Heritage Foundation President Kevin Roberts announced staff reassignments on Friday in the wake of the conservative uproar over his statement defending Tucker Carlson for interviewing white nationalist Nick Fuentes.
Roberts tapped the think tank’s executive vice president Derrick Morgan to serve as acting chief of staff until the end of the year. Ryan Neuhaus, who was serving in the role, was moved to be a senior adviser.
He made the announcement in an email to staff late Friday with the subject line: “Heritage’s Stand Against Antisemitism and for Civilizational Truth.”
The email, obtained by The Hill, opened by saying the thank tank had “launched and expanded numerous explicit efforts to combat antisemitism” under his leadership.
“Our position on Israel is principled and balanced: there’s a great deal of space between believing Israel can do no wrong and blaming it for every wrong,” the Heritage chief wrote.
Roberts went on to say that the organization is “also standing firm against cancel culture,” but that “rejecting cancel culture does not mean tolerating evil.”
He added, “At Heritage, we understand the moment we are in. This is a time for moral courage and conviction. We will continue to lead—not by silencing dissent, but by confronting and defeating bad ideas with Truth.”
The think tank president said the changes were made to “ensure we meet this moment with focus and excellence.”
“Ryan remains a vital part of our team and is joining the Simon Center as a Senior Advisor to work on critical issues, including housing, he wrote. “Ryan’s energy and acumen will be a great benefit to our efforts to preserve the intellectual and moral underpinnings of our nation’s Founding. I know he will flourish in this new role.”
Neuhaus had joined Heritage to become chief of staff in January 2025, after serving as legislative director for Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah.). He had reposted a number of messages in support for Roberts’ statement on social media, including one particularly controversial statement that Heritage employees who were “virtual signaling” in wake of the statement should “resign if so outraged,” and that it “would be addition by subtraction for the institution.”
Heritage’s B. Kenneth Simon Center for American Studies, where he was reassigned, is “dedicated to preserving the intellectual and moral underpinnings of our nation’s Founding.”
Morgan, in his role as executive vice president, oversees the policy, communications, and government relations functions. He had previously been chief of staff to Heritage’s founder and president, Ed Feulner, who died earlier this year.
“This structure ensures we close the year strong — united and disciplined,” Roberts wrote in the email to staff. “This change also reflects that we, as a team, must continue to integrate, adapt, and move faster and deliver on Heritage 2.0.”
Conservative magazine National Review reported on Roberts’ email announcement to staff earlier Saturday.
Roberts, who has made the leading conservative think tank more aligned with the MAGA base, posted a video statement on Thursday asserting that a “venomous coalition attacking” Carlson over the interview with Fuentes was “sowing division” and that the “attempt to cancel him will fail.” But he also argued that “canceling” Fuentes “is not the answer.”
That led to massive backlash from Heritage’s allies in the conservative movement, from Republican officials, and even within Heritage itself — with one staffer telling The Hill that Fuentes “is not someone with ideas worthy of debate.”
In response to the criticism, Roberts elaborated Friday on what he abhors about Fuentes’s views in another statement: “He is fomenting Jew hatred, and his incitements are not only immoral and un-Christian, they risk violence.”
The conservative civil war over antisemitism, criticism of Israel and who is worthy of debate has also appeared to spark public statements on antisemitism from members of Heritage’s own board of trustees.
Trustee Robert P. George, professor of Jurisprudence and director of the James Madison Program in American Ideals and Institutions at Princeton University, wrote Saturday in a post on social platform X that “the conservative movement, though it can and should be a broad tent, simply cannot include or accommodate white supremacists or racists of any type, antisemites, eugenicists, or others whose ideologies are incompatible with belief in the inherent and equal dignity of all.”
“I will not — I cannot — accept the idea that we have ‘no enemies to the right,’” George continued. “The white supremacists, the antisemites, the eugenicists, the bigots, must not be welcomed into our movement or treated as normal or acceptable.”
Roberts said in his initial video statement defending Carlson that “the American people expect us to be focusing on our political adversaries on the left, not attacking our friends on the right.”
Heritage board trustee John Coleman, co-CEO at Sovereign’s Capital, also responded in a in a post online Saturday.
“You cannot be a faithful Christian and anti-Semitic (or racist, more generally),” he wrote. “Anti-Semitism is a rejection, on multiple fronts, of core elements of the Christian faith.”
