No, Starbucks is not backing Project 2025 and The Heritage Foundation

Recent social media posts suggest people should boycott Starbucks because they claim the company is backing The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, and its Project 2025 initiative.

Project 2025’s goal is to provide a roadmap for the next conservative president to transform the government in favor of conservative social policies and ideals. 

Some online posts also claim Starbucks joined The Heritage Foundation as an official sponsor of the 2024 Republican National Convention, which was held in Milwaukee in mid-July.

Multiple VERIFY readers emailed and texted us to ask if the claims about Starbucks’ support for The Heritage Foundation and Project 2025 are true. 

THE QUESTION

Is Starbucks backing Project 2025 and The Heritage Foundation?

THE SOURCES

• Starbucks spokespersons
• Noah Weinrich, director of media and public relations for The Heritage Foundation
• Milwaukee Host Committee website
• Federal Election Commission (FEC)

THE ANSWER

No, Starbucks is not backing Project 2025 and The Heritage Foundation.

WHAT WE FOUND

Starbucks is not backing Project 2025 and The Heritage Foundation. The false claims stem from Starbucks’ efforts to give coffee to first responders at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee through a partnership with a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization. 

A Starbucks spokesperson told VERIFY the company is not affiliated with The Heritage Foundation or Project 2025. Noah Weinrich, a spokesperson for The Heritage Foundation, also said the claims are “purely misinformation.”

Weinrich said he believes the false claims stem from both The Heritage Foundation and Starbucks partnering with the Milwaukee Host Committee for the Republican National Convention (RNC).

But Starbucks did not provide a cash sponsorship of any kind, according to company spokesperson Jaci Anderson. Instead, Starbucks provided “in-kind support” to the host committee by giving coffee to first responders during the RNC, Anderson said.

“That’s not the same thing as directly sponsoring the RNC and certainly different from sponsoring Project 2025,” Weinrich added.

The Milwaukee Host Committee is separate from the Republican National Committee, which is the partisan organization that directs and operates the Republican National Convention.

The host committee is a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that serves as a liaison between the Republican National Committee, the city of Milwaukee and the state of Wisconsin. On its website, the committee says it was responsible for securing venues and working with local leaders to ensure the convention had what it needed to succeed in Milwaukee.

The Federal Election Commission (FEC) says a host committee’s primary purpose is to encourage “commerce in the convention city and the projection of a favorable image of the city to convention attendees.” 

A convention committee, on the other hand, “represents a political party in making arrangements for that party’s convention to nominate a candidate for office of President and Vice President,” the FEC says. 

According to Anderson, Starbucks has a similar partnership planned with the host committee for the Democratic National Convention in Chicago in August. 

“Our support of first responders and volunteers at the conventions is an extension of our ongoing commitment to the communities where we operate – which includes Milwaukee and Chicago,” Anderson said.