The Road Ahead: What to Expect from Trump’s Transition

Washington: Donald Trump ‘s impending return to White House means he’ll want to stand up an entirely new ministration from one that served under President Joe Biden . His team is also pledging that second won’t look much like first one Trump established after his 2016 victory.

president-elect w has a 75-day transition period to build out his team before Inauguration Day arrives on Jan. 20. One top item on to-do list: filling around 4,000 government positions with political appointees, people who are specifically tapped for ir jobs by Trump’s team.

That includes everyone from secretary of state and or hes of Cabinet departments to those selected to serve part-time on boards and commissions. Around 1,200 of those presidential appointments require Senate confirmation, which should be easier with Senate w shifting to Republican control. Here’s what to expect:

What will transition look like?

Though turver in new ministration will be total, Trump will be familiar with what he needs to accomplish. He built an entirely new ministration for his first term and has definite ideas on what to do differently this time.

He’s alrey floated some names.

Trump said at his victory party early Wednesday that former presidential hopeful and anti-vaccination activist Robert Kennedy Jr. will be tapped to “help make America healthy again,” ding that “we’re going to let him go to it.” Ahe of election, Trump didn’t reject Kennedy’s calls to end fluoridated water. Trump has also pledged to make South African-born Elon Musk, a vocal supporter of Trump campaign, a secretary of federal “cost-cutting,” and Tesla CEO has suggested he can find trillions of dollars in government spending to wipe out.

transition is t just about filling jobs. Most presidents-elect also receive daily or near-daily intelligence briefings during transition.

In 2008, outgoing President George W. Bush personally briefed President-elect Barack Obama on U.S. covert operations. When Trump was preparing to take office in 2016, Obama’s national security viser, Susan Rice, briefed Michael Flynn, her designated successor in new ministration. In 2020, Trump’s legal challenges of election’s results delayed start of transition process for weeks, though, and presidential briefings with Biden didn’t begin until v. 30.

Who is helping Trump through process?

Trump’s transition is being led primarily by friends and family, including Kennedy Jr. and former Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard, as well as president-elect’s ult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, and his running mate, JD Vance. Transition co-chairs are Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick and Linda McMahon, former wrestling executive who previously led Small Business ministration during Trump’s first term.

Lutnick said this year’s operation is “about as different as possible” from 2016 effort, which was first led by Chris Christie. After he won eight years ago, Trump fired Christie, tossed out plans former New Jersey goverr h me and gave job of running transition to n-Vice President-elect Mike Pence.

At start of his first term, Trump assembled an original Cabinet that featured some more mainstream Republicans and business leers who ultimately disappointed, or broke publicly with him, or both. This time, Trump has promised to value loyalty as much as possible — a philosophy that may ensure he makes picks that are more closely aligned to his ideological beliefs and bombastic professional style.

Unlike campaign of Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris , Trump’s team didn’t sign any pre-Election Day transition agreements with General Services ministration, which essentially acts as federal government’s landlord. He has refore alrey missed delines to agree with GSA on logistical matters like office and tech support and with White House on access to ncies, including documents, employees and facilities.

New transition rules

In 2020, Trump argued that widespre voter fraud — which hn’t actually occurred — cost him election, delaying start of transition from his outgoing ministration to Biden’s incoming one for weeks.

Four years ago, Trump-appointed he of GSA, Emily Murphy, determined that she h legal standing to determine a winner in presidential race because Trump was still challenging results in court. That held up funding and cooperation for transition.

It wasn’t until Trump’s efforts to subvert election results h collapsed across key states that Murphy agreed to formally “ ascertain a president-elect ” and begin transition process. Trump eventually posted on social media that his ministration would cooperate.

To prevent that kind of holdup in future transitions, Presidential Transition Improvement Act of 2022 mandates that transition process begin five days after election — even if winner is still in dispute. That is designed to avoid long delays and means that “an ‘affirmative ascertainment’ by GSA is longer a prerequisite for gaining transition support services,” according to ncy guidelines on new rules.

uncertainty stretched even longer after 2000 election, when five weeks elapsed before Supreme Court settled contested election between Republican George W. Bush and Democrat Al Gore. That left Bush with about half usual amount of time to man to transition government from outgoing Clinton ministration. That ultimately led to questions about national security gaps that may have contributed to U.S. being underprepared for Sept. 11 attacks following year.