Russell Vought, Office of Management and Budget director, listens as he addresses members of the media outside the West Wing at the White House in Washington, Monday, Sept. 29, 2025<\/span>Mother Jones illustration; Evan Vucci\/AP<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n On Thursday night, <\/span>President Donald Trump shared a music video<\/a> on Truth Social. In it, an AI-generated Russ Vought<\/a>\u2014Trump\u2019s director of the Office of Management and Budget<\/a> and a Project 2025 mastermind<\/a>\u2014is the grim reaper, carrying a scythe along a hallway lined with portraits of Democratic leaders. Vought, the video\u2019s soundtrack explains, \u201cwields the pen, the funds, and the brain\u201d to enforce the president\u2019s plans to axe federal workers.<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone still remembers when he said he wanted to cause maximum trauma to federal workers,\u201d one neighbor said.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n The budget chief has been in the spotlight lately as Trump\u2019s shutdown enforcer. He is pressing on with threats<\/a> to permanently cut federal workers en masse during this crisis. It is part of his long-held dream of shrinking the federal government and giving the president unrestrained powers. Vought\u2019s combination of bureaucratic know-how and hardline ideology has made him a star in right-wing circles.<\/p>\n But on the quiet, residential street tucked in the Virginia suburb where Vought lives, the perception of him and his role in the shutdown is less than favorable. Several homes in the neighborhood have a yard sign in the front proudly declaring: \u201cThis house supports federal workers.\u201d That includes the house right next door to his.<\/p>\n \u201cSo many people in this neighborhood are federal workers,\u201d said Cathy Hunter, a 60-year-old archivist who has lived in the area since 1993. \u201cThey do really good work and they just feel so disrespected.\u201d<\/p>\n Residents said the signs started cropping up early on in the administration, after Elon Musk\u2019s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) dismantled the US foreign aid agency and haphazardly purged<\/a> government employees who are now being rehired<\/a> by the hundreds. (A recent New York Times<\/em> article<\/a> included photos of a sidewalk chalk protest in the vicinity of Vought\u2019s house that read: \u201cI was hungry and the USA fed me. Until Vought cut USAID.\u201d) Other chalk protests have popped up, too.<\/p>\n These days, the pro-federal worker signs have been sending an even louder message to Vought.<\/p>\n \u201cPeople have strong feelings about him,\u201d one person who lives further down the street told me, describing the neighborhood as solidly blue. \u201cEveryone knows someone who lost their jobs.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe takes food and health care from the neediest and tries to, in his words, traumatize people\u2014then he calls himself a Christian,\u201d another neighbor told me. \u201cPretty despicable.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<\/figure>\n Residents I talked to said that many federal employees, contractors, and active and retired military live in the area. \u201cIt\u2019s a very friendly neighborhood,\u201d one person said. \u201cPeople look out for each other.\u201d Of Vought, she said: \u201cI don\u2019t think he\u2019s interacted with the neighbors at all.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cEveryone still remembers when he said he wanted to cause maximum trauma<\/a> to federal workers,\u201d the neighbor said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s hard to forget.\u201d<\/p>\n Most of Vought\u2019s neighbors I talked to for this article declined to speak on the record or asked to remain anonymous. Some said they didn\u2019t want to create a rift in an otherwise cordial neighborhood, while others worried about retribution or negative repercussions from their employers.<\/p>\n \u201cI just wish he would have gotten to know us,\u201d Hunter said. \u201cWe consider ourselves good Americans, we have good values. And I don\u2019t think he\u2019s been interested in getting to know any of us, in hearing if we might have a difference of opinion.\u201d<\/p>\n Last week, Vought sent around a memo<\/a> blaming Democrats\u2019 \u201cinsane demands\u201d for the imminent lapse in funding and instructing agency heads to start making plans to cut non-mandatory programs \u201cnot consistent with the President\u2019s priorities\u201d and \u201cuse this opportunity to consider Reduction in Force.\u201d Appearing on Fox Business, Vought claimed<\/a> an \u201cauthority to make permanent change to the bureaucracy here in government\u201d during the shutdown.<\/p>\n He has since announced pauses to funding for infrastructure projects in New York\u2014home state of House Minority Leader Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-New York), who called<\/a> Vought a \u201cmalignant political hack\u201d\u2014and slowdowns in clean energy projects in several blue states.<\/p>\n Vought, Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah said<\/a> on Fox News, \u201chas been dreaming about and preparing for his moment since puberty.\u201d<\/p>\n As <\/em>I <\/em>wrote<\/a> in a profile of Vought from 2024, the bespectacled official spent years as a Washington insider and government bureaucrat before becoming the architect of a supersized second Trump presidency.<\/p>\n An avowed Christian nationalist and dedicated America First warrior, he once described the job of OMB director as the \u201ckeeper of \u2018commander\u2019s intent\u201d and criticized the federal bureaucracy for standing in the way of the president\u2019s agenda. During Trump\u2019s first term, Vought tried to implement an executive order that would have made it easier for political appointees to fire career civil servants and replace them with MAGA loyalists. Now, he\u2019s getting to realize<\/a> his vision while earning points with the president. <\/p>\n For some of his neighbors, it is personal. \u201cYou stare it in the face when he\u2019s there,\u201d one person said. \u201cThis is<\/em> the guy, you know.\u201d <\/p>\n Another neighbor I talked to, who also asked not to be named, said many in the neighborhood find Vought\u2019s policies and actions \u201cabhorrent.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cHe takes food and health care from the neediest and tries to, in his words, traumatize people\u2014then he calls himself a Christian,\u201d the neighbor said. \u201cPretty despicable. You asked what it is like living near such a man. Frankly, I\u2019d rather not, but this is a wonderful neighborhood and, unlike Mr. Vought himself, we do not want our neighbors (even Mr. Vought) to be traumatized. So we just live with it.\u201d <\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n\n
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