Transition to Governing, 6
Recapping and assessing the first week of appointments
Most “Transition to Governing” columns are for paid-subscribers only. But this recap and assessment is available to all. Please do consider becoming a paid subscriber to support my work and so you have access to all of these posts. You can find the previous columns in this series here: Transition to Governing 1, 2, 3, 4, 5.
In this post:
My Top 12 Takeaways from the selections so far
“Governing Right” is a column about governing well from an American-conservative perspective. I leave campaigns, polling, and politics to others. Here I focus on the people and policies related to public service inside our governing institutions. My recap and assessment of the transition to Trump II (so far) follows: I focus on how we might think about the transition to the new administration if we care about able, decent, principled right-of-center governing.
1. The Good First Day
Because I care about effective, conservative governing, I was skeptical of the transition to Trump II before it began: His first transition and administration were ineffective. But I was pleasantly surprised with his first wave of picks. I thought the selection of Wiles as chief of staff was solid; I was cautiously optimistic. She has a little governing experience, and she seemed capable of bringing some order to what would otherwise be unordered. I understood the selection of Stefanik as UN Ambassador and thought she could be a strong voice on America’s behalf on the world stage. I was encouraged by Rubio’s selection as Secretary of State. Several other initial picks were solid.
It appeared that Mr. Trump had learned from his first term. Maybe this time he’d pick experienced, capable people for senior positions to increase his chances of governing success. Perhaps Trump II would be more serious about governing than Trump I.
2. The Lost Opportunity But Predictable Outcome of Wiles Selection
In my initial comments on Wiles as CoS, I highlighted what might prove to be her strengths. But I also explained (at some length) why those strength might be muted by Mr. Trump himself. She would only be able to bring order and good sense to appointments if Mr. Trump was amenable to that approach. I noted that he trusts his own judgment over all others’; that he hates to be managed; that he wants everyone to know that he is in charge; and that he doesn’t think in terms of responsible, effective governing—he puts other things above that.
I noted that people had hope for his previous chiefs of staff and that this didn’t work out so well.
He had four chiefs of staff the first time around, and none of them succeeded even though there were reasons to believe each might. For example, Reince Priebus, the consummate insider, lasted six months and was fired via Twitter, and John Kelly, a retired 4-star general and former cabinet secretary, was let go and later opposed Trump’s 2024 election, brutally assessing his unfitness for office.
My concerns were realized. Mr. Trump’s worst instincts seemed to have carried the day with numerous important selections.
3. Some Regrettable Selections:
While some of Mr. Trump’s early selections were very good and others were good, some were troubling. Four stand out: Hegseth, Gaetz, Gabbard, and RFK, Jr. Each is unqualified. It does a disservice to the seriousness of American governing to treat such serious roles like this.
In a previous post, I compared this approach to the “Bongcloud” opening in chess. If you know something about chess, you know the Bongcloud is terrible, but you might ironically like it—employing it for jokey or trolling reasons. But it’s also the case that you could use the Bongcloud opening if you don’t know what you’re doing. You might even try to defend the Bongcloud as innovative or representative of “four-dimensional” thinking. But the Bongcloud is neither. It’s just bad.
Governing is not a place for jokes or trolling. It’s also not a place for uninformed decision-making. Choosing unprepared people for important positions suggests the chooser knows entirely too little about the importance of those positions.
4. Non-Loyalists Need Not Apply?
In my first column in this series, I discussed my expectation that Mr. Trump would lean heavily toward true-blue loyalists. This isn’t true of all presidents. Most presidents pick some able, accomplished people who don’t have clear or strong partisan, personal, or ideological loyalties. Most presidents make some “team of rivals” picks, demonstrating that different points of views and loyalties can be valuable. Most presidents even pick one or more people from the other party.
The question for me was whether Mr. Trump would choose some able, accomplished people who are known first and foremost for their ability and accomplishments instead of their loyalty—like leading figures from state governments, previous (non-Trump) administrations, academia, think tanks; folks who are recognized as highly talented and sufficiently aligned. The answer so far is: Pretty much no (see Haley and Pompeo).
Most people selected are known for their loyalty to Mr. Trump. Some are primarily known for their loyalty to Mr. Trump. Said another way, it appears that the first screen being used is, “Are we absolutely certain that this person will be completely loyal?” Then comes the screens about governing experience, ability, comportment, and so on.
5. Is Anyone Saying “No”?
This one is hard to answer. In my initial post, I noted that many able right-of-center leaders might be unwilling to work for Mr. Trump; that is, after seeing the first administration, including the scandals and the president’s often poor treatment of his team, they might decide to demur. So has the Trump team wanted to hire anyone who begged off?
We know, for instance, that Tom Cotton and a few others announced that they would not join the administration. But we also don’t know if they would’ve been invited. I have two suspicions on this point. The first is that since the Trump team appears to have set the loyalty bar so high, those who might not want to work for the administration are probably considered insufficiently loyal for consideration. In other words, the transition is uninterested in the types of people who would not jump at the chance.
The second hunch is that many of the people who would probably say, “No, thanks” are those 1) who see themselves as having a future after the Trump era and 2) who don’t believe they need Mr. Trump’s imprimatur in order to have that future. These folks don’t want to anger the administration, of course, but they don’t feel the need to be associated with it. This is how I see Sen. Cotton.
6. Poor Process
Most presidential candidates spend months and months prior to the election preparing for the possibility of winning the White House. The transition process starts way before Election Day. You spell out positions and priorities. You find people who are aligned and capable. It’s enormous work. Then after the election, the president-elect makes use of that mountain of information to begin the process of discussions and interviews, leading to personnel decisions.
But Mr. Trump showed in 2016 that he doesn’t think much of the transition process; he infamously scrapped months of work by his team and started from scratch. He trusts his gut, not advice or process. That’s why the early decisions this time appear so rushed and occasionally ill-considered. I suspect most individuals have not been sufficiently vetted. And I suspect that because Mr. Trump doesn’t have clear views on most matters it is very hard to assess whether someone is aligned with him on matters of policy. Expressions of loyalty seem to have replaced that (see above).
If the reporting is true, some of the decisions about top officials happened quickly and with little preparation. That speaks to Mr. Trump’s disinterest in the transition process and his faith in his own instincts…and his willingness to swiftly, unceremoniously fire people who don’t work out. Why spend a lot of time on studying, recruiting, interviewing, and vetting if the president can make snap judgments and then dismiss mistakes?
7. Too Little Governing Experience
In my initial post, one of my top questions was whether Mr. Trump would hire more people with more meaningful governing experience this time around. Some, like Rubio, Ratcliffe, and Bergum, do. But Hegseth and Kennedy don’t. Nor Wright. Folks like Gaetz have been in governing roles but no one would ever accuse Gaetz of being serious about governing. The selection of Musk and Ramaswamy—two people with no governing experience—to lead an effort to make governing more effective is highly instructive. Mr. Trump does not value this kind of experience. And that is a problem for effective governing.
8. You Should Be Happy If…
If you voted for Mr. Trump not because of his ability to govern but because you like his disruptiveness and gift for trolling his opponents, you should be pleased. He is showing that he is not changed from his first term. He will use appointments (and presumably his other official powers) to shake things up and exasperate or infuriate those on the other side. Most people wouldn’t have imagined the selections of Gaetz, Hegseth, Gabbard, and Kennedy; those choices would’ve been thought too outlandish given the seriousness of the roles. But Mr. Trump chose them anyway. Or maybe he chose them because of that reason. If that is your aesthetic, you have reason to smile.
9. You Should Be Frustrated If…
If you want Mr. Trump to be a highly effective governing leader, you should be frustrated by many of his early choices. Some of these individuals will likely not end up in the jobs. But the political fights will take time and energy. The diminished political capital of the individuals who do make it will inhibit their effectiveness. Their lack of experience and governing capability will also inhibit their effectiveness.
10. Will the Senate Resist Anything?
As I wrote in my first post in this series, much will depend on the US Senate. Remember, the GOP will have a several-seat majority. Will they rubber-stamp all choices, no matter how objectionable? Will they resist one or two picks? Will they push back on more?
Yes, this matters for policy and personnel. A lot. But there are two other facets we have to think about… (see #11 and #12).
11. Will Trump’s Lame-Duck Status Matter?
Presidents can only serve two terms. So we know this is Mr. Trump’s last four years on center stage. At some point, GOP officials will start to feel some degree of independence from him. But when?
For instance, any GOP senator elected this year won’t face voters until Mr. Trump is two years removed from office. So do they feel more freedom to resist now? Will they be the ones to vote “No” on controversial nominees?
Or will independence only happen after the midterm? Only after Mr. Trump leaves office?
Said more directly: Mr. Trump can only get his appointments if GOP senators acquiesce. Will they?
12. Watch Out for Judge Selections
Though Mr. Trump mostly selected standard Federalist-Society-approved individuals for the bench during his first term, that might change. He’s evidently unhappy that they were not more loyal to him. So he very well could pick more controversial judges this time around.
If the US Senate rubber stamps even his most controversial cabinet picks, we should anticipate his selection of highly loyal, even highly controversial figures for the bench. That would include SCOTUS should any seats open up. If the Senate shows independence now, that might shape Mr. Trump’s choice of judicial nominees.
If GOP Senators don’t want to deal with bruising fights over radioactive judicial nominees later, they might want to vote down unqualified cabinet picks now.