Donald Trump names extremists to key administration roles

After appointing many people he denounced as morons to key positions in his first administration, President-elect Donald Trump has announced plans to appoint more right-wing extremists to his Cabinet and high-level government posts.

In his first presidential campaign, Trump ran on a promise to staff his administration with exceptional talent. “I am self funding and will hire the best people, not the biggest donors!” he posted on Facebook in April 2016. His initial Cabinet included an attorney general with a history of racism, an Education secretary who favored public funding for private and religious schools, a Housing and Urban Development secretary with no qualifications, and secretaries of Health and Human Services and Interior with ethics issues. When some of his appointees stood up to him in public or in private, Trump pronounced them “dumb as a rock,” “not mentally qualified,” and “a dope.”

This time around, Trump appears to be surrounding himself with loyalists. “President Trump has publicly said that he’s learned from his first term,” Mike Davis, a right-wing lawyer and friend of Trump, told Reuters on Nov. 11. “Political appointees require both competency and loyalty. You can’t have just one or the other. You need both.”

His picks so far include:

Matt Gaetz for attorney general

Gaetz, a Florida Republican, resigned his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives on Nov. 13, just two days before the House Ethics Committee was scheduled to vote on releasing a report on its investigation into his alleged sexual predation and drug use. A woman now in her twenties told the committee that Gaetz had sex with her when she was a 17-year-old high school student, ABC News reported on Nov. 14, though Gaetz has denied the claim.

In 2017, he cast the lone vote against a law combatting human trafficking, saying he wanted less government.

He has called for violence against protesters demanding an end to police violence, claimed “The Second Amendment is about maintaining within the citizenry the ability to maintain an armed rebellion against the government, if that becomes necessary,” and mocked a teenage abortion rights supporter by saying that she need not worry about becoming pregnant as “Nobody wants to impregnate you if you look like a thumb.”

He co-sponsored a proposed ban on abortion after six weeks’ gestation and voted against a 2021 bill to codify the right to contraception. 

Tulsi Gabbard for director of national intelligence 

Gabbard, a former Hawaii U.S. representative, left the Democratic Party in 2022 and accused its members of “stoking anti-white racism.” On a so-called fact-finding mission to Syria in 2017, she met with its brutal dictator Bashar al-Assad and later told MSNBC he was “not the enemy of the United States.”

Republicans, including Utah Sen. Mitt Romney, have accused her of spreading false Russian propaganda. She echoed Russian claims in 2022 that the U.S. funded secret “biolabs in Ukraine which if breached would release and spread deadly pathogens.” The United States government has denied the existence of any such facilities.

After Trump ordered a drone strike in 2020 that killed Iranian general Qassem Soleimani, Gabbard blasted him for “violating the Constitution, taking military action, taking out a top military commander of another country without any type of congressional authorization or declaration of war.”

Pete Hegseth for Defense secretary

Hegseth, a longtime Fox News host, has no government experience since serving in the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars. In 2019, he successfully lobbied Trump to pardon soldiers accused or convicted of war crimes. He has also opposed U.S. support for Ukraine after Russia’s invasion.

During a Nov. 7 appearance on the Shawn Ryan Show, Hegseth said women shouldn’t be allowed in combat roles and demanded the removal of any military leader who has worked to make the department more inclusive, calling it “DEI woke shit.”

On Nov. 14, a spokesperson for the City of Monterey, California, confirmed that local police had investigated a 2017 sexual assault allegation against Hegseth, though he was not charged and denied wrongdoing.

Elon Musk for co-leader of a new government efficiency department

Musk, the billionaire investor who spent a reported $200 million to elect Trump in 2024, has no experience working in the government. He runs Tesla, SpaceX, and X (formerly Twitter).

He has touted debunked conspiracy theories, including that Jews are stoking anti-white hatred and about a near-fatal attack on the husband of former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. After promising to turn the social media site then known as Twitter into a “platform of free speech” when he purchased it in 2022, he instead censored journalists and critics and amplified right-wing misinformation. The company has lost nearly three quarters of its value since Musk purchased it, according to Fidelity estimates in August.

Kristi Noem for secretary of Homeland Security

Noem, the Republican governor of South Dakota and a former U.S. representative, earned national attention for refusing to take action during the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic to curb the virus’ spread. She also encouraged people to attend a 2021 motorcycle rally that became a superspreader event.

As self-described anti-abortion absolutist, she backed a ban on accessing medication abortion via phone or the internet. Asked in 2022 if Trump bore any responsibility for the Capitol insurrection in January 2021, Noem answered, “I think we all need to examine this country and where we’re going.”

In a memoir published in May, Noem acknowledged killing her pet goat and dog.

Vivek Ramaswamy for co-leader of a new government efficiency department

Ramaswamy, a wealthy biotech executive who unsuccessfully ran for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination also has no government experience.

He has criticized secularism in the Unites States as well as “wokeism, climatism, transgenderism, gender ideology, Covidism,” calls abortion “murder,” and opposes any government involvement in reducing greenhouse gasses. As a candidate, he backed raising the voting age to 25 for most citizens and giving the president authority to abolish federal agencies without congressional approval.

Marco Rubio for secretary of State

Rubio, a Florida Republican U.S. senator, ran against Trump in the 2016 GOP presidential primary. At the time, Rubio called Trump a “con artist” and used a euphemism to mock his genital size. Trump repeatedly belittled him as “little Marco” and called him out for skipping dozens of votes in the Senate.

Rubio has backed abortion bans and voted against codifying a right to contraception. He supported the 2003 U.S. invasion of Iraq, a war Trump falsely claims he opposed.

Elise Stefanik for ambassador to the United Nations

Stefanik, a New York Republican U.S. representative, was first elected to Congress in 2014 as an independent-minded moderate but then steadily moved to the right. She has served as chair of the House Republican Conference since 2021, the caucus’ No. 3 leadership position. 

She voted for a ban on abortion after 20 weeks gestation and against protecting contraception rights. She signed on to an amicus brief backing Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election results and defended him as not to blame for the January 2021 Capitol insurrection.

Stefanik has little experience with foreign policy beyond criticizing the United Nations for what she called ”antisemitic rot” after it passed a resolution calling on Israel to “bring to an end its unlawful presence in the Occupied Palestinian Territory as rapidly as possible.”

Lee Zeldin for Environmental Protection Agency administrator

Zeldin, a former New York Republican U.S. representative, cast pro-environment votes just 14% of the time in Congress, according to the League of Conservation Voters. While he once served in the Conservative Climate Caucus, he opposed New York’s ban on fracking and called state regulations requiring electric heating in new homes a “far-left climate agenda.”

He voted against the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act, which authorized billions of dollars in clean energy and climate change infrastructure, and against the 2021 Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, which invested in electric vehicle infrastructure and climate change mitigation for roads and bridges. He also voted for a ban on abortion after 20 weeks’ gestation in 2017 and against reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act in 2021.