Kevin Roberts
Kevin Roberts is named in 13 events across the Capture Cascade Timeline, from 1973 to 2025.
Quick facts
Full name: Kevin David Roberts Born: June 24, 1974, Lafayette, Louisiana Education: BA History, University of Louisiana at Lafayette (1996); MA History, Virginia Tech (1999); PhD American History, University of Texas at Austin (2003) Religion: Catholic Known for: President of the Heritage Foundation; architect of Project 2025
Key positions
| Years | Role | Organization |
|---|---|---|
| 2003–2005 | Assistant Professor of History | New Mexico State University |
| 2006–2013 | Founder, president, and headmaster | John Paul the Great Academy (Lafayette, LA) |
| 2013–2016 | President | Wyoming Catholic College (Lander, WY) |
| 2016–2018 | Executive Vice President | Texas Public Policy Foundation |
| 2018–2021 | Chief Executive Officer | Texas Public Policy Foundation |
| Oct 2021–present | President | The Heritage Foundation |
Biography
Kevin Roberts came to conservative movement politics by way of academia and Catholic education. After earning a PhD in American history from the University of Texas at Austin in 2003 — with a dissertation on slavery in Louisiana — he taught at New Mexico State University, then founded a K–12 Catholic liberal arts school in Lafayette, Louisiana, and served as president of Wyoming Catholic College. In 2016 he moved into the think-tank world at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, becoming its CEO in 2018 and building it into the largest state-level conservative think tank in the country, with an expansion into Washington, D.C.
Named president of the Heritage Foundation in October 2021, Roberts repositioned the organization from a traditional policy shop into a combative, Trump-aligned operation. Soon after his arrival, Heritage launched Project 2025, an expansive plan to overhaul the federal government and consolidate executive power under a new Republican administration, coordinated across 50-plus conservative organizations and paired with a personnel database of vetted appointees. Roberts has been described as the project’s lead architect and public face; during the 2024 campaign, as Democrats highlighted its more extreme proposals, Trump publicly distanced himself from specific policies while maintaining his relationship with Roberts.
In late 2025 Roberts triggered the most serious internal crisis of his tenure. After Tucker Carlson — whom Roberts called a “close friend of Heritage Foundation” — released an October 27, 2025 interview with white nationalist and Holocaust denier Nick Fuentes, Roberts posted a video on October 30 defending Carlson against what he called a “venomous coalition” attempting to “cancel” him. The next day he denounced Fuentes’s “vicious antisemitic ideology” and “Holocaust denial” while holding his anti-cancellation line. The fallout was immediate: at least five members of Heritage’s antisemitism task force resigned, Princeton professor Robert P. George left the board (saying he could not remain without a full retraction), additional trustees departed through December 2025, and senior figures including longtime fellow Stephen Moore and Roberts’s own chief of staff Ryan Neuhaus exited. Mitch McConnell and Ben Shapiro publicly condemned Roberts’s stance; Shapiro said the comments “betray the legacy of Heritage.” At a November all-staff meeting where some employees called for his resignation, Roberts apologized — “I made a mistake and I let you down and I let down this institution” — and attributed the original video to his former chief of staff, who “had the pen.” He remained Heritage president through the controversy.
Sources
- “Kevin D. Roberts, PhD,” The Heritage Foundation. https://www.heritage.org/staff/kevin-d-roberts-phd
- “Kevin Roberts (political strategist),” Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kevin_Roberts_(political_strategist)
- “Heritage Foundation in uproar over Kevin Roberts defense of Tucker Carlson,” Washington Post, Nov. 6, 2025. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/11/06/heritage-foundation-tucker-carlson/
- “Backlash erupts at Heritage Foundation after leader defends Tucker Carlson’s interview with white nationalist Nick Fuentes,” CBS News, Nov. 2025. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/heritage-foundation-kevin-roberts-tucker-carlson-interview-nick-fuentes/
- “Heritage Foundation loses two more trustees in antisemitism controversy,” Washington Post, Dec. 16, 2025. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2025/12/16/heritage-antisemitism-controversy-board-members/
- “Project 2025 writer resigns over boss’ ‘indefensible’ comments,” Newsweek, 2025. https://www.newsweek.com/project-2025-heritage-foundation-resign-kevin-roberts-tucker-carlson-nick-fuentes-11253226