BOULDER, Colorado — Former Interior Secretary David Bernhardt endorsed the need to slim down his old department Friday, but added he does not align with Trump administration budget director Russ Vought’s views on federal employees.
Bernhardt said he would encourage his own children to become civil servants.
“I don’t subscribe to Russ Vought’s comment at all. That’s not my view of public officials,” Bernhardt said in remarks at the University of Colorado School of Law’s Martz Symposium on Public Lands.
Vought, who serves as director of President Donald Trump’s Office of Management and Budget, declared in speeches at private events in 2023 and 2024 that he wanted “bureaucrats to be traumatically affected” and federal workers to be viewed as “the villains.” Those remarks were first published last October by ProPublica.
