'Once a dirty secret': Group behind Project 2025 admits to tracking Trump shooter's data

A group connected to The Heritage Foundation — which is behind the 900-page Project 2025 blueprint for a second Donald Trump administration — claims that it "used mobile ad location data to map the movements of Thomas Matthew Crooks" ahead of his failed assassination attempt of Donald Trump, 404's Joseph Cox reports.

“We found the assassin’s connections through our in-depth analysis of mobile ad data to track movements of Crooks and his associates,” the Oversight Project, which is a part of the Heritage Foundation, tweeted Monday.

Last week, BBC reported:

Police and agencies investigating have been unable to identify a motive so far.

Officials briefed on the shooting were told he had visited the site of the attack, the Butler County fairgrounds, at least once in the days before the assassination attempt and had previously searched on his phone for symptoms of a depressive disorder.

READ MORE: US public rapidly sours on Project 2025 as awareness grows

The Oversight Project, Cox notes, "claims to have used the data to find devices that are 'linked' to Crooks—perhaps his own device or those of people he knows—and follow where they went over time."

The investigative journalist also emphasizes the Heritage Foundation proves that "access" to this kind of data "is not limited to governments, academics, or the location industry itself, but is also available to political operatives or other third parties."

Cox writes, "Once a dirty secret of the data industry, organizations are now publicly acknowledging and broadcasting their alleged use of the sensitive information, and openly admitting using it in an attempt to track down individuals."

Polling by the progressive firm Navigator published on Tuesday shows that "the recent upsurge in conversations and news coverage about" Project 2025 "since June has resulted in a greater number of Americans having negative views of" the plan, which "at least 140" of Trump's "former administration officials helped craft."

READ MORE: These 9 high-profile GOP candidates all have ties to group behind Project 2025: report

404's full report is available at this link.