WASHINGTON—Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russell T. Vought—the Trump administration’s top official in charge of guiding the federal bureaucracy’s day-to-day policy work—is transferring spending decision authority to his top political appointees.
“I hereby delegate to the Program Associate Directors (PAD) the authorities delegated by the President to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget for apportioning funds pursuant to 31 U.S.C. §1513,” Vought said in a Feb. 11 memorandum made available to The Epoch Times.
“This delegation supersedes any previous delegation of such authority and will remain in place until revised or revoked. The Program Associate Directors may re-delegate this authority as necessary in writing. This delegation does not limit the authority of the Director to exercise the delegated authority.”
While it may seem like nothing more than moving boxes around on a bureaucratic organization chart, Vought’s decision significantly increases his leverage for keeping subordinate officials on track throughout the federal government who would otherwise slow-walk or block presidential policies at the department and agency levels.
A senior White House official who asked not to be named told The Epoch Times that Vought “is bringing back accountability to OMB to ensure that the POTUS agenda is accomplished and more money doesn’t sneak out the door.”
In addition, the official said, “it’s about ensuring all tools are used to accomplish the president’s agenda, especially when it comes to what we are funding, and in light of agencies and bureaucrats ignoring executive orders.”
The OMB has the largest staff within the Executive Office of the President in the White House and is the central contact point for all federal departments and agencies for receiving, defining, and understanding the day-to-day implementation of presidential policies and decisions.
Created in 1970 by President Richard Nixon, OMB can veto department and agency decisions thought to be contrary to presidential directives. But the vast majority of OMB staffers—including until now the five PADs—have always been career civil servants and will likely continue to be under Vought.
The OMB’s influence is a combination of that leverage over the day-to-day decisions by subordinate officials and the fact the president’s annual budget is created by OMB.
Cabinet secretaries and agency directors appointed by Republican presidents in the past have often found their proposals to enact reforms blocked by OMB officials, especially in the tedious process of deciding what to include and what to exclude from the annual budget.
Budget preparation is a 365-day-a-year responsibility within OMB, but the agency is also responsible for providing policy analyses of legislation proposed in Congress and drafting policy statements in conjunction with the president’s key domestic policy advisers.
Vought is also a former executive director of the Republican Study Committee in the House of Representatives, and he was policy director for the Republican National Committee’s platform committee in 2024.
Chicago Attorney Joseph Morris, who was general counsel at the U.S. Office of Personnel Management during the Reagan administration where he dealt on a daily basis with OMB officials, told The Epoch Times that “deepening the political team at OMB” is a much-needed move.
“A major factor in the past growth of the administrative state has involved senior careerists at OMB acting in the name of the president to impose the ‘permanent government’s’ agenda in effectively overriding the policies and priorities of presidential appointees and political appointees in the departments and agencies,” Morris said.
