WASHINGTON TIMES: DAVID BOSSIE: The Democrats’ shutdown backfires

The shameful “Schumer Shutdown of 2025” is not only reckless but also totally avoidable, and it is happening when all of us can least afford it. With political violence and dangerous rhetoric from the radical left surging, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer should be working to lower the temperature in Washington, not making the situation worse.

For many Americans, this isn’t their first experience witnessing Mr. Schumer in action. Folks around the country from across the political spectrum know a career politician who represents everything that’s wrong with Congress when they see one. To put it simply, Mr. Schumer is part of the problem, not part of the solution to the challenges facing America.

Imagine being so out of touch, power hungry, dishonest and arrogant that you are willing to cause pain for millions of hardworking American families in a “Hail Mary” attempt to get into a less perilous political situation in your home state. It’s beyond obvious that Mr. Schumer has chosen to pull this harmful stunt because he is petrified of his unhinged left-wing base in New York.

At the end of the day, Mr. Schumer is causing all this stress for so many because untalented and unserious Democratic agitator Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez may attempt to rob him of a sixth term in the Senate, to which he thinks he is entitled.

Even amid the Schumer Shutdown and the divisive times we live in, we must attempt to find silver linings in life. There is one for small government fiscal conservatives like me. There’s an adage in Washington that conservative icon Morton Blackwell has driven into generations of activists, the concept that “personnel is policy.” Thankfully, President Trump, our country’s most consequential political change agent in 100 years, fully understands this and is putting it into action.

Look no further than Russell Vought, the president’s Office of Management and Budget director. Mr. Vought is the quintessential fiscal hawk who has been fighting on the front lines for balanced budgets, holding the unelected bureaucracy accountable and cutting the size and scope of government for decades. Mr. Trump recognized Mr. Vought’s unique skill set during his first term and thought so highly of him that he rehired him for the top OMB job in his second term.

So far, Mr. Vought has been instrumental in helping the president keep his promise to confront Washington’s addiction to wasteful spending and drain the swamp. In less than nine months, the Department of Government Efficiency has uncovered more than $200 billion in savings; the largest mandatory spending cut in American history is now the law of the land; the horrendously bloated federal workforce is on its way to having 300,000 fewer bureaucrats on the taxpayers’ payroll; and rescissions packages are becoming a much-needed regular occurrence.

The Trump-Vought budget team has been the best steward of taxpayer dollars in Washington since House Speaker Newt Gingrich forced the Clinton administration to negotiate a balanced budget agreement almost 30 years ago.

However, Mr. Vought’s greatest strength is perhaps the progress he can make in the name of fiscal sanity during a government shutdown. As Sen. Mike Lee posted on X, “OMB Director @russvought has been dreaming about — and meticulously preparing for — the Schumer Shutdown since puberty.” Of course, Mr. Lee was just having some fun, but for those of us who know Mr. Vought well, he was only half-kidding.

House Speaker Mike Johnson recently said, “We think the federal government is too big. It does too many things, and it does almost nothing well.” He is precisely on point here. During the Schumer Shutdown, Mr. Vought can make dramatic inroads through commonsense reforms to which hardworking American families can easily relate to address what’s gone so wrong in Washington over the past two decades when it comes to our nation’s finances and rapidly growing $37 trillion national debt.

In the opening days of the government shutdown alone, the Trump administration has canceled around $8 billion in “Green New Scam” funds that are a complete waste of taxpayer dollars. An additional $20 billion in infrastructure projects are being put on hold to review the constitutionality of their contracts. Meanwhile, Messrs. Trump and Vought are going through each agency with a fine-tooth comb to assess the need for substantial reductions to the federal workforce so it can operate more efficiently on behalf of the American people. The recent announcement that the IRS will be furloughing more than 34,000 workers because of the shutdown, nearly half its employees, is welcome news for millions of hardworking Americans who believe the IRS has grown bloated, inefficient and out of control.

If Senate Democrats refuse to vote to reopen the government, the American people will continue to suffer unnecessarily, and the Schumer Shutdown will drag down the flailing Democratic Party even further. In the meantime, Mr. Trump and Mr. Vought will continue keeping promises to the American people by reining in the unchecked federal bureaucracy and slashing wasteful government spending.

David N. Bossie is the president of Citizens United. He served as a senior adviser to the Trump 2024 and 2020 campaigns. He served as deputy campaign manager for Donald J. Trump for President in 2016 and deputy executive director for the Trump transition team.