“The advantage I have now is that I know everyone. I know people. I know the good, the bad, the stupid, the smart.

– Donald Trump, Time Magazine, April 2024

One of the most important powers of the presidency is the power of appointment. There are several hundred federal agencies, and the president has the authority to make several thousand appointments to these agencies as well as his cabinet and various executive branch institutions.

Donald Trump’s first term was marred by several appointments that had to be revoked during the first year. National Security Advisor Michael Flynn was removed from office in less than a month for lying to the FBI and Vice President Pence. The ethics accusations led to the dismissal of several cabinet officials, including the secretary of Health and Human Services; the head of the Environmental Protection Administration; the Secretary of the Interior and the Secretary of the Veterans Administration. The Secretary of State was fired in his first year and the Attorney General resigned or was also fired.

And there were those who resigned less than two years later and lambasted Trump soon after. UN Ambassador Nikki Haley described Trump as “simply toxic” and “unbalanced,” “lacking moral clarity.” Chief of Staff John Kelly said he has never met anyone more unscrupulous than Donald Trump. Attorney General Bill Barr and National Security Advisor John Bolton were equally critical. Among Trump’s top appointees, only four of the 44 top appointees supported his bid for a second term.

Appointments for Trump’s second term cannot be attributed to outside recommendations; they are far worse and more dangerous than those adopted in the first term, when Trump could at least say he appointed people he didn’t really know. So far, Trump appointees lack the skills and experience their particular missions require. They truly are a house of horrors.

The worst and most dangerous nomination is Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense. Various experts will tell you that running the Department of Defense is the most difficult management task in the world. It has nearly 3 million employees, including uniformed military personnel from around the world; civilians and the National Guard. The Pentagon’s budget is more than $900 billion a year, and it’s growing. It was Hegseth who convinced Trump to pardon war criminals during his first term. Hegseth, Fox News’ anchor on its weekend shows, couldn’t be more emphatic, and his confirmation process will test the mettle and mettle of new Senate Majority Leader John Thune.

Another cause for concern is Tulsi Gabbard, as director of national intelligence. In 2017, Gabbard met with Syrian President Bashar al Assad and defended his attacks on Syrian civilians. She even disputed intelligence that documented Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilian communities. More recently, Gabbard said media freedom in Russia was “not that different” from that in the United States. Gabbard was reportedly placed this year on a Transportation Security Administration (TSA) watch list known as “Quiet Skies,” which allows federal air agents to track U.S. citizens and collect information on their behavior.

The nomination of Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) for attorney general speaks for itself. Gaetz can be counted on to lead the Justice Department against Trump’s political enemies, and Gaetz will also move quickly to end the two federal criminal cases against Trump.

Lack of experience appears to be the primary qualification for most appointments. Kristi Noem has been named head of the Department of Homeland Security, which has a budget of $60 billion and a staff of 234,000. He is responsible for the Secret Service, the Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. Elise Stefanik has no training in diplomacy or international relations, but she will be a UN ambassador. Her biggest qualification seems to be her disdain for the United Nations, and that’s how Nikki Haley got the job during Trump’s first term. Of course, the same could be said of ambassadors to the UN such as John Bolton during George W. Bush’s first term or Jeane Kirkpatrick during Ronald Reagan’s first term.

The list is long. John Ratcliff, who politicized intelligence during Trump’s first term as director of national intelligence, will become director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Lee Zelden, who has no experience with climate or energy issues, will be administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency. Mike Huckabee, who claims that Palestinians do not exist and that illegal Israeli settlements in the West Bank are actually legal Israeli communities, will be ambassador to Israel. Stephen Miller, on the far right of the political spectrum, will serve as White House deputy chief of staff for policy, particularly immigration policy. Miller favors mass expulsions, as does new border czar Tom Homan, who favored a family separation policy as a way to deter immigration when he was acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

A worrying aspect of the new national security appointments is their hostility toward China. Such is the case with new National Security Advisor Mike Waltz, who has introduced legislation to rename Dulles International Airport to (you guessed it) Trump International. The expected Secretary of State, Mario Rubio, is both a China hawk and an Iran-Cuba-Venezuela hawk. The Washington Post has already endorsed Rubio’s nomination, saying a tough China policy would win concessions from Xi Jinping. We are sure to have a trade war with China in the near term, but perhaps we shouldn’t rule out the war itself.

All these appointments pale in comparison to Hegseth’s appointment to the Pentagon. There have been 30 secretaries of defense since the creation of the Department of Defense in 1947. Only a handful of these secretaries have been truly successful: George Marshall in the Truman administration; Harold Brown in the Carter administration; and Bill Perry in the Clinton administration. Some of the most savvy failed, like Les Aspin, whose health deteriorated during his short tenure as defense secretary. The first Secretary of Defense, James Forrestal, committed suicide shortly after leaving his post at the Pentagon. Bob Gates and Leon Panetta simply surrendered to the military in uniform and did not act as civilian leaders of the Department of Defense. The fact that Trump has talked about using the Insurrection Act to involve the uniformed military in the fight against domestic violence makes Hegseth’s nomination particularly threatening.

Political loyalty is obviously key to Trump’s selection process. This is certainly true of Ratcliff and Waltz in the national security arena; for Stefanik in the diplomatic field; and for Miller and Homan in the area of ​​immigration. And the situation could get worse before it gets worse, because so far there has been no mention of Jeffrey Clark, Kash Patel, Matthew Whitaker or Richard Grenell, who have been more than loyal to Trump. Stay tuned to this space.