Nov.26

electoral-vote.com

Dem 47

   

GOP 53

The Latest Round of Appointments

Donald Trump announced a bunch more appointments, nearly all of them on Friday afternoon/evening of last week. Was he trying to sneak them in, either by flooding the zone, or by announcing right before the deadest part of the news cycle? Maybe. In any event, we wanted to wait a bit to see what interesting information came out. And now, here's a rundown:

• Secretary of the Treasury: This is the biggie. Despite reports that his candidacy had been done in by backbiting in the Trump camp, the President-elect nonetheless chose hedge fund manager Scott Bessent. He's the kind of normal pick who will make Wall Street breathe a sigh of relief. It is extremely probable that what closed the deal was Bessent's 333 plan. He wants to see 3% annual growth in the economy, a reduction of the deficit to 3% of GDP (it's about 6% right now), and an increase in oil production of 3 million barrels a day. The plausibility and/or utility of these three targets is open to debate, but it's a very simple plan. Trump loves simple plans.
  
  
• Housing and Urban Development: To Trump, "Urban" and "Black" are synonyms. So, once again, his HUD Secretary will be a Black guy. It was Ben Carson the first time out, and this time it will be former NFL player and former Texas legislator Scott Turner. He's engaged in some substantial community-level activism, which is actually a pretty good background for a HUD secretary, although let us not forget that Republicans roundly mocked such work when it was on Barack Obama's résumé.
  
  
• Secretary of Labor: As expected, Trump gave the nod to soon-to-be-former representative Lori Chavez-DeRemer. Interestingly, she's actually pro-labor, especially by Republican standards, having supported the Protecting the Right to Organize Act while in Congress. Consequently, right-wing media is hopping mad about the pick. Apparently, "Labor" is the Latino/a position in Trump's mind, as Chavez-DeRemer will be only the second Latino/a in his second Cabinet, while Secretary of Labor Alexander Acosta was the only Latino in the first.
  
  
• Secretary of Agriculture: Trump's selection to lead Agriculture is Brooke Rollins. She is a lawyer, worked for a right-wing think tank for 15 years, was director of the Domestic Policy Council during the first Trump administration, and worked for a different right-wing think tank (the ultra-Trumpy America First Policy Institute) after he left office. The careful reader will notice that nothing here has anything to do with agriculture or agriculture policy. Assuming she is confirmed (no sure thing, because farm interests want a Secretary who knows what she is talking about), she will be tasked with helping farms deal with a bunch of current challenges, with the effects of tariffs possibly piled on top of that (see below).
  
  
• Surgeon General: For this no-longer-in-the-Cabinet position, Trump has chosen Dr. Janette Nesheiwat. On one hand, she's not a vaccine denier. On the other hand, she believes that many medical problems are solved with "miracles," rejects the notion of gender dysphoria and, like so many right-wing physicians, is a grifter who hawks nutritional supplements of dubious merit. Oh, and she's a Fox contributor.
  
  
• Director of the Food and Drug Administration: Here we have another doctor, and another Fox news contributor. In this case, it's Dr. Marty Makary, who was Fox's favorite talking head for pieces about COVID-19 and/or vaccines during the pandemic. This despite the fact that Makary is an oncologist, not a virologist. The good news is that Makary is on staff at Johns Hopkins, which might be the most respected medical school in the nation. The bad news is that he's said he likes a lot of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.'s ideas, and that Kennedy is "not a controversial figure." As coincidence would have it, RFK will be Makary's new boss, assuming they are both confirmed.
  
  
• Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: A third doctor, though he's not on Fox News, so we're not sure how he got an interview. In any case, Trump has chosen former representative Dave Weldon, who might be an M.D., but who is also a vaccine skeptic. That is right, the guy who will be responsible for preventing disease does not believe in vaccines. We are not sure what his plan is, maybe burning incense and singing "Stayin' Alive," by the Bee Gees.
  
  
• Director of the Office of Management and Budget: In another instance of getting the band back together, Trump will again appoint Russell Vought to lead OMB. He is yet another person who was involved with Project 2025, the document that Trump knows nothing about. In any event, it will be up to Vought to figure out the precise details for how the Trump administration will dramatically increase the national debt by lavishing money on the military.

With this latest round of nominations, there is no Cabinet post (i.e., job in the line of succession) that is without a candidate. Among Cabinet-level posts, United States Trade Representative, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, Administrator of the Small Business Administration, and Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy remain unfilled.

And so it goes. (V & Z)