U.S. President Donald Trump gestures as he arrives on the South Lawn of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., Sept. 30, 2025.
Ken Cedeno | Reuters
President Donald Trump on Thursday said Democrats have given him an “unprecedented opportunity” to slash federal agencies, signaling plans to harm his political opponents during the two-day-old government shutdown while blaming them for causing it.
Trump’s warning came a day after his administration froze about $18 billion for two major infrastructure projects in New York City and canceled roughly $8 billion more for climate-related projects in Democratic-leaning states.
Both of the funding halts were first announced by Russell Vought, the director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, not by the departments that have oversight over the projects.
Trump said he will soon meet with Vought “to determine which of the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, he recommends to be cut.”
The two men will also weigh “whether or not those cuts will be temporary or permanent,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.
Vought was a key author of Project 2025, the conservative blueprint for massively reforming the U.S. government.
Trump repeatedly disavowed Project 2025 while running for president, saying he and his campaign had “nothing to do with it.”
But Trump, in Thursday’s post, touted Vought as “he of PROJECT 2025 Fame.”
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