Donald Trump announces that Russell “Russ” Vought will return as the director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) if confirmed by the Senate.
The Office of Management and Budget significantly influences the executive branch’s agenda, including developing the president’s budget request.
In the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025 policy book, Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise, Vought describes the OMB as the “air-traffic control system” that directs which Trump policies move forward and which policies need to be grounded.
Earlier this year, Vought was secretly recorded discussing how Project 2025’s anti-democratic plans will be incorporated on Day One and his view for a second Trump term, including:
- Reshaping the Justice Dept. and the FBI as arms of the Trump White House
- Using the military to end First Amendment rights and fulfill Trump / the GOP’s most violent fantasies
- New restrictions on pornography and immigration
- Turning government offices into Project 2025 / MAGA “shadow” agencies
- Replacing support for “religious liberty” with support for “Christian nation-ism” (nationalism)
Vought also claimed his organization, the Center for Renewing America, was drafting “hundreds of executive orders, regulations, and memos” for Trump’s second term.
Vought was confirmed by the Senate for the same position by a vote of 51-to-45 in 2020. After Trump’s loss, he initiated a plan to remove up to 88% of the office’s 500+ staff.
His wife, Mary Vought, is the Heritage Foundation’s Vice President of Strategic Communications. She is also believed to be a member of the Council for National Policy.
