Who’s the most dangerous man in Washington?

Update from The New York Times: Employees of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau were instructed to cease “all supervision and examination activity” and “all stakeholder engagement,” effectively stopping the agency’s operations, in an email from the director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russell Vought, on Saturday evening.

Who’s the most dangerous man in Washington? Maybe it’s Trump. Maybe it’s Musk. But certainly Russ Vought, the new director of the Office of Management and Budget, is everything you’d want in a saboteur of American democracy. He believes in a “post-Constitutional presidency” where Trump, and not Congress, has the power of the purse. He believes the president is above the law and empowered to do exactly what Musk is trying to do in Washington right now — make random, draconian cuts to the federal workforce and federal funding that Congress has authorized. Checks and balances? Forget it. If Vought gets his way, that principle of American democracy goes away, and Trump will be able to cut off any funding for any reason.

Vought believes the 2020 election was “rigged” for Joe Biden’s victory over Trump. He is a Christian nationalist who called Trump’s candidacy a “gift from God.” Vought believes in a “commitment to an institutional separation between church and state, but not the separation of Christianity from its influence on government and society.” 

Of course, that’s a brand of Christianity that insults most Christians and cuts off U.S. aid to the poorest people in the world.

ProPublica reported that, in private speeches delivered in 2023 and 2024, Vought said he is willing to deploy the military in response to domestic unrest, defund the Environmental Protection Agency and “traumatize” career civil servants.

Funding for Ukraine’s existential war against the invading Russians will be in jeopardy with Vought as OMB director — even though Congress already has approved military aid.

Vought was a major force in the Project 2025 agenda and, as a Washington insider, you can bet that he’s totally behind Musk’s assault on the federal government and federal funding for everything from local fire departments to medical research projects.

Democrats tried to stop Vought’s confirmation.

Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland, who represents thousands of federal employees, issued warnings about what Vought would bring to the OMB.

Sen. Chris Van Hollen of Maryland called Vought’s nomination “unconscionable” given his refusal to say whether he would advise Trump to impound Congressionally-appropriated funds “in clear violation of Article II of the Constitution and the unambiguous text of the Impoundment Control Act of 1974.”

None of this made any difference to spineless Senate Republicans, all of whom voted to confirm Vought as OMB director. It was a party line vote, 53-47, to unleash this Trump zealot, and now we see the consequence.

The end game? Reduce the federal role in American life, drastically reduce regulation of business and industry, demoralize the federal workforce, discourage public service, and make possible more tax reductions for the wealthiest Americans and corporations. 

Resist Trump II: Organizing Indivisible Baltimore at Ovenbird Bakery Feb. 9 and 16