Russell Vought should not be confirmed as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, CREW wrote in statements for the record for Vought’s confirmation hearings with the Senate Budget Committee and the Senate Committee on Homeland Security And Governmental Affairs. For years, Donald Trump and his allies have planned to purge career civil servants and replace them with political appointees through an executive order known as Schedule F. This order would reclassify thousands of career merit-based civil servants to be “at will” employees, thereby making it far easier to fire them all. During his tenure as OMB Acting Director and then Director from January 2019 to January 2021, Vought was a central figure in attempting to implement Schedule F and dismantle our government’s current merit-based civil service system. The Senate should consider this when examining his nomination, as well as his ties to the Heritage Foundation and Project 2025.

Federal agencies filled with unqualified party loyalists would negatively impact almost every part of everyday Americans’ lives and would likely cause large-scale corruption. It would also jeopardize national security and leave our democracy vulnerable.

Vought’s repeated threats and attacks on career civil servants make him unfit to lead OMB. Vought has publicly stated that he wants to put career civil servants “in trauma,” and that when “they wake up in the morning, we want them to not want to go to work because they are increasingly viewed as the villains.” Vought called for “an army of investigators” to prosecute current and former government officials who sought to hold Trump accountable. This vilification of government employees makes it abundantly clear that he cannot be entrusted with this role. 

In addition to Vought’s intention to dismantle the civil service, the Senate cannot ignore his willingness and intentions to misuse his own authority and craft plans for the president to subvert the law and, in the process, American democracy. Vought supports the president withholding congressionally appropriated funds, which violates the Impoundment Control Act, as well as bypassing the advice and consent of the Senate to push recess appointments. He also supports invoking the Insurrection Act to deploy the military on the American public and abusing emergency powers. 

The Senate should reject Vought’s nomination, and by extension, reject his plan to replace independent civil servants with political loyalists who prioritize blind obedience over following the law. Under Vought, there is too great a risk for government dysfunction and corruption, which would further harm the public’s faith in our government. The Senate has the Constitutional duty to give its advice and consent on presidential nominations. CREW strongly urges the committee to exercise this responsibility by rejecting Vought’s nomination in order to protect our democratic institutions and the American public.

Statements for the Record

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