Congress

How Russ Vought’s ‘trademark chaos’ is shaking up the shutdown fight

Published

9 months ago

September 26, 2025

Russ Vought careened into the escalating government shutdown fight this week, threatening mass layoffs of federal workers if Democrats don’t capitulate to President Donald Trump and fellow Republicans.

For those who know the White House budget director’s long history in Washington, it was only a matter of time.

“You could have anticipated what was coming,” Bill Hoagland, a former longtime top Senate GOP budget aide, said in an interview. “He is clever. But he has a clear intent here, which I think is to strangle the beast. And he knows how to play the game.”

With the layoffs threat Wednesday, Vought has cast himself as a main character in the shutdown standoff ahead of the Tuesday midnight funding deadline. It’s a role he is no doubt comfortable playing, having navigated dozens of spending fights as a congressional aide, think-tank operative and Trump official.

Now Vought, 49, is well positioned to further execute his long-held views on government spending if federal cash stops cold, after months of groundwork undermining bipartisan funding negotiations and upending the federal bureaucracy.

His ideological allies are already excited by what Vought might have in store at the Office of Management and Budget if the government does in fact shut down at midnight Sept. 30.

Paul Winfree, who served as Trump’s director of budget policy during his first term, called Vought’s threat a “brilliant” move.

During the last shutdown under Trump, which ended in early 2019, Vought served in an understudy role. Administration officials at the time sought to play down the impact on most Americans, Winfree noted.

“This time, Russ is putting the pain on the bureaucracy,” he said.

Democrats, meanwhile, are stewing and eager to make Vought a bogeyman of the partisan fight after sparring with him for years.

Soon after Blue Light News published the OMB memo Wednesday, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries called him a “malignant political hack.”

“We will not be intimidated by your threat to engage in mass firings,” Jeffries wrote on social media. “Get lost.”

Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who has long criticized the OMB chief as the House’s top Democratic appropriator, said in a statement Thursday that the layoffs threat was “Russ Vought’s trademark chaos.”

An OMB spokesperson did not respond to requests for comment about Vought’s approach to the potential shutdown. But what is clear from Vought’s history and his own statements is that he sees a method to the madness.

Speaking on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” podcast last week, he called the shutdown deadline “a very critical juncture” and said that Republicans have Democrats “in a very good position, where they should be with us to fund the government.”

The OMB director’s latest move fits neatly into the playbook he articulated during vetting earlier this year for Senate confirmation, after helping write the Heritage Foundation’s controversial “Project 2025” recommendations during Trump’s campaign for a second presidency.

Put simply, he thinks Congress can set a ceiling for agency funding but a president can spend less.

One first-term Trump administration official said no one familiar with the administration’s strategy was surprised by Vought’s memo to agencies this week. Shutdowns “create a natural inflection point between essential and nonessential,” said the person, who was granted anonymity to speak candidly about White House thinking.

“If the government can function with only essential employees and not inflict pain on the American people … then why would we not want that?” the former official added. “It proves the point the administration has been making from the campaign all the way to day one: That there is bloat and excess within the government.”

In the roughly 45 years Congress has been letting federal funding lapse amid partisan standoffs, OMB directors have frequently used their power to either lessen the impact of a government shutdown or maximize it, depending how the White House wanted to sway the negotiations.

Vought is now taking those powers to a new level. Threatening to terminate federal jobs during a funding lapse goes far beyond the usual discretion of a budget chief to determine “essential” and “nonessential” work during government shutdowns, further demonstrating how a motivated ideologue can torpedo norms in Congress as well as the executive branch by testing the limits of a typically bureaucratic and process-focused role.

Not every Trump ally understands the calculus, however. Another official who served in the first Trump administration, also granted anonymity to speak frankly about Vought’s moves, said it could be “just a really heavy-handed way of spooking Democrats.”

There is no obvious advantage to firing large swaths of federal workers during a government shutdown, besides applying pressure on Democrats, because the White House has already been executing those “reduction-in-force” layoffs, the former official said. And after the administration fired federal workers under the Department of Government Efficiency initiative earlier this year, the Trump administration has since rescinded many of those terminations.

“Most people I’ve talked to just assume it’s a scare tactic,” the person said. “Everyone was like: Well, why are they hiring all of these DOGE fires back, and then suddenly want to do another RIF? Why do you need a shutdown to do a RIF?”

Democrats so far are showing no sign of retreat. Rep. Glenn Ivey, who represents droves of federal workers in suburban Maryland, said in an interview Thursday that Vought is “clearly the bad cop” in the government shutdown standoff.

“We figured that out a long time ago, and also the fact that he’s not paying attention to following the law or the Constitution,” Ivey said. “So I think for Democrats on Blue Light News, we understand we’ve got to fight back. And this is the time to do it.”

Over the past eight months, Vought has been far bolder in testing the bounds of his role as budget director than he was during his initial stint leading the budget office during Trump’s first presidency, when OMB withheld aid to Ukraine in 2019, contributing to the president’s first impeachment.

He has since openly questioned the constitutionality of the federal law requiring presidents to get congressional approval before canceling federal cash — asserting that funding for programs Trump considers “woke and weaponized” can’t be spent in a way that’s consistent with the president’s agenda. Last month, he orchestrated a legally dubious move to unilaterally cancel billions of dollars in approved spending without the consent of lawmakers.

Over the summer, Vought told reporters he wants government funding negotiations on Capitol Hill to be “less bipartisan,” infuriating lawmakers of both parties who have long led those delicate talks.

“He becomes enemy No. 1 on the Democrat side,” Rep. Steve Womack (R-Ark.), a senior appropriator, said in an interview this month.

“If you’re a Democrat — even just like a mainstream Democrat — your predisposition might be to help negotiate with Republicans on a funding mechanism,” Womack said. “Why would you do that if you know that whatever you negotiate is going to be subject to the knife pulled out by Russ Vought? That’s a challenge for us.”

Meredith Lee Hill, Nicholas Wu and Sophia Cai contributed to this report.

Congress

Republicans get antsy about confirmations as the Senate hangs in the balance

Published

2 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

President Donald Trump is showing little urgency in sending nominations to the Senate even as the GOP’s control of the chamber beyond 2026 is increasingly in doubt.

There are more than two dozen federal court vacancies. Labor secretary, FDA commissioner and scores of other open positions do not have nominees, and a senior White House official said Trump is in no rush to fill them.

“Ultimately, we need to have the right people in those positions,” said the official, who was granted anonymity to describe internal thinking. “So if it’s acting for now, so be it. If [it] takes a little while to find that perfect person, then it takes a little while.”

That’s unsettling some Republican senators who are anxious to fill spots ahead of the midterms, a daunting task given the legislative calendar and host of competing GOP priorities.

“We’re running short on time,” said Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.), a member of the Senate HELP Committee, which oversees health, labor and other issues. “We’d love to get at least one or two of them and get it in the next tranche.”

As far as judges, Tuberville said he wants to see “as many as we can get” nominated, adding, “I don’t know why we don’t have more.”

Trump’s apparent nonchalance — particularly over judges — is a marked departure from his first term, when he opined that appointing people to the bench might be the “single most important thing you do” as president. But as the Senate left for a two-week recess Thursday, there were only 10 nominees pending for 29 judicial vacancies.

The vacancies come amid ongoing tensions between the Senate and Trump, who has put pressure on the chamber to pass the GOP elections bill known as the SAVE America Act, going so far as to cancel a planned Wednesday signing of a bipartisan housing bill.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), a member of the Judiciary Committee, said he “absolutely” wants to see the president nominate more judges before the end of the year. Texas has three court vacancies with zero nominees.

“And that’s one of his greatest legacies, both first term and second,” Cruz said of Trump.

Trump is on pace with his first term in total confirmations in part because Republicans changed the Senate rules last year to confirm slates of civilian posts at once by a simple majority vote.

One tranche confirmed in Mayincluded 49 nominees, from ambassadors to midlevel posts at various federal agencies. So far, 502 of Trump’s second-term nominees have been confirmed, compared to 509 at this point during his first term and 601 at the same point during former President Joe Biden’s term.

Federal judges and members of the Cabinet still have to be confirmed individually, despite the rule change for other posts.

Trump inherited only about 40 judicial vacancies for his current term, fewer than any president since Ronald Reagan. Judiciary Committee Chair Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) previously complained that the White House hasn’t nominated more judges. More recently, though, he’s blaming his committee for not acting more quickly on the already pending nominees.

“Right now it’s hard for me to blame the White House when in the last three executive weeks, we were supposed to have meetings to vote judges out, we couldn’t have enough members present,” Grassley said in an interview.

A White House official said “Trump plans to nominate well qualified individuals to fill these vacancies.”

Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) said he’s had “a couple good discussions” with the White House about a circuit court vacancy, which he expects the administration to fill. As a Judiciary Committee member, he can block any nominee that doesn’t get support from Democrats.

“If it’s somebody I support, I’ll vote for them. If it’s somebody I don’t support, I’ll vote no,” Kennedy said. “It’s an important spot. They know I’m on Judiciary, and they know I’ll vote no if I don’t agree.”

The Labor secretary and FDA commissioner picks, meanwhile, go through the HELP committee — chaired by Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.), who lost his primary last month after Trump endorsed a challenger.

Republicans have been left in the dark about those nominees, some on the panel say.

Sen. Roger Marshall (R-Kan.) said he’s heard “nothing at all” and “radio silence” from administration. Another GOP senator, granted anonymity to speak candidly, said they’ve heard nothing from the administration about its thinking or plans for a Labor secretary nominee specifically.

The HELP Committee membership poses challenges for the administration. Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) previously expressed concerns about Casey Means’ nomination as surgeon general before Trump pulled her, for example. And the dynamic between the president and the chair could be a hurdle, three people granted anonymity to comment on the process said.

“Why give Cassidy a platform to get back at DJT?” one of them said.

Another, a GOP senator, predicted Cassidy would “play games” with nominees who have to go through his committee.

“I really don’t think a lot of senators are in any mood to give the president any wins because they’re frustrated with him,” said the third person, who is close to the White House.

But confirming nominees before he leaves the Senate could be a priority for Cassidy, one of the few Republican doctors to push the administration toward public health nominees who align with established science on issues like vaccines.

A potential successor — Republican Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky — is a critic of the vaccine and masking standards set during the pandemic and would likely set the committee on a different path.

Recent appointees such as Nicole Saphier for surgeon general and Erica Schwartz for Centers for Disease Control and Prevention director are more mainstream than some past HHS appointees like Means and Dave Weldon, who was nominated for CDC director before the administration determined he didn’t have the votes.

Those nominees have been moving through the regular process, including meeting with Cassidy and other senators ahead of confirmation hearings.

Cassidy told reporters after he lost his primary that he would “vote for the good of my country and the good of my state.”

“There’s some nominees that have not gotten through committee for whatever reason, so that’s not anything new,” he added. “That’ll just be part of the process.”

A HELP Committee spokesperson added Thursday that Cassidy has voted for every Trump nominee and that the panel will “do its job to confirm qualified nominees and serve the American people.”

“Anyone who says otherwise doesn’t know what they’re talking about,” the spokesperson added.

The White House official said “Trump remains committed to nominating highly qualified individuals for a variety of posts that are aligned with the agenda the American people elected him to enact” and will continue to send nominees to the Senate, including to the HELP Committee.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview he had not spoken to the White House about their plans for some of the major picks under HELP jurisdiction but he encouraged the administration to send nominees.

“I think it’s always better to have people in permanent positions rather than temporary,” Thune added.

Megan Messerly contributed to this report.

Congress

Rick Scott says he’s just trying to help

Published

2 hours ago

June 29, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

Rick Scott swears he’s not up to something.

Fresh speculation about the Florida Republican’s ambitions erupted again in recent days after he invited President Donald Trump to address the Senate at an especially sensitive moment — and without Majority Leader John Thune’s express approval. Then, he circulated a letter outlining how he thought the Senate GOP should be preparing for the November midterms.

But Scott insists those who see this as a prelude to a leadership challenge have it all wrong. Sitting in his Senate office less than 24 hours after hosting Trump, he told Blue Light News he’s perfectly happy running the conference’s conservative Steering Committee and predicted Thune would easily secure another term as leader.

“There won’t be a vote,” he said, adding that he’s “fine” with Thune continuing in the position.

“Here’s what I don’t get,” Scott continued, expressing exasperation with the palace intrigue. “Other people get to put out their position. If I put out mine, then I want to be leader?”

What has become eminently clear in recent weeks is that Scott — after a long career in business, two terms as governor and nearly eight years as senator — just isn’t a back-bench kind of guy.

He has lots of thoughts on how the Senate should be run and a willingness to express them, even if it puts him at odds with Thune’s vision. The leader, who trounced Scott in a 2024 conference election, has largely avoided holding doomed votes that would split Republicans and, like many GOP senators, would like nothing more than to get past the monthslong intraparty fight over the SAVE America Act, the elections bill pushed by Trump.

“One thing we can do up here is, we can take votes,” Scott said. “Even if they’re not going to pass, we each show people where we are versus the other side. And so, one thing that surprises me is, why don’t we take votes? … Let’s show people.”

Scott hosts a regular Wednesday lunch for senators and invited Trump in that capacity.

Scott’s incarnation as a conservative thought leader is only his latest attempt to stay in the thick of the action in a body where obscurity can be hard to avoid. His stint running the GOP Senate campaign arm ahead of the 2022 midterms was controversial and ended with Democrats beating historical headwinds and slightly expanding their bare majority.

He annoyed colleagues with his policy of not intervening in contested Republican primaries and infuriated some of them by promulgating a policy agenda through his personal political operation that they hadn’t agreed to.

That did not deter Scott from challenging then-Minority Leader Mitch McConnell after the election that year, garnering only 10 votes of 47. He tried again after McConnell stepped down as leader two years later. Scott won 13 votes in a three-way race, but Thune ultimately prevailed.

Thune, unlike McConnell, doesn’t have an openly antagonistic relationship with Scott. He said in an interview that the Florida Republican has done a “great job” as Steering chair. It is in that role that Scott convenes the weekly Wednesday senators’ lunch and invited Trump to attend.

“He brings people in that help inform our conversations and discussions about some of the major policy issues,” Thune said. “I’m very supportive of what he’s doing.”

One Senate Republican who was granted anonymity to speak candidly said that Scott had earned “street cred” within the conference for how he’s run the Steering Committee. He has brought in Trump, Elon Musk and White House chief of staff Susie Wiles, among others, underscoring his connections with key luminaries in the contemporary GOP.

For now, the Steering position and his close ally’s return to the White House have given him renewed influence and a base of support outside of leadership, where multiple Republicans are viewed as potential contenders to succeed Thune if he decides to retire in 2028 or beyond.

Scott isn’t up for reelection until 2030, and he did not guarantee in the interview that he would stick around the Senate indefinitely.

“I’ve done this. I’ve tried different stuff,” he said. “So we’ll see.”

He had been the subject of past speculation about a presidential run but made clear in the interview he’s not interested in a Cabinet position because “I was 25 years old the last time I worked for somebody.” His future, he said, will revolve around the question, “Am I being productive?”

The GOP senator granted anonymity said he doesn’t think Scott will run for leader again in November but acknowledged that Scott is viewed as ambitious and that there’s “not a lot of ways to go up” in the Senate absent running for leader or president.

“Rick, appropriately, properly feels he’s got more to contribute,” the senator added. “I hope he feels a certain sense of satisfaction about his leadership on the Steering Committee because he really has made it great.”

Elon Musk was another of Scott's prominent lunch guests.

For now, Scott’s sense of productivity has certainly been boosted by his dealings with and loyalty to Trump.

“President Trump works great with Senator Scott and has appreciated his efforts to advance the President’s America First agenda in the Senate — including urging a path forward for the SAVE America Act,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said in a statement.

A person familiar with the administration’s thinking, granted anonymity to speak candidly, attested to Scott’s “deep relationships” across the administration, pointing to Wiles and Secretary of State Marco Rubio in addition to the president himself.

“Trump remembers the people who were with him” between his two presidential terms, the person said, adding that Trump “also respects ‘successful’ people and Rick may be the most successful business person in the Senate.”

Last week’s lunch invitation grew out of a conversation between Trump and Scott, though the meeting did not go as Scott had planned. Notes from Scott’s introduction obtained by Blue Light News show he wanted to spark a policy-driven conversation focused on three issues: the future of the Senate filibuster, passage of the SAVE America Act and preventing another government shutdown.

Instead, Trump came into the closed-door meeting “pissed” over a symbolic vote the previous day on the Iran war, Scott said, and quickly got into a back-and-forth with retiring Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) on that issue. Trump proceeded to mostly air his grievances at senators rather than engage in any productive back-and-forth, attendees said.

Still, Scott said, “something positive” came out of the meeting because hours later Republicans defeated a different Iran war powers resolution. And he predicted there would be a “renewed emphasis” on the GOP elections bill that Trump views as his No. 1 priority.

He pointed to three potential paths forward for the SAVE America Act: attempting a “talking filibuster” that would force Democrats to hold the floor in order to block the bill, breaking the voting bill up into pieces or trying to include it in a party-line budget reconciliation bill, which would require precedent-breaking moves many GOP senators oppose.

Only the talking filibuster option, Scott believes, has a possible chance of success, and he urged Thune and his other colleagues to consider it.

“I think the right way is, let’s put it on the floor,” he said. “Maybe we should take all of August and do it. It is the most important thing to Americans, and it actually is important.”

Many of his colleagues don’t share his optimism, and it could be difficult to get enough senators interested in voting to even restart debate on the bill given the high level of frustration within the conference.

Asked about that frustration, Scott cut in: “[Then] don’t do it. Hey, I’m just saying, here’s how I look at life — I’m one senator.”

Alex Gangitano contributed to this report.

Congress

Johnson says he will send housing bill to Trump on Monday

Published

19 hours ago

June 28, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

House Speaker Mike Johsnon said he plans to send President Donald Trump a bipartisan housing bill Monday, just days after the president abruptly canceled a signing ceremony for the legislation after Congress failed to pass his elections security act.

Speaking with Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures,” Johnson said the 21st Century ROAD To Housing Act is a Republican priority for lowering costs for Americans.

“I’m going to send the bill over to him on Monday, and it will become law,” the Louisiana Republican told host Maria Bartiromo. “I certainly want him to take the biggest, boldest marker that he has and do that big Trump signature proudly on that legislation because we’re delivering for the people, and that’s what he wants to do.”

The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Johnson’s remarks.

The bill is the product of almost a year of back-and-forth between all four congressional corners and aims to increase affordability by boosting housing supply and home ownership. It passed both chambers of Congress with wide bipartisan support.

Trump was scheduled to sign the bill into law last week but canceled the ceremony “until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency.”

Trump’s SAVE America Act would require voters to present a photo ID at the ballot box and effectively end mail-in voting. Trump has also said he would like the bill to include prohibitions on transgender athletes competing. But Republican leaders have repeatedly indicated the legislation does not have enough votes to pass.

Congressional leaders appeared taken aback by Trump’s signing cancellation, but Johnson on Sunday said he and the president have since met in the Oval Office to discuss the housing bill “in great detail.”

“We made a lot of promises to the voters, and we’re fulfilling those every single day of this Congress,” Johnson said. “This is a big part of that because this will increase the availability, the access to more housing, bring down cost, cut regulations, do the things we know are very important for that market. The president and I talked about that at length. Of course he wants to do those things.”

But if Trump does not sign the housing bill into law within the next few days, it would still become law unless he were to veto it. Congress also has the power to override a presidential veto.