Dem
51
GOP
49
One of the biggest mistakes Donald Trump made in his first term was at least paying nominal attention to the ability of appointees to do their jobs. Top officials like Elaine Chao (Transportation), Dan Coats (DNI), Nikki Haley (UN), John Kelly (Homeland Security), Jim Mattis (Defense), Herbert McMaster (NSA), Mike Pompeo (CIA), David Shulkin (VA) and Rex Tillerson (State) were at least somewhat qualified for their jobs and could have been chosen by any Republican president. Many of them ended up opposing him. He is not going to make that mistake in Trump v2.0.
To make sure that doesn't happen again, Trump has appointed his sons, Donald Jr. and Eric, to be gatekeepers. They will vet all future appointees—not for their ability to do the job but for their loyalty to Donald J. Trump. That will come before anything else. In that way, when Trump says "jump" they will all say "how high?"
The brothers would not officially run the transition team, but whoever is picked to officially run it would understand from the get-go that every candidate for every office has to be run by them before getting serious consideration. One insider said the goal "is to keep the John Boltons of the world outside a second Trump administration." And remember, at the time Bolton was picked, many people thought he was batsh*t crazy and hellbent on starting World War III. People who felt this way, incidentally, were entirely correct. But the goalposts have moved so far that now he seems like one of the normal ones.
Trump's problem is that key groups, like the Heritage Foundation, are making lists of people he could appoint based on their ideology, not based on their personal loyalty to Trump. This is what the brothers are supposed to sniff out. People who are ideologically compatible with Trump but who have their own ideas and don't want direction from him are not welcome next time. Campaign aides Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita made this clear when they put out a statement—aimed directly at the Heritage Foundation—that said "any personnel lists, policy agendas, or government plans published anywhere are merely suggestions. Policy recommendations from external allies are just that—recommendations."
Is the influence of the two brothers better or worse than last time around? It is already clear that Darling Daughter Ivanka and Young Jared are not going to play a role in a second Trump administration. They are too busy playing with the Saudis' money. Given Trump's preference for nepotism as a governing philosophy, Junior and Eric are going to take over their slots. Whether Eric will be as good as Jared at bringing about peace in the Middle East remains to be seen. (V)