 2025 is that it has winning ideas that the American people support, while their own recommendations, which are currently destroying our country, are wildly unpopular,” the spokesperson added.

Trump campaign spokesperson Danielle Alvarez told Fox News Digital earlier this year that “Agenda 47 and President Trump’s RNC Platform are the only policies endorsed by President Trump for a second term.”

“Team Biden and the DNC are LYING and fear-mongering because they have NOTHING else to offer the American people,” she added. “Remember this is the same group that lied to Americans and hid Joe Biden’s cognitive decline all these years.” 

Fox News Digital reached out to the Biden White House and Harris campaign for comment but did not receive a response.

Fox News Digital’s Joe Schoffstall and Thomas Catenacci contributed to this report

In an unprecedented moment in modern American history, the 2024 Republican and Democratic presidential candidates will face off in their first debate after just seven weeks of campaigning against each other.

The New York Times analyzed what the two candidates have said about each other on social media from July 21, when President Biden dropped out of the race and Vice President Kamala Harris became the frontrunner to replace him as the Democratic nominee, through Sept. 6. (For the most part, their statements on social media mirror their public comments at rallies and other events.)

While both candidates attack each other, The Times found that former president Donald Trump targets Ms. Harris much more frequently, an average of more than three times per day, and his posts (on Truth Social) almost always include a personal smear.

What Harris says about Trump in personal terms

Ms. Harris’s posts about Mr. Trump (on X) tend not to go for the jugular. A handful of times, she has drawn attention to his history of legal trouble, saying, for example, that she knows “Donald Trump’s type” because she “took on predators, fraudsters and cheaters” as a prosecutor.

She has also described him in the following ways:

What Trump says about Harris in personal terms

By contrast, Mr. Trump’s attacks on Ms. Harris resemble the name-calling insults of a sexist schoolyard bully. He frequently drops personal slights into political attacks, but he has also attacked Ms. Harris numerous times in personal terms without making any particular reference to her policies or political record. Some of these posts have touched instead on her racial identity or included generic insults referencing her authenticity or capability.

Here is how he has described her:

Mr. Trump told rallygoers in North Carolina last month that he’d had trouble coming up with a “name” for Ms. Harris, but that he was settling on “comrade.”

“I think that’s the most accurate name,” he said.

What the candidates say about each other on the issues

While both candidates also criticize each other on policy matters, Mr. Trump nearly always sprinkles in a personal jab (or two or three) about Ms. Harris.

Mr. Trump’s posts about Ms. Harris frequently include spelling mistakes, falsehoods and his distinctive style of grammar and capitalization. He spent a few days in August frequently calling Ms. Harris “Kamabla,” though he has since abandoned that moniker. Ms. Harris’s posts are more typical of a traditional politician.

The border is an especially contentious issue.

In making immigration a central theme of his campaign, Mr. Trump repeatedly and falsely calls Ms. Harris the Biden administration’s “border czar.” Ms. Harris notes that Mr. Trump pressured Republicans to oppose a bipartisan immigration deal.

Both accuse each other of being extremists.

Ms. Harris ties Mr. Trump to Project 2025, a set of conservative policy proposals that Mr. Trump has recently tried to distance himself from. Mr. Trump (falsely) claims Ms. Harris is a “communist” who will “destroy America.”

Ms. Harris attacks Mr. Trump over abortion rights.

The vice president regularly reminds voters that Mr. Trump appointed the Supreme Court justices who voted to overturn Roe v. Wade. Mr. Trump rarely mentions reproductive rights.

Their barbs on the economy are more classically partisan.

Ms. Harris accuses Mr. Trump of only caring about wealthy Americans. The former president blames Ms. Harris for inflation.

More than 3,000 family members of 9/11 victims are demanding both former President Trump and Vice President Harris oppose any Middle East peace deal with Saudi Arabia unless the kingdom acknowledges and is held accountable for its involvement in the attack.

“We waited 23 years for truth, justice and accountability,” Brett Eagleson, head of the advocacy group 9/11 Justice who lost his father in the World Trade Center, told Fox News Digital ahead of the 23rd anniversary of the nation’s deadliest terror attack. 

“As we continue to push and as we continue to make noise, we’re seeing more and more evidence, smoking-gun evidence coming out about the kingdom’s role in supporting 9/11 hijackers, and our government has done nothing to hold them accountable.”

Both Trump and President Biden have been pushing for a security deal that would normalize relations between Israel and the Saudis, allow for civil nuclear energy cooperation and defense guarantees to counter Iran. That deal was put on ice after the Hamas attack on Israel last October.

The families point to video footage of a Saudi government agent “casing” the U.S. Capitol as proof of Saudi involvement. 

They sent an original letter to both Harris and Trump last week and a follow-up one this week. They also invited both candidates to meet with them at Ground Zero next Wednesday on the 9/11 anniversary.

New York firefighters are shown amid the rubble of the World Trade Center after the 9/11 attacks. (Getty Images)

“As you campaign to become the next President of the United States, we ask you to pledge that you will not endorse any Middle East peace deal involving Saudi Arabia unless it fully addresses the role of the Saudi Arabian government in the 9/11 attacks,” their letter reads.

HARRIS’ RECORD GIVES INSIGHT TO GOALS: GETTING TOUGH ON SAUDI ARABIA AND RENEWING IRAN DEAL 

Omar al-Bayoumi, who the FBI says was an operative of the Saudi intelligence service with close ties to two of the 9/11 hijackers, can be seen filming a video published by CBS in June 2024 around the Capitol pointing out entrances and exits, security posts and a model of the building. 

Al-Bayoumi noted the airport nearby and pointed to the Washington Monument and said he would “report to you what is in there.” 

Federal investigators believe the hijackers of Flight 93, which crashed in Shanksville, Pennsylvania, had intentions of flying the plane into the Capitol. 

“We’re saying that if the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia truly wants to engage with the West, and they want to continue to buy our weapons, and they want our nuclear technology, and they want the defense of our troops, the least they can do is admit their fault and admit that the practices within their government 23 years ago, with supporting the hijackers and exporting this radical form of Islam, admit that it were not for that, 9/11 would have never had happened.”

Eagleson said Saudi Crown-Prince Mohammed bin Salman [MBS] “had nothing to do with 9/11 – we were both 15 at the time.”

“To MBS’ credit, he is sort of being a progressive, but … it doesn’t absolve them from the sins of their past.”

Formed by families of victims in Pennsylvania, New York and Virginia, 9/11 Justice has sued the Saudi government and pushed the U.S. government to declassify all remaining documents about 9/11. 

Fifteen of the 19 al Qaeda hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, but the direct links of the Saudi government have remained murky for years. 

“The leaders of our government, the two candidates for office, have refused to address this issue, and we’re sick and tired of it,” said Eagleson. 

OPINION: WHY SAUDI ARABIA MATTERS MORE THAN EVER TO THE US

In 2021, Biden signed an executive order for the review and declassification of 9/11 documents, but it’s “not working,” Eagleson says.

“We’re having to go outside of the country to get this information,” he added, noting that the casing video had come from British police. The London Police provided the FBI with the video years ago, but it was never made available to the 9/11 commission or the CIA, according to Deputy Director Michael Morrell. 

“I’m 99.9% confident that we did not have this video. I was the president’s briefer at the time. If somebody had shown me this video, I would have shown it to the president,” he told CBS. 

“Have President Biden and Vice President Harris seen this video? Has President Trump seen it? Why was this video buried?” Eagleson said. “The fact that they’re not answering that question just smells of conspiracy, it smells of cover-up.”

The Harris and Trump campaigns could not be reached for comment.