Budget ‘grim reaper’ eyes big cuts amid shutdown

Russell Vought, the right-wing ideologue who heads the Office of Management and Budget, is using the US government shutdown to deliver his brand of shock therapy to American bureaucracy. He is perhaps the most powerful man in Washington at the moment, after Donald Trump.

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Shutdowns usually result in hundreds of thousands of federal workers being placed on temporary unpaid leave. But this time, the White House has said mass firings are “imminent.”

Mr Trump has tapped Mr Vought to tell him “which of the many Democrat Agencies... he recommends to be cut.”

He even posted on his Truth Social platform an Al-generated video depicting the budget chief as the grim reaper walking through Washington, scythe in hand.

Mr Vought is following a far right governance blueprint, Project 2025, which he helped author.