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Some of President-elect Donald Trump’s nominees for key executive branch positions have raised red flags as well as eyebrows on both sides of the aisle.
All presidents, of course, have the right to nominate whomever they want. But the Senate has the constitutional duty to ensure that those nominees are qualified and appropriate for the given position. As Alexander Hamilton explained in 1788 in Federalist No. 76, the Senate’s duty to provide “advice and consent” is designed to serve as “an excellent check upon a spirit of favoritism in the President,” which “would tend greatly to prevent the appointment of unfit characters.”
The Republicans will have a narrow Senate majority in 2025. If all Democrats vote nay on a nomination, only four Republicans would need to join them to tank it. When Trump nominated Rep. Matt Gaetz to be attorney general, the negative reaction was so swift from some Republican senators that Gaetz was dropped within days.
Ideally, nominees should have the knowledge and experience to direct large departments or agencies with multibillion-dollar budgets. They should be able to pass an FBI background check and satisfy the qualifications for a security clearance.
As I write this, it appears that Trump’s controversial nominee for secretary of defense, Peter Hegseth—who, among other things, has been accused of sexual assault, public drunkenness and financial mismanagement—might suffer the same fate as Gaetz.
The Department of Defense is arguably the world’s largest government institution, with over 3 million uniformed and civilian employees; bases and deployments around the world; cutting-edge military technology, including an arsenal of nuclear weapons; and an $800 billion annual budget. Whoever serves as its chief needs to have at least some experience leading a large organization and, since that person will literally deal in life and death, should have a stable personality
as well.
To paraphrase Hamilton, Hegseth is drawing so much flak because he might be an unfit character.
Another nominee who has raised concern is former Democratic Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s pick for director of national intelligence. She has no intelligence experience whatsoever and has openly sided with Russia’s Vladimir Putin and Syria’s ousted leader Bashar al-Assad. She would oversee the entire intelligence community, including its 17 civilian and military agencies.
On the other hand, Trump’s nominee for secretary of state, Sen. Marco Rubio—the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee—appears qualified for that position. The same can be said for Trump’s pick for national security adviser, Rep. Mike Waltz, a decorated Green Beret and former Pentagon adviser to two Republican secretaries of defense and Vice President Dick Cheney.
Trump will face many vexing foreign policy and national security challenges when he reenters office. Here are just a few:
◗ The Ukraine war that has pitted democratic Europe and NATO against Putin’s dictatorship, now with North Korean combat troops coming to Russia’s aid.
◗ Conflicts in the Middle East, including the Gaza war that seems to have no end in sight, a fragile ceasefire between Israel and Hezbollah that could break down at any moment, and a reinvigorated Syrian Civil War, with Russia, Iran and Hezbollah bolstering Assad’s brutal regime.
◗ Challenges posed by the political instability rocking some of our most important democratic allies: France, Germany and South Korea.
America remains the world’s most significant global power and foreign crises and the actions of our adversaries, including China, will top the agenda of his second term. Trump, with Senate approval, should put a competent, qualified and responsible team in place, for the sake of America’s national security.•
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Atlas, a political scientist, is a senior lecturer at the Paul H. O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University-Indianapolis. His opinions do not necessarily reflect those of Indiana University. Send comments to ibjedit@ibj.com.
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Quick guide to parsing our incoming president’s cabinet nominations: If establishment hacks such as Perfesser Atlas here think they are great and qualified (see: Rubio, little Marco), they are actually awful and will continue the current bipartisan policies of endless war and never-ending growth of the surveillance state. If they are freaking out and using their unlimited access to establishment media to attack a nomination (see Gabbard, Lt. Col. Tulsi), that’s how you can tell this is someone who will fight, fight, fight against the blob and actually change things.