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President Donald Trump has signed a new executive order to extend his authority in the White House.
According to Newsweek, Trump ordered independent agencies be placed under White House oversight in his next move to radically overhaul the federal government and expand his authority.
Independent agencies must now appoint White House liaisons and "regularly consult with and coordinate policies and priorities" with the Director of Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought along with the White House Domestic Policy Council and National Economic Council.
Trump's latest executive order directs Vought to "establish performance standards and management objectives" for agency leaders and "report periodically to the President on their performance and efficiency in attaining such standards and objectives." Vought must also evaluate and adjust the agencies' budgets "as necessary and appropriate, to advance the President's policies and priorities."
"For the Federal Government to be truly accountable to the American people, officials who wield vast executive power must be supervised and controlled by the people's elected President," the executive order states.
The order also weakens the power of agency attorneys, stating that "no employee of the executive branch acting in their official capacity may advance an interpretation of the law as the position of the United States that contravenes the President or the Attorney General's opinion on a matter of law."
The move appears to align with the OMB section of Project 2025 written by Vought, who argued that the president should expand his authority by lessening the power of career civil servants and placing the entire federal bureaucracy under White House control. Vought cited the "unitary executive theory," which states that the president should have the sole authority of the executive branch.
Trump has already fired several independent agency directors and ordered mass terminations for probationary workers at multiple government departments.
The president's latest move is set to face legal challenges over the expansion of authority.
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