Americans are giving President Joe Biden harsh reviews before he leaves office in less than two weeks, on Jan. 20. And worse than that, they appear to be judging him even more harshly than his two most recent predecessors, Donald Trump and Barack Obama.
According to a survey released on Friday by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, just one-quarter of U.S. adults (25%) said that Biden was a “good” or “great” president, compared with Trump, whom 36% of U.S. adults gave the same ranking after his first term in office ended, in 2021. (Notably, though, Trump had slightly higher “poor” and “terrible” ratings than Biden.)
Even more remarkable is that the survey about Trump was conducted shortly after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. And this is backed up by other polling as well. For instance, between Jan. 7-20, 2021, Trump’s approval ratings dropped from 42% to 39%, according to 538’s average. But at present, Biden’s job approval ratings sit at about 37%, according to 538’s average.
The result of this past November’s election, where Trump got very close to earning a majority of the popular vote, showed that voters preferred a return to Trump versus a continuation of Democratic rule, perhaps especially one tied to Biden. But now we have even more verification of the degree to which voters, after seeing both men govern, simply (if slightly) prefer Trump to Biden.
According to a national tracking poll by Civiqs, just 38% of registered voters have a favorable view of Biden. In fact, he has been below 40% since Nov. 10, making the odds of a rebound ahead of Trump’s inauguration pretty slim. Meanwhile, 45% of voters have a favorable view of Trump, according to Civiqs, and his favorability has been steadily increasing since about February 2023.
The issue? Polling suggests voters either don’t know this or believe Biden was insufficient in other ways. The AP-NORC survey found that only 2 in 10 Americans (22%) think Biden made good on his campaign promises. A larger share, 38%, said that Biden did not keep his word. The remaining 39% said he tried but failed to keep his campaign promises.
Biden is also faring considerably worse than Obama was at the end of his presidency. AP-NORC found that Obama left his second term in office with a majority of Americans (52%) describing his tenure as “good” or “great.” This squares with data released earlier this week by Gallup, which found Biden’s standing is similar to that of former President Richard Nixon, who resigned amid the infamous Watergate scandal. (Unlike the AP-NORC survey, Gallup’s involved a retrospective assessment of past presidents, not a contemporaneous one.)
Former President Barack Obama
As other politicos have pointed out, Trump seems to be enjoying a honeymoon period since his win in November. It’s possible, of course, that four years of Biden caused the electorate to reassess Trump, who once had dismal approval and favorability ratings too.
The good news for Biden, if there is any, is that Americans’ negative views toward him may change over time. After all, Gallup found that other presidents who left with low approval ratings—including George W. Bush and Jimmy Carter—saw Americans’ perception of their presidencies warm with time.
Plus, knowing Trump, he’ll surely squander his goodwill with the American electorate in due time. Every honeymoon must come to an end, including Trump’s. And with the high number of unpopular campaign pledges he’s made, he’s likely to only accelerate that timeline.
Donald Trump's co-president, Elon Musk, admitted on Wednesday that he probably can't cut $2 trillion from the federal budget as he had promised, running into the political reality everyone told him existed but that he refused to accept because he’s a billionaire who thinks he knows better than everyone else.
"I think if we try for $2 trillion, we’ve got a good shot at getting $1 [trillion],” Musk said in the interview, which aired on Musk's disinformation platform X. “And if we can drop the budget deficit from $2 trillion to $1 trillion and free up the economy to have additional growth, such that the output of goods and services keeps pace with the increase in the money supply, then there will be no inflation. So that, I think, would be an epic outcome.”
When asked what specific things he'd cut, Musk offered nothing concrete.
“It’s a very target-rich environment for saving money. … It’s like being in a room full of targets—you could close your eyes and you can’t miss,” Musk said, a metaphor so stupid he almost sounds like his buddy Trump.
Experts always said Musk's $2 trillion goal was unattainable.
Elon Musk, left, and Donald Trump attend a campaign event in Butler, Pennsylvania, on Oct. 5, 2024.
The entire federal budget in fiscal year 2024 was $6.75 trillion, with massive chunks of it spending that is either legally or politically impossible to cut, including Social Security, Medicare, defense spending, and debt service.
“Our federal budget is about $7 trillion a year. And I still think that they're talking about that $2 trillion number with serious purpose, that that's what they're looking at. And it would be unimaginable that we could find $2 trillion in savings out of seven in one year," Maya MacGuineas, president of the nonprofit Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, told NPR in November.
Even finding $1 trillion in cuts, as Musk now says he can achieve, will be extremely hard.
Of the discretionary spending Congress appropriates each year, more than half goes toward national defense, while “the rest to fund the administration of other agencies and programs,” according to the Treasury Department. “These programs range from transportation, education, housing, and social service programs, as well as science and environmental organizations.”
According to an analysis from the CRFB, “in order to achieve balance within a decade, all spending would need to be cut by roughly one-quarter and that the necessary cuts would grow to 85% if defense, veterans, Social Security, and Medicare spending were off the table.”
What’s more, Musk admitted in October that slashing the budget would require "hardship" for the American people. And given that members of Congress are accountable to voters, they are unlikely to slash spending for programs that their constituents could punish them for.
This isn't the first promise Musk and Trump are backtracking on after the 2024 election.
Trump recently admitted he probably can't bring grocery prices down—arguably the key reason Trump was elected in November. "It's hard to bring things down once they're up. You know, it's very hard," Trump said in an interview with Time magazine.
The American people were sold a bag of goods that they'll never get.
Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito has disclosed that he had a private phone call with Donald Trump just hours before Trump petitioned the court to block his criminal sentence in his hush money case. The call raises new questions about the independence of the court and the court’s role in putting Trump above the law.
Alito claims that the call between him and Trump was about recommending one of his former law clerks for a job in the upcoming administration.
“William Levi, one of my former law clerks, asked me to take a call from President-elect Trump regarding his qualifications to serve in a government position,” Alito told ABC News.
But after the two conservative leaders spoke, Trump’s lawyers filed an emergency request with the court to prevent New York from handing down a criminal sentence for him on Friday. Trump was convicted on 34 felony counts for falsifying business records when he tried to cover up payments to adult film actress Stormy Daniels. Trump was trying to cover up details of his affair with Daniels, preventing them from being disclosed to the public while he was running for president in 2016.
Stormy Daniels
“We did not discuss the emergency application he filed today, and indeed, I was not even aware at the time of our conversation that such an application would be filed,” Alito told ABC. He also told the outlet that he and Trump did not discuss current or possible Supreme Court cases.
But there is no independent confirmation of what was said in the phone call, nor has a recording been provided and the discussion has raised concerns about the court and corruption.
“No person, no matter who they are, should engage in out-of-court communication with a judge or justice who’s considering that person’s case,” Gabe Roth, executive director of the group Fix the Court, said in a statement. Roth also described the Trump-Alito call as an “unmistakable breach of protocol.”
Trump and Alito are ideologically aligned on conservative issues. Alito was part of the 6-3 majority on the court that overturned the federal right to an abortion in the landmark case Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. Trump appointed three of the justices who voted along with Alito—Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett. Trump has also praised the court for their decision despite the devastating effect it has had on millions of Americans.
In his personal life, an upside-down U.S. flag (a sign of distress) was flown over Alito’s house while President Joe Biden was in office, echoing other anti-Biden conservatives. The Alito family also hung an “Appeal to Heaven” flag at their beach house, a symbol used by conservative “Stop the Seal” election conspiracy theorists.
Trump has a history of exerting corrupt political influence in private phone calls.
His first impeachment came about because Trump tried to pressure Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelenskyy to implicate Trump’s political rivals (especially President Joe Biden) in corruption allegations. Similarly, after he lost the 2020 election to Biden, Trump used a phone call as part of his pressure campaign to get Georgia election officials to throw out votes for Biden so he would win the race.
The Trump-Alito call comes just a few months after the conservative majority on the Supreme Court (including Alito) voted to put Trump above the law with a presidential immunity ruling, blocking him from being charged with criminal actions undertaken while he was in office.
The public has continued to express a lack of confidence in the conservative-led court. In an aggregate of opinion polls on the matter, the court only has the approval of 40% of the public while 50.3% disapprove of the body.
As Trump heads into the presidency with the court on his side, those trends are unlikely to improve.
FIRST ON FOX: A group of more than 60 former Democratic and Republican attorneys general sent a new letter to Senate leaders Thursday urging the confirmation of Pam Bondi to head up the Department of Justice, praising what they described as Bondi’s wealth of prosecutorial experience— including during her eight years as Florida’s top prosecutor—that they said makes her especially qualified for the role.
The letter was previewed exclusively to Fox News Digital and includes the signatures of more than 20 Democratic attorneys general or attorneys general appointed by Democratic governors.
The group praised Bondi’s work across the party and state lines during her time as Florida’s attorney general and as a state prosecutor in Hillsborough County, where she worked for 18 years.
"Many of us have worked directly with Attorney General Bondi and have firsthand knowledge of her fitness for the office," the former attorneys general said in the letter. "We believe that her wealth of prosecutorial experience and commitment to public service make General Bondi a highly qualified nominee for Attorney General of the United States."
The letter praised what signatories described as Bondi’s "unwavering" commitment to public safety and the rule of law in her time in the Sunshine State, where she sought to crack down on violent crime, protect consumers and combat the opioid crisis— which was at its height when she was elected as attorney general in 2010.
Bondi "was and remains a valued and respected member of the State Attorney General community," they wrote. "Thus, we are confident that she will serve with distinction as United States Attorney General."
The letter comes just hours after the Senate Judiciary Committee announced the official dates for Bondi's confirmation hearing later this month.
Bondi is expected to be confirmed in the Republican-majority chamber. Earlier this week, a group of more than 100 former Justice Department officials sent a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee urging her confirmation.
Still, the new letter of support from the state attorneys general comes just hours after the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., issued a statement Wednesday evening expressing fresh reservations about Bondi following their meeting — citing in particular Bondi’s work defending President-elect Donald Trump in his impeachment proceedings and following the 2020 election.
"The role of the Attorney General is to oversee an independent Justice Department that upholds the rule of law and is free of undue political influence," Durbin said in a statement.
"Given Ms. Bondi’s responses to my questions, I remain concerned about her ability to serve as an Attorney General who will put her oath to the Constitution ahead of her fealty to Donald Trump."
A former FBI informant who prosecutors say fabricated a phony story of President Biden and his son Hunter Biden accepting $10 million in bribes from the Ukrainian gas company Burisma was sentenced Wednesday to six years in federal prison.
Alexander Smirnov, a dual U.S.-Israeli citizen, has been behind bars since he was arrested last February on charges of making false statements to the FBI.
The indictment came in connection with special counsel David Weiss’ investigation into Hunter Biden. Weiss later indicted Hunter on tax and gun-related charges, but President Biden granted him a sweeping pardon in December before his son was to be sentenced.
The Justice Department tacked on additional tax charges against Smirnov in November, alleging he concealed millions of dollars of income he earned between 2020 and 2022, and Smirnov pleaded guilty in December to sidestep his looming trial.
Smirnov was accused of falsely telling his FBI handler that executives from the Ukrainian energy company Burisma had paid then-Vice President Biden and his son $5 million each around 2015. Smirnov's explosive claim in 2020 came after he expressed "bias" about Joe Biden as a presidential candidate, according to prosecutors. The indictment says investigators found Smirnov had only routine business dealings with Burisma starting in 2017 — after Biden's term as vice president.
Prosecutors noted that Smirnov's claim "set off a firestorm in Congress" when it resurfaced years later as part of the House impeachment inquiry into President Biden. The Biden administration dismissed the House impeachment effort as a "stunt."
Before Smirnov’s arrest, Republicans had demanded the FBI release the unredacted form documenting the unverified allegations, though they acknowledged they couldn’t confirm if they were true.
"In committing his crimes he betrayed the United States, a country that showed him nothing but generosity, including conferring on him the greatest honor it can bestow, citizenship," Weiss' team wrote in court papers. "He repaid the trust the United States placed in him to be a law-abiding naturalized citizen and, more specifically, that one of its premier law enforcement agencies placed in him to tell the truth as a confidential human source, by attempting to interfere in a Presidential election."
Prosecutors agreed to pursue no more than six years against Smirnov as part of his plea deal. In court papers, the Justice Department described Smirnov as a "liar and a tax cheat" who "betrayed the United States," adding that his bogus corruption claims against the Biden family were "among the most serious kinds of election interference one can imagine."
In seeking a lighter sentence, Smirnov's lawyers wrote that both Hunter Biden and President-elect Trump, who was charged in two since-dropped federal cases by Special Counsel Jack Smith, "have walked free and clear of any meaningful punishment."
His lawyers had asked for a four-year prison term, arguing that their client "has learned a very grave lesson," had no prior criminal record and was suffering from severe glaucoma in both eyes. Smirnov's sentencing Wednesday in Los Angeles federal court concluded the final aspects of Weiss’s probe, and the special counsel is expected to submit a report to Attorney General Merrick Garland in accordance with federal regulations. Garland can decide whether to release it to the public.
Smirnov will get credit for the time he has served behind bars since February.
A former FBI informant who fabricated a story about President Joe Biden and his son Hunter accepting bribes that became central to Republicans' impeachment effort was sentenced Wednesday to six years in prison.
FIRST ON FOX — Dozens of former Justice Department (DOJ) officials sent a letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee Monday urging confirmation of President-elect Donald Trump’s pick for attorney general, Pam Bondi, later this month— praising both her commitment to the rule of law and her track record as Florida’s former attorney general that they said makes her uniquely qualified for the role.
The letter, previewed exclusively to Fox News Digital, was signed by more than 110 senior Justice Department officials who served under both Democratic and Republican administrations, including former U.S. attorneys general John Ashcroft, Jeff Sessions, Bill Barr and Edwin Meese.
Former acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, deputy attorneys general Rod Rosenstein and Jeffrey Rosen, and Randy Grossman, who served as the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of California under the Biden administration, are among the other notable signatories.
The DOJ alumni expressed their "strong and enthusiastic support" for Bondi, Florida’s former attorney general, who also spent 18 years as a prosecutor in the Hillsborough County State Attorney’s office.
"It is all too rare for senior Justice Department officials—much less Attorneys General—to have such a wealth of experience in the day-to-day work of keeping our communities safe," they wrote.
"As a career prosecutor, Attorney General Bondi will be ready from the first day on the job to fight on behalf of the American people to reduce crime, tackle the opioid crisis, back the women and men in blue, and restore credibility to the Department of Justice," they wrote in the letter sent to Sens. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
The letter praised Bondi's work as Florida's attorney general, where she led an aggressive crackdown on opioid drugs and the many "pill mills" operating in the state when she took office. They also praised what they described as Bondi's "national reputation" for her work to end human trafficking, and prosecuting violent crime in the state.
Officials also emphasized Bondi's other achievements in Florida, where she secured consumer protection victories and economic relief on behalf of residents in the Sunshine State. After the 2008 financial crisis, her work leading the National Mortgage Settlement resulted in $56 billion in compensation to victims, the letter said — and in the wake of the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill, Bondi's lawsuit against BP and other companies responsible resulted in a $2 billion settlement in economic relief.
The letter also stressed Bondi's commitment to the rule of law, and what the former officials touted as her track record of working across the aisle during the more than two decades she spent as a prosecutor.
"Some of us have worked directly with Attorney General Bondi during her time in office and can personally attest to her integrity and devotion to the rule of law," they wrote. "Many more of us know and admire her well-earned reputation from her long and accomplished career in government service in Florida, her litigation and advocacy on the national stage, and her demonstrated courage as a lawyer."
"As former DOJ officials, we know firsthand the challenges she will face as Attorney General, and we also know she is up to the job."
Those close to Bondi have praised her long record as a prosecutor, and her staunch loyalty to the president-elect, alongside whom she has worked since 2020—first, helping to represent him in his first impeachment trial, and, more recently, in her post as co-chair of the Center for Law and Justice at the America First Policy Institute (AFPI) a think tank set up by former Trump staffers.
She also served in Trump's first presidential term as a member of his Opioid and Drug Abuse Commission.
Bondi's former colleagues have told Fox News Digital they expect her to bring the same playbook she used in Florida to Washington—this time with an eye to cracking down on drug trafficking, illicit fentanyl use, and the cartels responsible for smuggling the drugs across the border.
"We firmly believe the Justice Department and the Nation will benefit from Attorney General Bondi’s leadership," the DOJ officials said in conclusion, adding: "We urge you in the strongest manner possible to confirm her as the next Attorney General of the United States."
Former Speaker Newt Gingrich, who led Republicans to their first House majority in four decades in 1994, said Saturday the House Freedom Caucus should recall how his own caucus led conservatives to power within the party.
Gingrich tweeted that he and other conservatives had developed "positive action principles" in 1983 as part of what they called the Conservative Opportunity Society.
"[Those] led 11 years later to the Contract with America and the first GOP House Majority in 40 years."
"If the Freedom Caucus would study them, they could be dramatically more effective," Gingrich said, going on to cite and agree with a sentiment from political reporter Mark Halperin’s "Wide World of News" newsletter.
"[T]he Freedom Caucus is a bunch of rebels with a series of causes but no coherent path to achieving said causes," Halperin wrote.
In the 1980s, although Ronald Reagan was in the White House, Boston Democratic Speaker Tip O’Neill wielded strong control of the House. O’Neill and Reagan had a notably friendly but ideologically disparate relationship.
Coinciding with the early days of C-SPAN televising live floor proceedings, Gingrich would often take to the well of the House in the late-night hours and address conservatives’ issues to a mostly empty chamber but with a captive audience on the new TV format.
Gingrich biographer Craig Shirley told Fox News Digital on Saturday that the Freedom Caucus should study the work of their comparative predecessor, the Conservative Opportunity Society, as well as the path Gingrich led from a low-profile congressman to speaker.
"I guess the word brilliant is thrown around so, so cavalierly. So let me just say, it was extremely smart politics to make the case for conservative governance," Shirley said of Gingrich’s work in the 1980s and 1990s.
"Reagan had already blazed that path eight years before Gingrich did."
While critics say the GOP has shifted hard to the right on some issues and softened on others, Shirley said it’s essentially the same as it was during Gingrich’s rise.
"Less government, more freedom, less taxes, strong national defense, pro-life."
Former Rep. Vin Weber, R-Minn., another top member of Gingrich’s conservative group, said in a PBS interview that there have not been too many groups like the Conservative Opportunity Society (or the Freedom Caucus, which hadn’t been formed at the time of the interview) and that there was the same issue with apprehension over angering their party leaders.
Weber said there had been a few small intra-caucus conservative groups prior to the Reagan era, including one in the 1960s led by then-Rep. Donald Rumsfeld, R-Ill. – who would go on to serve as Pentagon chief two times.
On the last day of the 1982 session, Gingrich approached Weber and asked, "What are you doing next year and for the next 10 years after that?."
"I thought that was interesting and I said, ‘I expect to be back here, but nothing special other than that,’" Weber recalled.
"What he was saying was that he, as one person, was not being effective…. He identified me in the [GOP] conference as somebody [who] had been supportive of his point of view and maybe had some ability to organize things," Weber said.
Shirley said the current Freedom Caucus has the rare opportunity to achieve their goals if they play their cards right, with full Republican control of Washington.
"They don't have a ‘contract,’ but they have the next best thing there. They have a core set of issues and an ideology that they can easily follow," he said, adding that "no one should ever doubt" Speaker Mike Johnson’s commitment to "Reaganite" principles.
In additional comments to Fox News’ "Hannity," Gingrich said the one-round vote Friday was a "great victory" for Johnson, R-La.
"[He’s] just a decent, hardworking, intelligent human being.… I could not have been the kind of speaker he is. I don't have the patience. I don't have that ability to just keep moving forward. It's really very extraordinary."
Meanwhile, Freedom Caucus member Ralph Norman, R-S.C., told Fox News the group met with Johnson earlier and that he "just didn't come away with the feeling that the ‘umph’ or the willingness to fight for Trump's agenda was there."
"And I use as a backdrop what’s happened the last 14 months, we had 1500-page omni-bills that you couldn’t read – where you had no spending cuts to offset $100 billion in new spending."
"And I know we had a slim majority, but that's over with now. What we wanted to impress with [Johnson] yesterday was, are you going to fight for these things that we've been asking for, like a balanced budget? Like offsets? Like getting behind all of the Trump agenda?"
Norman, along with Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, initially did not vote for Johnson, which would have set up a second round of speaker votes.
But, Norman told "The Story" that that action was the "only way to let my voice be heard."
He said Johnson "gave his word" to fight for the things he mentioned to Fox News, and that agreement, plus a message from Trump that Johnson was the only speaker candidate with support in the caucus, guided his decision to ultimately support the Louisianan.
In a "Dear Colleague" letter released Friday, House Freedom Caucus Chairman Andy Harris, R-Md., and his members expressed several policy points that Johnson should commit to in order to "reverse the damage of the Biden-Harris administration," as well as achieve long-standing conservative goals.
The letter indicated they had voted for Johnson because of their "steadfast support" of Trump and ensuring the Jan. 6 elector certification can run smoothly.
"We did this despite our sincere reservations regarding the Speaker’s track record over the past 15 months."
The caucus called for Johnson to modify the House calendar so its schedule is as busy as the Senate’s, ensure reconciliation legislation reduces spending and deficits in "real terms," and halt violations of the "72-hour-rule" for debate on amendments to bills.
They also demanded Johnson not rely on Democrats to pass legislation that a majority of his own caucus won’t support.
In comments on "The Story," Norman said he believes Johnson now understands – through the initial silence of several Republicans during the first roll call and his and Self’s initial non-Johnson-vote – that he will have to work to consider the conservative bloc’s demands.
Republican President-elect Donald Trump spent the closing months of his campaign trying to distance himself from a blueprint for his second term known as Project 2025.
Then, in the days after his victory, Trump picked major architects of the Heritage Foundation’s vision for key posts in his next administration, setting the stage for them to implement a conservative Christian agenda that has the potential to reshape the federal government and redefine rights long held by all Americans, though likely to disproportionately impact women, LGBTQ+ people and vulnerable populations like the elderly and disabled.
One of these architects is Russell Vought, whom Trump has again tapped to lead his Office of Management and Budget, or OMB, an under-the-radar entity to most Americans that wields immense influence over the federal government by crafting the president’s budget. If confirmed by the Senate, a very likely outcome, Vought will be optimally positioned to inject Project 2025’s priorities — many of which reflect his career-long push to dismantle programs for low-income Americans and expand the president’s authority — across the federal agencies and departments that OMB oversees.
Ben Olinsky, who advised Democratic former President Barack Obama on labor and workforce policy before joining the liberal-leaning Center for American Progress, where he works on issues related to the economy and governance, said that Vought’s vision for OMB as presented in Project 2025 is “to basically change the plumbing so they can do whatever they want without any meaningful checks and balances” during Trump’s second term.
“I think that it's important to really make sure [Americans] understand what the plans are for changing the plumbing,” Olinsky said.
Vought has firsthand knowledge of the OMB’s wide-ranging scope. During Trump’s first term, he was OMB’s deputy director, acting director and, finally, confirmed director. In those roles, he helped then-President Trump craft a plan to jettison job protections for thousands of federal workers and assisted with a legally ambiguous effort to redirect congressionally appropriated foreign aid for Ukraine.
Vought has used two pro-Trump groups he founded — the nonprofit Center for Renewing America and its advocacy arm, America Restoration Action — to discredit structural racism as a driver for inequality and attempt to stymie diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts. In August, he told a pair of British journalists posing as potential donors that the Center for Renewing America is “an organization I helped turn into the Death Star,” the fictional Star Wars space station that can destroy planets, and it “is accomplishing all of the debates you are reading about.”
The chapter that Vought wrote for Project 2025 details how the Office of Management and Budget could be a vehicle to advance the Christian nationalist agenda he favors — and he has not hesitated to talk about it.
Acting Office of Management and Budget director Russ Vought speaks during the daily press briefing at the White House in March 2019.
“I think you have to rehabilitate Christian nationalism,” Vought told the British journalists at the Centre for Climate Reporting, which released video of the conversation that was recorded using hidden cameras.
In an interview with conservative activist Tucker Carlson shortly after Trump’s reelection, Vought likened OMB to the “nerve center” through which a president can ensure their policy directives trickle down to the multitude of federal agencies and a civilian workforce of more than two million people.
“Properly understood, [OMB] is a President’s air-traffic control system with the ability and charge to ensure that all policy initiatives are flying in sync and with the authority to let planes take off and, at times, ground planes that are flying off course,” Vought wrote in Project 2025.
He sees two primary ways to ground wayward planes: by eliminating potential dissent within agencies and withholding money appropriated by Congress for projects and programs the president does not support.
Both would clear the way for Trump’s next administration to implement many of the priorities detailed in Project 2025, which could essentially redefine rights, systems and cultural norms for all Americans.
Some of Project 2025’s recommendations include restricting abortion access and supporting a “biblically based” definition of family, because the “male-female dyad is essential to human nature,” by replacing policies related to LGBTQ+ equity with those that “support the formation of stable, married, nuclear families.”
It also suggests transforming the FBI into a politically motivated entity to settle scores and barring U.S. citizens from receiving federal housing assistance if they live with anyone who is not a citizen or permanent legal resident, which would serve Trump’s campaign promise to take extraordinary measures to crack down on illegal immigration. During remarks in September titled “Theology of America’s Statecraft: The Case for Immigration Restriction,” Vought justified the separation of families and condemned so-called sanctuary cities, or those that pass laws that limit their cooperation with federal immigration authorities. “Failing to secure the border is a complete abdication of [the government’s] God-given responsibility,” he said.
Olinsky explained that while many of the policies in Project 2025 have been floating around Republican circles in Washington for years without gaining much traction, the document is a detailed roadmap that shows how its authors believe they can finally deliver on key pieces of their conservative Christian agenda.
“One, it says all of the quiet parts out loud about the full scope of the agenda. And then the second thing, which I think is something folks should really pay attention to, is it says how they're going to accomplish it, practically, by using executive action,” Olinsky said.
In many ways, Vought’s approach to bending the federal government to a president’s will began taking shape during Trump’s first administration. In late 2020, as Trump’s first term drew to a close, Vought helped him craft an executive order known as “Schedule F,” which reclassified thousands of civil servants and, with that, stripped them of their job protections; Vought recommended that close to 90 percent of OMB’s workforce be reclassified.
President Joe Biden rescinded the executive order on his third day in office. Project 2025 recommends reinstating it.
Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia, a Democrat who sponsored the legislation to protect federal employees, warned of a “loyalty-based system that would impede the work of the federal government, expose people to intimidation and bring people into jobs that are not qualified to do them, thus risking the American public’s safety and quality of life.”
Vought is among the Trump loyalists who have been open about their desire to slash the federal workforce — as a route to purge critics, improve efficiency or both.
In the interview with Carlson, Vought said, “There certainly is going to be mass layoffs and firings, particularly at some of the agencies that we don’t even think should exist.” His language appeared to communicate an effort to ensure obedience and compliance. With the firings and layoffs, Vought said he wants to avoid having “really awesome Cabinet secretaries sitting on top of massive bureaucracies that largely don’t do what they tell them to do.”
Trump’s transition team did not respond to requests to discuss Vought’s selection for OMB or the chapter he wrote for Project 2025 about the agency. The 19th reached out to Vought through his Center for Renewing America, which likewise did not respond to a request for comment.
Power of the Purse
During Trump’s first term, OMB helped find money to begin building a small section of wall along the U.S.-Mexico border — a key campaign promise Trump made in 2016 — “because Congress wouldn’t give him the ordinary money,” Vought told Carlson.
Trump also enlisted OMB to withhold $400 million in military aid that Congress approved for Ukraine, as Trump and his associates tried to pressure the country to investigate Biden and his family. The move prompted the abuse-of-power case House Democrats made against Trump during his first impeachment, when Vought defied a subpoena to testify. The Government Accountability Office, a nonpartisan watchdog, concluded that the scheme violated the 1974 Impoundment Control Act. Days later, the Republican-led Senate acquitted Trump. (Trump had eventually released the aid.)
When Trump subsequently nominated Vought to lead OMB in 2020, Democrats opposed him because of his approach to impoundment authority. He was nonetheless confirmed.
Vought’s path to confirmation is all but certain this time around: Republicans control the Senate, the congressional chamber charged with approving presidential nominations. Very likely to feature in his confirmation hearings is Vought’s belief that the OMB can help Trump overcome opposition and implement policy priorities, possibly including those contained in Project 2025, by redirecting or refusing to spend funds appropriated by Congress, which under the Constitution holds the power of the purse.
“Making Impoundment Great Again!” Vought wrote in June on X, riffing on the “Make America Great Again” slogan that has come to define Trump’s movement.
A copy of Project 2025 is held during the 2024 Democratic National Convention.
Trump spent his campaign insisting that he had not read Project 2025 and did not know its authors. “I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal,” he wrote in a July post on his Truth Social platform.
But of the more than 350 people who contributed to Project 2025, at least 60 percent are linked to the incoming president, according to a list of contributors and their ties reviewed by The 19th. They range from appointees and nominees from Trump’s first administration, like Vought, to members of his previous transition team and those who served on commissions and as unofficial advisers.
Democrats, including Vice President Kamala Harris, seized on Project 2025 during their campaigns to highlight the dangers they believe are posed by a second Trump presidency. At 920 pages, it offers a vision of government that is far more detailed and specific than the policy proposals put forward by Trump directly. The “Agenda 47” on Trump’s campaign website was a list of 20 bullet points that included vague policies like “end the weaponization of government against the American people” and “unite our country by bringing it to new and record levels of success.”
When Trump announced Vought as his OMB pick, he said Vought “knows exactly how to dismantle the Deep State and end Weaponized Government.” His other selections for OMB leadership posts include anti-abortion activist Ed Martin and Vought’s colleague at the Center for Renewing America, Mark Paoletta, whom the president-elect praised as a “conservative warrior.”
One question as Trump takes office on January 20 and Vought, if confirmed, helps him control the government’s workforce and purse strings, is which version of the country they will promote and whose rights are — and aren’t — protected.
