The Senate has confirmed President Donald Trump’s decide to guide the White Home funds workplace regardless of Democrats delivering a marathon of speeches condemning the administration’s imaginative and prescient for slashing the federal authorities.
Lawmakers voted 53-47 Thursday night to return Russ Vought for a second tour as director of the Workplace of Administration and Finances. Republicans had been in lockstep behind the person who may dramatically alter how federal {dollars} get spent, partially by taking the “energy of the purse” away from members of Congress.
Democrats all voted in opposition to Vought, nevertheless it wasn’t sufficient. It had been clear for days that the GOP majority was united behind Trump’s decide for OMB director, even because the company rocked Congress final week with an try to freeze congressionally authorised funds.
However even with Vought’s path to affirmation clear, Democrats had been below stress from their get together base to push again in opposition to Trump and his nominees in any means they may. Whereas they couldn’t stop the inevitable, they at the very least may gradual it down by refusing to yield again 30 hours in procedural time that might have in any other case allowed for a extra expedient vote.
They in the end slow-walked proceedings up till the very finish. As every Democratic senator solid their vote, they stood by their desk within the chamber and named a program or challenge of their state which may be impacted by OMB’s tried freeze of federal funds.
It was the fruits of their first such protest of the second Trump administration. The earlier afternoon, Democrats launched what grew to become an all-nighter, offering programming on the Senate ground into the early hours of Thursday morning and all through the day.
“Why doesn’t authorities run like a enterprise?” requested Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) in a single ground speech. “Let me inform you why: as a result of should you ran authorities like a enterprise, you’ll shut down each rural hospital.”
Schatz, who was referring to a mantra of conservative funds hawks and the tech billionaire Elon Musk who has gained huge affect over govt department decision-making, took a number of shifts on the ground over a 30-hour interval — typically solo, typically in a buddy-act with Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.). Senate Minority Chief Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) was additionally a frequent presence.
This was not an actual speaking filibuster, the place one lawmaker should maintain the ground for hours with out relaxation so as to grind proceedings to a complete halt. This 30-hour time clock would have expired whether or not or not anybody gave speeches.
However Democrats’ dedication to filling the time with anti-Vought rhetoric — not studying kids’s books or different off-topic bloviating — was their try to amplify a message they’ve sustained since final yr’s campaigns: that the Heritage Basis’s Venture 2025 blueprint for Trump’s second time period is a harmful risk to democracy.
Vought authored a chapter on the “Government Workplace of the President” within the Venture 2025 doc.
“Russell Vought and Donald Trump suppose they could be above the regulation,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) stated Wednesday throughout his talking flip.
Even earlier than their speech-a-thon, Democrats made two makes an attempt on the committee stage to point out how critical they had been about their disapproval of Vought. Senate Homeland Safety and Governmental Affairs Committee Democrats voted in opposition to him in committee on Inauguration Day. Senate Finances Committee Democrats later boycotted their panel’s vote on the nomination.
Senate Democrats additionally held a number of information conferences to name out the excessive stakes of Vought’s affirmation.
“I want they’d the energy, rattling it, to vote him down. And I do know the Senate was up all evening,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the highest Democrat on the Home Appropriations Committee, stated of Republicans in an interview on Thursday. “Russ Vought doesn’t belong in public service. He actually must be thrown out. He’s a harmful particular person to our authorities.”
Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee, stated Wednesday she can be “involved if the Trump administration is clawing again cash that has been particularly appropriated for a specific goal.”
However she, too, voted Thursday to substantiate Vought. So did Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), the chair of the Homeland Safety and Governmental Affairs Committee who’s deeply delicate to perceptions of govt department meddling in congressional enterprise, together with spending.
Overwhelmingly, Republicans on each side of the Capitol have been captivated with Vought’s rise to energy, believing he’ll convey a heavy hand to spending cuts throughout the federal authorities.
“There isn’t any higher thoughts for rooting out the entire nonsense,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) stated in an interview this week. “And he’ll be working aspect by aspect with the DOGE guys and determining what we have to do to really ship.”
Vought’s set up follows two weeks of turbulence spurred by OMB’s transfer — below an performing director — to freeze congressionally authorised spending, adopted by a U-turn rescinding a key memo ordering the freeze.
Amongst his most controversial concepts is that the Impoundment Management Act, enacted greater than 50 years in the past to insulate the congressional appropriations course of from intervention from the chief department, is unconstitutional and the president ought to have extra unilateral powers to chop spending.
The Senate’s affirmation of Vought may embolden the White Home because the administration seeks to shirk that regulation, which requires the president to ask Congress to rescind or maintain spending it has already authorised.
Vought additionally has a historical past of holding again federal {dollars} authorised by Congress, together with the freezing of Ukraine support throughout Trump’s first presidency — an episode that fueled Trump’s first impeachment in 2019.
“The president ran on the notion that the Impoundment Management Act is unconstitutional,” Vought advised lawmakers in his affirmation listening to final month earlier than the Finances Committee. “I agree with that.”
Jennifer Scholtes and Meredith Lee Hill contributed to this report.
