WASHINGTON (AP) — There’s a standard trait that President-elect Donald Trump is clearly prizing as he selects these to serve in his new administration: expertise on tv.
Trump loves that “central casting” look, as he likes to name it.
Trump, a former actuality tv star himself, has made no secret of his intention to stack his administration with loyalists after his decisive 2024 election win — together with some whose lack of related expertise has raised considerations amongst lawmakers. However he’s additionally working to arrange a extra forceful administration on this time period, and in his eyes, lots of these individuals occur to intersect with superstar.
The development was not misplaced on Democratic Rep. Jim Himes of Connecticut, who posted on social media after the Oz nomination: “We are becoming the world’s first nuclear-armed reality television show.”
For good measure, Himes added: “Just spitballing here, but what if the Attorney General and the Secretary of HHS fight each other in an octagonal cage?” That was a reference to Trump’s affinity for the UFC fighters who do battle within the octagon.
Selecting TV personalities isn’t that uncommon for the once-and-future president: Various his first-term decisions — John Bolton, Larry Kudlow, Heather Nauert and Mercedes Schlapp, have been all on TV — principally additionally on Fox. Omarosa Manigault Newman, a confrontational first-season member of Trump’s NBC present “The Apprentice,” was briefly on the White Home earlier than she was fired.
Former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican who ran Trump’s 2016 transition group till he was fired, stated that eight years in the past, Trump held “Apprentice-like interviews at Bedminster,” summoning potential hires to his membership in New Jersey.
On a name on Tuesday organized by the Council on International Relations, Christie stated this yr’s Cupboard decisions are totally different than 2016’s but it surely’s nonetheless “Donald Trump casting a TV show.”
“He’s casting,” Christie stated.
As for Oz, Trump stated: “He won nine Daytime Emmy Awards hosting ‘The Dr. Oz Show,’ where he taught millions of Americans how to make healthier lifestyle choices.”
It’s additionally true that these in search of positions in Trump’s orbit typically take to the airwaves to audition for an viewers of 1. Tom Homan, Trump’s alternative for “border czar,” is a frequent Fox contributor. Ohio Sen. JD Vance was chosen as Trump’s working mate partly due to how effectively he comes throughout on air.
Whereas the Arizona name finally proved appropriate, it set in movement inside second-guessing and led some Fox personalities to embrace conspiracy theories, which finally value the community $787 million to settle a defamation lawsuit by Dominion Voting Techniques.
However Trump continues to be an avid watcher — the community supplies Trump a window into conservative considering, with commentary from Republican lawmakers and thinkers who’re, typically, talking on to the president-elect.