الاندماجية - الترامبية - الشرعية – الجمعية الفيدرالية - مشروع كلمات مفتاحية: 2025 Abstract The American conservative movement has undergone profound transformations in recent decades, raising renewed questions about continuity and rupture within the American Right. This study examines the transition from classical Fusionism, associated with the efforts of William F. Buckley Jr. and Frank S. Meyer since the 1950s, to Trumpism as the most influential phenomenon in contemporary American conservatism. It argues that Trumpism represents neither a complete rupture nor a direct continuation of the fusionist tradition, but rather a selective recombination of some of its elements within a new institutional and political context. The analysis focuses on the role of the Heritage Foundation and the Federalist Society in redefining legitimacy criteria within the conservative movement, shifting them from Respectability Politics and intellectual discipline toward institutional loyalty and the effective pursuit of political and judicial gains. It further traces the transition from Buckley’s strategy of Gatekeeping to the post-2016 alliance between legal conservative elites and Donald Trump, showing how accumulated Credibility Capital was converted into direct political influence. The study identifies a central paradox: the judicial and institutional gains achieved by the New Fusionism—including the reshaping of the federal judiciary and the emergence of Project 2025—have coincided with the erosion of some of the symbolic foundations of conservative legitimacy and the weakening of boundaries separating institutional conservatism from populist and radical currents. Keywords: Fusionism – Trumpism – Legitimacy - Federalist Society - Project 2025.
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