‘Damn Good Job!’ Dem Senator Throws Down With Trump Budget Director over ‘Traumatizing’ Federal Workers

A tense Senate hearing erupted Thursday as Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) repeatedly pressed Trump budget chief Russell Vought to grade his own success at “traumatizing” the federal workforce.

Appearing before the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee to testify about the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB), Vought found himself facing questions over reported past remarks in which he allegedly said he wanted to put federal employees “in trauma.”

Warner seized on those comments in his questioning as he accused the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) director of carrying out exactly what he had previously promised to do.

“Well, the real question I want to get to, you said in your writings that you wanted to traumatize federal workforce,” Warner began.

Vought immediately pushed back, interrupting to say: “That’s not what I said, Senator, but I’m happy to clarify previous statements.”

Warner rejected the response, insisting the administration’s approach had spoken for itself.

“Listen, your writings were very clear. You wanted to make sure federal workers felt like they shouldn’t go to work. You felt like you wanted to add trauma,” he said before demanding that Vought assign himself a letter grade for how successfully he had achieved that goal.

Rather than answer directly, Vought pivoted to defending the administration’s record: “We’ve done aggressive actions to live and have fiscally responsible government –”

Warner cut him off: “The thing is, you want to ask the questions, get elected, and sit up here. You’ve got a United States senator asking a question. Give yourself a grade, A, B, C, D, F, on how well you’ve done at traumatizing our workforce.”

Vought again declined to engage with the premise, instead replying: “I think we’ve done an incredible job in running the CFPB, and I’m excited to be here to answer questions about that.”

“I was a business guy, so don’t use bureaucratic mumbo-jumbo,” Warner snapped.

“Did you get an A, B, C, or did you fail?” the senator repeated. “I actually think you did a pretty, with your goal of traumatizing and undermining the federal workforce, I think you’ve done a pretty damn good job. What grade would you get?”

Vought stuck to his defense of the agency’s performance, responding: “We’ve done an excellent job running the CFPB.”

Warner closed the confrontation with a final rebuke: “Sir, I would say excellent job on terrorizing and traumatizing our federal workforce.”

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