President-elect Donald Trump is rolling out his nominees for roles on his cabinet and other leadership positions at a record pace. Here are some observations about a handful of his picks so far:
The obvious place to start is with Matt Gaetz. This one came out of left field. Say what you want about Merrick Garland or Jeff Sessions, but put either’s resume up against Matt Gaetz and the distinctions are glaring. The only explanation I can come up with is that Trump is simply giving the DOJ a big middle finger by saying “this is the guy that I’m choosing to be your boss.” On a more cynical note, perhaps it is a favor to Gaetz who needed a good reason to resign his house seat before his ethics probe results were unveiled, and Trump has no intention of seeing him confirmed. I hope he’s not.
Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. This is the opposite of the Gaetz nomination in my mind. While these aren’t official cabinet positions, Musk and Ramaswamy have the opportunity to do something that’s been needed since the 1970s. Even after Franklin Roosevelt added 13 new federal agencies in the 1930s, the U.S. government had fewer than 1 million civilian employees in 1940. It doubled by 1952 to over 2 million. Amazingly, we have hovered around that 2 million mark since the 1950s. But those 2 million have overseen an increase in non-military spending at the federal level from around $2 trillion in 2000 to over $5 trillion in 2023.
One of my friends defines the Democratic party as the “tax and spend” party and the Republican party as the “don’t tax and spend” party. Both parties are culpable and we need an intervention. The U.S. government doesn’t have a revenue problem, it has a spending problem. Even if we seized every dollar from every billionaire citizen, it wouldn’t put a dent in our national debt. I’m optimistic that Musk and Ramaswamy will come up with some sensible proposals.
Women. Mark Cuban recently stated on The View, “Donald Trump, you never see him around strong, intelligent women. Ever.” Of course this got pushback from Trump supporters including Nikki Haley. Trump’s picks include an array of bright, successful women, including Susie Wiles as Chief of Staff, Karoline Leaven as Press Secretary, Linda McMahon as Education Secretary, Elise Stefanik as UN Ambassador, Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence, and Kristi Noem as Secretary for Homeland Security. One might disagree with some of these ladies on policy, but no one can say that any of them are empty suits (which one could say about Matt Gaetz).
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. There is a lot of howling from the left regarding this pick. They dismiss him as a vaccine conspiracy nut. I listened to Joe Rogan’s interview of RFK Jr. earlier this year and came away thinking that this is a guy who should be listened to. Not because he’s always right, but because he’s not afraid of asking hard questions. His concerns about the possible link between childhood immunizations and autism have largely been determined to be unfounded. But the causes of the spike in autism diagnoses in recent decades deserves to be researched further. One thing we learned during COVID that RFK Jr already knew is that government officials and the pharma industry don’t like being challenged. Virtually every doctor who questioned the efficacy of the COVID vaccines was censored. Upon further study, many of them have proven to be correct. I’m optimistic about an RFK Jr period of leadership at the Department of Health. He’s clearly an upgrade.
Pete Hegseth. I don’t yet have an opinion on Hegseth. His military service and his patriotism are a plus, but there are some warning signs. Vanity Fair published an article this week that accuses Hegseth of rape in 2017. Is this Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch all over again or is this one legit? Hard to know with the progressives as they love to play this card. The other card they are playing is that Hegseth is a white supremacist or Christian national as evidenced by his chest tattoo. Fox News wrote a piece defending their former teammate. White supremacism is another tiresome accusation that the left loves to try to pin on right-center candidates. If the rape allegation has merit, that should be a problem, but you can forget about the Christian nationalism complaint. While that’s being sussed out, the important question is, “is Pete Hegseth the right guy to lead the Department of Defense?” I can definitively say that “I don’t know.” I can also confidently say that the people that are currently in charge are not.
Linda McMahon. This is an interesting choice as Trump is on record favoring the elimination of this agency altogether. This was Reagan’s position, but by the time we got to George W. Bush, Republicans passed the No Child Left Behind Act, full of bureaucratic edicts which entrenched this agency even further. It is obvious that this agency that was created by Jimmy Carter in 1979 has failed to close achievement gaps between rich and poor, white and black, etc. It’s hard to see how it adds value to the state and local organizations it supports (to some degree) and controls (in other ways). I’m on record supporting school choice and local control of education. Even though this agency has fewer than 5,000 employees and a budget of “only” $238 billion, I predict Musk and Ramaswamy will recommend this agency be eliminated. If so, I will applaud. And Linda McMahon is an excellent choice to manage the transition.