The Shutdown Isn't a Stalemate It's a Power Grab. And the Media Are Missing It.

"But amid all the breathless horse-race coverage, the press is largely missing the real story: this shutdown isn't just a byproduct of gridlock. It's a strategy a calculated power grab by a faction of the Republican Party that has long dreamed of dismantling traditional legislative norms and centralizing authority in the executive branch. At the center of this maneuver is Russ Vought, President Donald Trump's budget director and the ideological architect behind the controversial Project 2025 blueprint."

"Speaker Mike Johnson, for his part, offered an almost comically straight-faced defense of Vought's role at a Thursday press conference: Russ does this reluctantly. He takes no pleasure in this. Because Russ has to sit down and decide which policies, personnel, and which programs are essential and which are not. That's not a fun task and he's not enjoying that responsibility if they keep the government closed, it's gonna get more and more painful."

The government shutdown functions as a deliberate strategy to centralize power rather than mere legislative gridlock. A faction of the Republican Party aims to dismantle traditional legislative norms and transfer authority into the executive branch. Russ Vought, as budget director and the architect of Project 2025, is orchestrating plans to reshape the federal government and concentrate power. With Congress paralyzed, Vought has been making unilateral spending decisions that target Democratic-leaning states and programs, bypassing negotiation and oversight. Those actions operate like a sledgehammer version of a line-item veto to enforce partisan priorities.

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