\n<\/p>\n

The Heritage Foundation<\/a> is 50, and after a half-century as the gold standard in movement conservatism<\/a>, it is grappling with changing currents on the Right.<\/p>\n

Tax cuts, deregulation, and opposition to abortion remain as important to the conservative movement as when Ronald Reagan<\/a> was president, but much else has changed. Immigration, trade, foreign policy, and even broader questions about whether government power should be used to advance traditionalist ends are being debated as never before.<\/p>\n

VANCE RAILWAY SAFETY BILL DEBATE TESTS MORE POPULIST, BLUE-COLLAR GOP\u00a0<\/a><\/u><\/b><\/p>\n

Some younger conservatives question whether the old movement was successful at conserving anything. They are disproportionately drawn to former President Donald Trump<\/a> and Gov. Ron DeSantis <\/a>(R-FL), the two leading prospects for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination.<\/p>\n

Kevin Roberts<\/a>, who has been Heritage\u2019s president since October 2021, is trying to steer<\/a> the venerable think tank through these uncharted waters.<\/p>\n

\u201cSome legacy organizations, if you will, don\u2019t even want to have the conversation with a New Right,\u201d Roberts told the Washington Examiner<\/i>. \u201cI mean, our sponsorship of the National Conservatism Conference last year was a signal there. We didn\u2019t agree with everything that was said.\u201d But he said he thought the conversation was important.<\/p>\n

Tucker Carlson<\/a> is keynoting the 50th-anniversary celebration. In the statement announcing this, Roberts described Carlson as \u201ca fearless American who is unafraid to challenge the Washington regime, ask tough questions, and hold the ruling elite accountable.\u201d DeSantis is speaking twice. How to deal with Big Tech is on the menu alongside perennial issues such as taxes and federal spending.<\/p>\n

Part of what distinguishes the so-called New Right from its elders is as much attitude as any policy position, which is why Trump, DeSantis, and Carlson are dominant figures.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to be civil wherever and however we can,\u201d Roberts said. \u201cBut I think my experience with the radical Left and academia and policy here in D.C. shows they don\u2019t play by the rule. And so reestablishing the rules means figuratively, we got to bust them and bloody their noses sometimes.\u201d<\/p>\n

It isn\u2019t all attitude, however. Roberts penned an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal <\/i>calling for greater scrutiny over U.S. aid to Ukraine and implying there should be some limit to Washington\u2019s commitment, even as he denounced Russian President Vladimir Putin<\/a>\u2019s invasion. \u201cThe war in Ukraine may finally force conservatives into the intramural foreign policy debate they have put off for more than 30 years,\u201d he wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cCalling for that doesn\u2019t mean we want the Ukrainians to lose,\u201d he told the Washington Examiner<\/i>. \u201cQuite the opposite.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a familiar debate.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I say that I\u2019m a recovering neocon, I mean that\u2019s an understatement,\u201d Roberts said <\/i>when asked about David Frum\u2019s 20-year-old piece denouncing prominent conservative critics of the Iraq war as \u201cUnpatriotic Conservatives.\u201d \u201cI remember that National Review <\/i>piece. Well, I thought that, you know, my childhood political hero, Patrick Buchanan, was wrong about that. I thought Robert Novak was just a luminary who was wrong on that one issue, but I still respected him.\u201d<\/p>\n

<\/div>\n
\u201cHow right I thought they were,\u201d Roberts said of former President George W. Bush\u2019s team, \u201cand you know what, they were dead wrong. I don\u2019t get into imputing motive. I just know that in hindsight, we can look back and say that was wrong.\u201d<\/p>\n
Roberts doesn\u2019t see this acknowledgment as a break with mainstream conservatism, however.<\/p>\n
\u201cSome people \u2026 believe that the only way to implement Reagan\u2019s peace through strength is for the United States to be interventionist, but neither Reagan nor Eisenhower would have called for that, that scale of involvement, and beyond that, each era is different,\u201d he said. \u201cYou know if Russell Kirk were here and listening in on this conversation, he would say remember that conservatism has these eternal principles, but there\u2019s a certain politics of prudence, which is the recognition of the age you\u2019re in.\u201d<\/p>\n
Nevertheless, Roberts does concede that a lot has changed on the Right since the invasion of Iraq.<\/p>\n
\u201cI give great credit to President Trump, to Gov. DeSantis, any of the other political leaders, Sen. [J.D.] Vance (R-OH), many members of the House who have the courage and face a lot of gratuitous criticism in D.C.,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
CLICK HERE TO READ MORE IN THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER\u00a0<\/a><\/u><\/b><\/p>\n
The Trump-era conservative movement still has a long way to go before accomplishing anything on the scale of ending stagflation or winning the Cold War. It took nearly the entirety of Heritage\u2019s existence to overturn Roe v. Wade<\/i>, handed down the year the think tank was founded, though the abortion debate is not over.<\/p>\n
Heritage\u2019s 50th-anniversary celebration launched on Thursday with a summit. It will conclude with a gala on Friday night.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
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