AMERICA FIRST, ALWAYS
The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) is a 501(c)(3) non-profit, non-partisan research institute. AFPI exists to conduct research and develop policies that put the American people first. Our guiding principles are liberty, free enterprise, national greatness, American military superiority, foreign-policy engagement in the American interest, and the primacy of American workers, families, and communities in all we do.
THE AMERICA FIRST PRIORITIES
America First Policy Institute is pursuing a robust policy agenda that puts America First and its people first. These policies are broken down into five thematic pillars subdivided into specific policy centers, which drive towards the mission of putting the American people first.
American First Institute Website
JOBS FIRST
Center for American Prosperity
The strength of a nation rests first in the hearts of its people — but a free and flourishing economy is a necessity for any nation to build and prosper. The America First Policy Institute conducts research and develops policies to promote economic strength. Sound economic policies from 2017 to 2020 delivered extraordinary prosperity including unprecedented growth and the lowest-ever unemployment levels for American communities who needed it the most. Economic strength is not something we pursue for the sake of big finance and big business: it matters only to the extent Americans experience it in their communities and in their homes. We measure our economy not by its promotion of big returns, but by its creation of big dreams.
Center for the American Worker
The spirit of the American worker is the very foundation of our nation. There is no force more potent — when left to be free, to prosper, and to flourish. From 2017 to 2020, the American workforce experienced one of the greatest and most robust economies in U.S. history. In this period, the skills-gap crisis and seismic shift in work challenged the “college or bust” mentality which propelled policymakers to promote a full range of career and education opportunities and to prepare our workforce for the changing nature of work. The American First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies to promote a full range of career opportunities and prepare our workforce for the industries of the future. As we work to rebuild our economy and recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, the AFPI is prioritizing our Nation’s most critical asset, the American worker. AFPI will help restore American workers to their proper place, which is at the center of governance and policy alike. The class of Americans who made our Republic the greatest Nation on Earth deserves to be heard, valued — and in charge.
Center for Fair Trade
For years, the D.C. and global corporate elites, in the name of free trade orthodoxy, allowed markets and market efficiencies to be an overwhelming influence on policy decisions. Nowhere was that more evident than in the realm of international trade relations, where the United States repeatedly entered into deals that protected and promoted the interests of foreign workers, foreign agriculture, and foreign businesses — but not our own. American workers and American communities were ground beneath the inescapable “progress” that transformed the likes of Shenzhen and Reynosa into productive powerhouses — while the likes of Detroit, Cleveland, Milwaukee, and Pittsburgh — America’s industrial backbone — slid into decline. Free trade is an intrinsic good, but only if it is also fair trade, and the America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies that champion free and fair trade.
American First Institute Website
OPPORTUNITY FIRST
Center for a Healthy America
The United States healthcare system has the world’s best medical innovation, specialty care, and scientific discovery, yet our fractured healthcare system does not serve Americans to its fullest potential. With rising consumer costs and diminished consumer control over the past half century, healthcare affordability and access have become top concerns of Americans. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) is identifying innovative policies to put healthcare back into the hands of the American people — stripping power away from the nexus of big insurance and big government that invade the doctor-patient relationship and bankrupt households. AFPI will research and develop policies that put the patient and doctor in control, dignify life, promote better health and health outcomes, improve access to high-quality care, and lower healthcare costs. As a result of these efforts, Americans will become healthier and able to fully embrace life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Center for Education Opportunity
For American families and students today, education provides a pathway to the realization of their aspirations, and a realization of their dignity. Right now, public education achieves neither end. The key to a better education system, one that serves both America and Americans, is researching and developing policies that puts American families first, including choice. That’s exactly what the America First Policy Institute (AFPI) is here to achieve. AFPI will formulate educational policies that provide educational opportunity for all American families. This means putting parents and students — not bureaucracies, unions, or politicians — in charge of the education of America’s next generation. AFPI aims to restore our system of public education to its original, legitimate purpose: educating and raising the next generation of Americans, facilitating their dreams — and our prosperity.
Center for Second Chances
The American system of justice exists to safeguard our rights, and in doing so, create and sustain secure communities where Americans can live and their dreams can flourish. Too often, the justice system fails at both outcomes. A justice system gripped by metrics of performance divorced from public safety and the public good delivers outcomes ranging from unsafe communities, and rising crime rates to incarceration without clear purpose and beyond. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) works to change all that. AFPI will envision a system of American justice returned to its first principles — and to its best purpose. AFPI will research and develop policies to improve community safety, offender restoration, and respect for law enforcement. Americans deserve communities and neighborhoods where they can pursue the American Dream in security and opportunity, unbounded by fear.
Center for Opportunity Now
Sound policies brought about the greatest economy for America’s most underserved communities with record low unemployment and skyrocketing wages for the most distressed Americans. Solutions such as low taxes, reasonable regulation, and worker prioritization worked for all Americans — and the results speak for themselves. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will always strive for greater access to capital, food security, and clean drinking water while supporting entrepreneurship, capital inflow to opportunity zones, and family unification. AFPI is determined to lift up our forgotten men, women, and children and to ensure they are forgotten no more.
Center for the American Child
Americans must provide the next generation with the resources and understanding necessary for their own journey as citizens. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies to promote the social, emotional, and physical health of children. From improving our Nation’s foster care system to addressing neonatal abstinence syndrome, to incorporating character education and social emotional learning, AFPI will not fail our next generation and will provide a guiding light for a brighter future!
American First Institute Website
SECURITY FIRST
Center for Homeland Security and Immigration
Our Nation’s unique heritage is a source of pride for all Americans, and our diversity of backgrounds is a major source of our national strength and greatness. From efforts to dissuade social integration of immigrants, to narratives proclaiming American iniquity, to abuse of our asylum system, we are witnessing an unprecedented assault on what has made our Nation great. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) conducts research and develops policies to secure our borders, modernize our outdated ports of entry, and advance merit-based policies — first and foremost in the American interest.
Center for American Security
The twin American victories in the Second World War and the Cold War established our country as “the last, best hope for man on earth.” Freedom’s cause in every part of the globe depends upon a strong America. With our country secure, we can, with greater confidence, advance American security abroad. American security is exemplified by a strong military, fair trade deals, alliances that are equitable, aggressors who are isolated, and those who harm us, destroyed. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) examines American security abroad as a prerequisite for peace at home: always putting American interests first. This includes removing ourselves from endless, unnecessary wars in order to rebuild the homeland, while also understanding our indispensable role in maintaining a world at peace.
Center for China Policy
For decades, D.C. insiders and Wall Street elites perpetuated the lie that American engagement with Communist China would cause that nation to open, to liberalize, and to reform. Even as evidence accumulated to the contrary, some benefitting from this deception continued to profit off of China at the expense of America’s stature and America’s workers. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) researches and develops policies that study how decades of America’s accommodation of Communist China has nurtured an existential rival to our Nation and our livelihood as we know it.
Center for Election Integrity
The foundation of the American system of self-governance is liberty — and the core expression of the people’s liberty is the ability to vote in free and fair elections. Safeguarding the integrity of our elections is paramount to preserve our republic. Attempts by the federal government to impose a one-size-fits-all scheme for elections undermine our core principles of self-governance and federalism. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will conduct research and develop policies in the field of election integrity as it undergoes profound changes including technology, mobility and social media.
American First Institute Website
FREEDOM FIRST
Center for American Freedom
The American republic was founded as a government by, for, and of the people — but sadly that aspiration too often seems like a distant dream. Policymakers empower unelected bureaucracies that rule huge swaths of American life. What began two-and-a-half centuries ago as man’s greatest experiment in self-governance looks now like rule by authoritarian regime. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will conduct research and generate policies that cut the red tape of burdensome regulations and restore American governance as originally intended.
Center for 1776
America’s Founding Fathers recognized that “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights …” Sadly today, academic elites and demagogues challenge this self-evident proposition, choosing instead to embrace identity politics, division, and submission. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will work to affirm and celebrate America — not as an aesthetic act, but as a moral statement. Our work aims to promulgate American values in our educational institutions and through our Nation’s citizens — not as a look back at the past, but as the foundation of our future.
Center for American Values
The core of American government is, as the Declaration of Independence states, “to secure these rights” — namely, “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Today, a dizzying array of ideas and influences threaten these inalienable rights and our system of government. The forms they take are myriad. The American First Policy Institute’s (AFPI) Center for American Values will research and develop policies that respect life, uphold God-given liberties, preserve freedom of expression, and restore basic humanity.
Center for Law & Justice
The rule of law is indispensable to our Nation. However, it is impossible for our Nation’s citizens to be secure if crime plagues our streets and lawlessness dominates our communities. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies that support the American people’s right to live and prosper in free and secure communities. Respect for legitimate law enforcement, reverence for the law, and smart-on-crime reforms are essential to American life and liberty.
Center for Media Accountability
The American Founders recognized that a free press was essential to the preservation of our liberties, and therefore our Republic. Even the Founding Founders had a complicated relationship with the press, however, a backbone of our nation rests on freedom of speech. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will explore the effects media imbalances and current practices have on the American people and our system of government.
American First Institute Website
INNOVATION FIRST
Center for Energy Independence
American ingenuity and entrepreneurialism have transformed American energy in the past decade. Our country has moved from a position of chronic energy dependency to true energy independence. The American energy sector has achieved a generational strategic goal: making the oil-producing tyrannies and autocracies, from Russia to Saudi Arabia, Venezuela to Iran and beyond, effectively irrelevant. Our American energy sector has achieved something else as well: in providing abundant and affordable energy to American homes and communities, it has opened up new vistas of American dreams and opportunities. That’s freedom. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies to support energy freedom.
Center for The Environment
Conservation signifies care for the natural environment in a fashion that prioritizes its use for the good of all men and women. Environmentalism, in the conservationist sense puts Americans and their prosperity front and center in the study and formulation of environmental policy. The United States enjoys the cleanest air and water in the world. Our Nation’s clean environment is a direct testament to what’s possible when American innovation and ingenuity are allowed to flourish. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research, develop, and educate about policies that benefit both the environment and the well-being of the American people.
Center for New Frontiers
America was not founded to restore an imagined past, but to move its people into a bright and brilliant future. In this first half of the twenty-first century, the United States stands on the precipice of an array of extraordinary possibilities. Dreams from our yesterdays — interplanetary travel, autonomous vehicles, subterranean transit systems, artificial intelligence, 3D printing, organ regeneration, extraordinary new power sources, and beyond — are poised to enter our tomorrows. The America First Policy Institute (AFPI) will research and develop policies that nurture America’s experimental spirit.
American First Institute Website
