The U.S. Senate has finally confirmed President Donald J. Trump’s nomination of Russell Vought as director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). Vought previously served as OMB deputy director and later director during the America First leader’s first term in office.
Democrats threw up some of their fiercest opposition to Vought, using several procedural moves in the Senate to delay his nomination in the hopes of derailing it. Vought is seen as not only one of Trump’s staunchest allies but also one of his most aggressive and effective lieutenants, charged with dismantling the “Deep State.” An architect of the Heritage Foundation’s Project 2025, the new OMB director has a long history in Washington, D.C., policy circles, where he has a reputation as both an effective and fiercely conservative policymaker.
In one of the more bizarre moments in recent years, Vought holds a strange footnote in the documentation of Cassidy Hutchinson’s lies both before the January 6 Select Committee and in a book she authored. In her book, she recalls an incident where she claims former Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows unwittingly drank alcohol. In her recollection, Hutchinson says that White House Office of Management and Budget director Russ Vought was also present, identifying him as a “faithful Mormon.” The only issue is that Vought isn’t Mormon and has said so publicly.
Another incident during the 2024 presidential campaign saw Vought and several other Project 2025 figures clandestinely filmed by a United Kingdom-based far-left climate change activist group. Despite selective editing to attempt to scaremonger with the video, Vought articulately described how President Trump can use executive branch authorities to deport illegal immigrants and defund Planned Parenthood—both things Trump pledged to do on the campaign trail.
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