When Donald Trump chose a Project 2025 author to lead a key federal agency that would carry out the underpinnings of the conservative manifesto’s aims, he solidified the project’s role in his second term.
Shortly after he won re-election, the US president nominated Russ Vought to lead the office of management and budget. Vought wrote a chapter for Project 2025 about consolidating power in the executive branch and advances a theory that allows the president to withhold funds from agencies, even if Congress has allocated them. Consolidating power, in part through firing a supposed “deep state” and hiring loyalists, is a major plank of the project – and of Trump’s first 100 days.
