Shadow President: Project 2025 Architect Russell Vought Is Using Shutdown to Gut Federal Agencies

We look at the influence of Trump's top budget adviser and the architect of Project 2025, Russell Vought, over the Trump administration's policies and Trump himself. Vought is the driving force behind the [government] shutdown" and basically a second commander-in-chief, a shadow president," says ProPublica reporter Andy Kroll, who spent months researching Vought for an extensive profile on the Office of Management and Budget director. During this second Trump administration, Vought's deeply conservative ideology has been unchallenged by a compliant Congress, Kroll explains, placing unprecedented power into the hands of the executive branch.