Project 2025 just jumped up and bit Trump on the butt

White House did not know about controversial memo

By Mike Sorrell

Donald Trump, federal employee No. 1, apparently got traumatized this week by Russell Vought.

Here’s what happened.

A memo went out across the country that evening notifying institutions, nonprofits and individuals that there would be a “temporary pause” in the federal funding they receive.

The alleged purpose was to give the Trump administration time to review where federal money goes and whether waste and abuse is involved. The clear impression was that the overly powerful new president just issued another of his hundreds of executive orders and directives aimed at shaking up the federal government.

Millions of people got shook.

The memo was rescinded Wednesday.

It turns out the memo released Monday came from the Trump administration’s Office of Management and Budget without seeking clearance from the White House. It see s to bear the fingerprints of Vought, who is Trump’s nominee to direct OMB. He apparently jumped the gun, sending out the memo before the Senate has confirmed his nomination and before Trump looked at it and gave his approval.

Democrats on the Senate Budget Committee, which is scheduled to vote Thursday on whether to send Vought’s confirmation on to a vote in the full Senate, say Vought has been deeply involved in OMB’s operations before getting confirmed, The Washington Post reported Thursday.

Trump is a control freak who demands obedience from everyone he hires, nominates for office or joins his red-hatted MAGA movement. Under Trump, nobody is supposed to step out of line, let alone go to the head of the line and in front of Trump.

The fact that Trump did not know what was going on does not let Trump off the hook. He is supposed to know. He is the president. Besides, a memo that creates widespread chaos and fear is just the sort of vague, confusing message Trump likes to send, so it sure seemed like Trump called for the temporary shutdown.

So, the stink from what happened will linger for Trump longer than what occurs when a hound dog encounters a skunk.

The skunk in this case apparently is Russell Vought.

Vought, as you might recall, is the far-right ideologue who promised that he and his like-minded army of bureaucrats will purposely “traumatize” federal workers. He said those workers will get jerked around so badly that they won’t want to get up in the morning and go to work. He has also said the United States is a post-Constitution nation, implying that he is part of a far-right political movement that will recreate the nation,

Vought is also the primary author of Project 2025, a 900-page document produced by the Heritage Foundation that lays out for the Trump administration how to substantially change the federal government. Project 2025 calls for deep budget cuts in programs and even the elimination of some departments.

When it was released last summer, candidate Trump said he had not heard of it nor read it (no surprise there because he does not read). Now, as a president who issues executive orders by the dozen, Project 2025 provides a list of issues Trump wants to tackle.

Which means with the memo sent out Monday, Project 2025 just jumped up and bit Trump in the butt.

How that happened was outlined in a story by reporter Ashley Parker, headlined “The Memo That Shocked the White House,” posted Wednesday night on the digital issue of The Atlantic. Vought is mentioned in the story but not as the author of the memo. Parker wrote that a “source familiar with the OMB memo that touched off so much controversy this week said that it had been drafted by Mike Paoletta, who was appointed by Trump as the agency’s general counsel. OMB declined to comment on that claim.”

Meanwhile, the Senate Budget Committee is expected to vote Thursday on whether to send the nomination of Vought on to the full Senate for confirmation. Democrats on the committee want to first ask Vought about the Monday night memo.