Questions — and, for some, outrage — intensified over several of President-elect Donald Trump’s cabinet picks Friday, as Washington awaits announcements for more major positions, including the FBI and Treasury chiefs.
Trump has vowed to dismantle the liberal “deep state” he says is running Washington and is banking on his decisive victory — and triumph for Republicans in the US Senate — to give him the political capital he needs to force through his nominees.
Trump, 78, began shaping his team with a number of unremarkable selections, naming conservative Florida Senator and foreign policy hawk Marco Rubio for secretary of state.
But then came a quartet of nominations for leaders of sprawling federal departments in his new government who have little or no relevant experience — but a history of loyalty to the incoming president.
“Presidents are entitled to have the people that they want in these key positions to carry out the mandate that’s been delivered to him by the voters of the United States,” Rubio said Wednesday.
The most controversial nomination, far-right former congressman Matt Gaetz for attorney general, was being investigated by the US Congress over allegations of sexual misconduct and illicit drug use until Wednesday.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a vaccine skeptic, will be the new health secretary if Trump gets his way, while Tulsi Gabbard, a conspiracy theorist who has been accused of spreading Kremlin propaganda, will be director of national intelligence.
“Kennedy is a science-denying, morally bankrupt conspiracy theorist who will endanger people’s lives if placed in a position of authority over health,” said Lisa Gilbert, co-president of progressive advocacy group Public Citizen.
Rounding out the most divisive nominations, ex-Fox News anchor Pete Hegseth has been tapped to run the world’s most powerful military, having never managed a large organization.
Trump has also nominated some of his personal attorneys to be top ranking Justice Department officials.
‘Shock and overwhelm’
The incoming president’s supporters believe his comfortable win over Democrat Kamala Harris last week gives him enormous latitude for an overhaul of the federal bureaucracy and sweeping cuts to government spending.
But the Senate confirmation process for all of his most controversial picks could be tumultuous.
Trump has demanded approval of at least some of his choices without full hearings — through a strategy known as “recess appointments” — his first loyalty test for what will almost certainly be a Senate with a 53-47 Republican edge.
Analysts say his choices demonstrate his determination to move quickly on his campaign promises to eliminate “woke” diversity and environmental policies from all aspects of federal government and private business.
“I do think that they are looking to essentially shock and overwhelm the system so that they can maximize what the system will tolerate,” Trump biographer and New York Times journalist Maggie Haberman told CNN on Thursday.
But he has yet to name leaders of several major departments, and Wall Street remains on tenterhooks waiting for his Treasury secretary pick.
US Senator and occasional Trump whisperer Lindsey Graham is pushing for fellow South Carolinian Scott Bessent to be picked for the prestigious role, although Trump transition co-chair Howard Lutnick is also said to be in the running.
Trump has promised to take on the FBI as part of his federal shake-up, and looks likely to fire director Christopher Wray and a host of other top officials.
Trump appointed Wray in 2017, but his Mar-a-Lago club in Florida was later raided by agents from the 35,000-employee agency seeking to recover classified documents, and he has since been a huge critic of Wray’s leadership.
Former FBI agent and ex-congressman Mike Rogers — another staunch Trump loyalist — looks to be the favorite to replace Wray after meeting the transition team at Mar-a-Lago.
Trump on Friday announced he would appoint his 27-year-old campaign spokeswoman, Karoline Leavitt, as White House press secretary, reportedly the youngest ever in history. She will be tasked with fielding questions from the media, with which her boss has a famously adversarial relationship.
The incoming president also announced the launch of a new National Energy Council to be headed by his former presidential rival Doug Burgum, having already revealed that he wants the North Dakota governor to be his secretary of the interior.
“This council will oversee the path to US energy dominance by cutting red tape, enhancing private sector investments across all sectors of the economy, and by focusing on innovation over longstanding, but totally unnecessary, regulation,” he said in a statement.
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