"Zoom in: On "The Charlie Kirk Show" last week, Vought said: "We want to be very aggressive where we can be in shuttering the bureaucracy, not just the funding, but the bureaucracy - that we now have an opportunity to do that." Though the shutdown does slow the administration down in some areas, Vought said it still allows his department to focus on "saving money." "If there are policy opportunities to downsize the scope of the federal government, we want to use those opportunities.""
"Zoom out: The latest reductions in force, or RIFs, reflect Vought's vision of small government, says Nick Bednar, a law professor at the University of Minnesota. " This is just him taking advantage of an opportunity to try and pursue that vision, and I think it would have happened with or without the shutdown." Between the lines: The administration is shedding people and agencies it ideologically opposes. President Trump said earlier this month that terminations would be " Democrat oriented.""
This is the first recorded use of a government shutdown to terminate federal employees. The firings align with a stated plan to bring the federal government under stronger presidential control and shrink its scope, as outlined in Project 2025. OMB leadership frames the shutdown as an opportunity to shutter bureaucracy, reduce spending, and use policy openings to downsize federal programs. Specific targets include green New Deal–related Energy programs, the Minority Business Development Agency, environmental justice efforts at EPA, and the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Recent reductions in force reflect a broader small-government, ideologically driven restructuring of agencies.
Read at Axios
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