The Patriot Post® · Trump's Team to Change Washington
In the roughly three weeks since his second presidential election victory, Donald Trump has been busy assembling a cabinet. There have definitely been a few surprises and controversies, but overall, Trump seems to have learned something from entering the White House fresh and inexperienced in 2017.
“He did not have a network [then],” said the Manhattan Institute’s Brian Riedl. “He relied on Washington old hands and the conservative establishment to help staff his administration, and in many ways he wound up regretting that.”
This doesn’t mean things have gone smoothly this time around. In fact, some of his picks have already been subject to swatting and bomb threats.
There were his own seemingly odd choices, too. First, there was the Matt Gaetz brouhaha, which ended with his withdrawal from consideration for attorney general and Trump nominating Pam Bondi instead. With that out of the way, Trump’s pick for defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, has been getting the most media criticism, with dubious allegations of sexual assault swirling. However, it would appear that the real objection to Hegseth is that he is not a Pentagon man. Clearly, Trump likes this; we’ll see if Senate Republicans do, too.
Trump’s other controversial picks include Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to lead the Department of Health and Human Services and Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence. There’s a lot to say about them, but for now, let’s just leave it that both are former Democrats who ran in Democrat presidential primaries. Now they’re part of Team Trump.
Indeed, Trump has assembled the most ideologically diverse cabinet in American history. Leave it to the Leftmedia to pooh pooh this impressive fact and whine that Trump’s cabinet isn’t racially diverse enough. Evidently, identity politics dies hard with the Leftmedia. No wonder so many Americans have stopped listening.
Here’s the full list of Trump’s picks for cabinet and other significant posts:
- White House chief of staff: Susie Wiles
- National security advisor: Michael Waltz
- Border czar: Tom Homan
- Press secretary: Karoline Leavitt
- Treasury: Scott Bessent
- Attorney general: Pam Bondi
- State: Marco Rubio
- Interior: Doug Burgum
- Agriculture: Brooke Rollins
- Commerce: Howard Lutnick
- Labor: Lori Chavez-DeRemer
- Health and Human Services: Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
- Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services: Dr. Mehmet Oz
- CDC: Dr. Dave Weldon
- FDA: Dr. Marty Makary
- Surgeon general: Janette Nesheiwat
- National Institutes of Health: Dr. Jay Bhattacharya
- Education: Linda McMahon
- Transportation: Sean Duffy
- Veteran Affairs: Doug Collins
- Energy: Chris Wright
- Homeland Security: Kristi Noem
- National Intelligence: Tulsi Gabbard
- CIA: John Ratcliffe
- Office of Management and Budget: Russ Vought
- Environmental Protection Agency: Lee Zeldin
- Housing and Urban Development: Scott Turner
- Trade representative: Jamieson Greer
It’s not an official government agency or position, but Trump also tapped Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy to run the Department of Government Efficiency, which will advise his administration on how to streamline government, cut waste, and, to adulterate Kamala Harris’s favorite line, unburden Americans with the regulations that have been.
Looking at most of Trump’s picks, it becomes apparent that he has chosen communicators over administrators and Washington outsiders over career bureaucrats and politicians. Trump clearly wants these individuals to help him communicate his efforts to change and eliminate the waste and corruption within the federal government.
They all have a tall task ahead of them, but unlike in his first term, the majority of the American people have given Trump a mandate. America wants change, and Trump appears committed to delivering on that change. His cabinet looks like a good start.