WASHINGTON — The Trump administration may have hired teenagers earlier this year in a misguided effort to make the federal government more efficient, but it’s 49-year-old Russ Vought who might really have a chance to fulfill his adolescent dreams.
That’s according to Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah), who said this week that Vought, the director of the Office of Management of Budget, is relishing the government shutdown that started Wednesday.
“Russ Vought, the OMB director, has been dreaming about this moment, preparing this moment, since puberty,” Lee told Fox News.
In the lead-up to the shutdown that began Wednesday, conservative Republicans and Trump administration officials have been portraying Vought as an unstoppable boogeyman who is ready to slash government relentlessly if the shutdown gives him a chance. But it’s far from clear if the GOP has the political will to actually enact the cuts they’re threatening in order to gain leverage in shutdown negotiations.
The Trump administration’s first round of cuts to the government earlier this year, led by billionaire Elon Musk, ended when the political backlash — seen at rowdy town hall meetings with Republican members and in an embarrassing defeat for Musk in one of the nation’s premier swing states — became too great. With public opinion surveys already showing voters blaming Trump and the GOP for the shutdown, letting Vought go wild could easily blow up in the GOP’s face.
