How Trump plans to get his ‘mega-Maga’ team approved – and what it would mean

Is he offering up shaky candidates to make his other picks appear better? Or is he actually taking aim at the Department of Justice?

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Trump Force One was cruising toward Washington DC when the plan to appoint Matt Gaetz as attorney general was hatched.
Mr Gaetz, a controversial conservative star, was on the plane with him as it hurtled towards the capital for key transition talks.
But it was one of Donald Trump’s closest legal advisors who lobbied hard for the appointment, all the while the president-elect’s chief of staff, thought to be a moderating force, was in an adjacent room.
When the nomination was announced it was met by dismay in the media and anger even among some Republicans in Congress.
Making Mr Gaetz lead the Department of Justice, which hounded him over underage sex allegations for two years, was described as “reckless” or even “god-tier trolling” of Mr Trump’s political opponents.
Some on Capitol Hill speculated whether it was a trap. Was Mr Trump offering up a shaky candidate to make his other picks in his Cabinet appear more reasonable?
Scepticism about whether or not Mr Gaetz would even get through the Congressional hearings was rife, with 10 Republican senators said to be willing to vote against.
However, game playing aside, the appointment of Mr Gaetz also follows Mr Trump’s loose at times campaign pledge to go after the DoJ for investigating his own alleged crimes.
And with Mr Gaetz he also appears to have a loyal acolyte who would push for a full dismantling of federal institutions, or the “deep state”, so he can remould them to his will.
Complete control over the Department of Justice and the removal of its normal practice of keeping politics and law enforcement separate would enable Mr Trump to go after his enemies with criminal prosecutions.
He has suggested Jack Smith, the special counsel who pursued two federal prosecutions of Mr Trump, could be a target.
Mr Gaetz has also spoken of closing the FBI, the agency behind raids at Mr Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort to retrieve classified documents.
Mr Trump’s first Cabinet appointments early this week were hardliners and foreign policy hawks, some of whom even Democrats said they were comfortable with.
But late on Tuesday and by Wednesday Mr Trump’s Cabinet picks took a more radical turn.
They included Pete Hegseth, the axe-throwing ultra-conservative military veteran and Fox News personality as his defence secretary, and Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democrat congresswoman-turned-Trump-fanatic who is accused of being soft on Vladimir Putin as director of national intelligence.
All three nominations fit the bill for a selection strategy, as reported by The Telegraph earlier this week, that involved vetting candidates for signs of disloyalty in the wake of the Jan 6 insurrection.
As a Congressman, Mr Gaetz introduced legislation that would limit the sentences of anyone who participated in the attacks on the US Capitol.
And if confirmed, he will be in charge of the Department of Justice, the very department responsible for a now-closed federal sex trafficking investigation he was embroiled in.
Mr Hegseth, a man who does not believe women should occupy front-line roles in the military, will be responsible for America’s 1.3 million serving soldiers.
Despite some misgivings about Mr Trump’s foreign policy plans ahead of his 2016 election victory, Mr Hegseth soon fell in line as one of the president-elect’s most fervent television cheerleaders.
And Ms Gabbard, who was credited with preparing Mr Trump for his election debate with Kamala Harris, will oversee 18 different spy agencies.
She had long been a popular American figure with Russian state media, and was accused of parroting Kremlin propaganda by claiming there were “25 plus US-funded biolabs in Ukraine” shortly after Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of the country.
In 2017, Ms Gabbard also visited Syria on a “fact-finding mission”, where she met Bashar al-Assad, the Syrian president, whose regime was propped up by America’s enemies Iran and Russia.
The then-Democrat said she was “sceptical” that Assad’s troops were behind a deadly chemical weapons attack, which even Mr Trump attributed to the despot’s regime.
The US Constitution stipulates that the Senate must approve a series of presidential appointments, including ambassadors and Supreme Court judges.
The process starts with nominees being subjected to hearings by committees which have jurisdiction over the government department.
After a series of background checks, the committee then votes on whether to accept or reject the candidate. This is followed by a Senate-wide vote, requiring a simple majority of senators to approve the nominee.
Only a small number of picks have ever been spurned by the Senate, normally because candidates withdraw ahead of the final vote if the defeat seems inevitable.
Mr Trump saw his initial first-term selections for defence secretary, Patrick Shanahan, and labor secretary, Andrew Puzder, both withdraw.
The current race is incredibly tight, with Mr Gaetz, Mr Hegseth and Ms Gabbard needing at least 50 senators to be confirmed, meaning they can only afford to lose the backing of three Republicans.
The Senate is currently controlled by 53 Republicans, compared to 47 Democrats.
“Gaetz has a better shot at having dinner with Queen Elizabeth II than being confirmed by the senate,” Max Miller, a Trump ally and Republican, said.
He added: “I think he has a zero per cent shot of getting through the Senate… reckless pick.”
Michael Guest, the Republican head of the ethics committee, said he was “surprised” by the decision to nominate Mr Gaetz.
His committee is investigating the candidate for sex trafficking, allegations of illegal drug use, misuse of campaign funds and accepting bribes. It would be closed if Mr Gaetz resigns to become attorney general.
Other Republicans have described Mr Gaetz’s appointment as a distraction so that Mr Trump can choose another controversial, but more acceptable, candidate at a later date.
In the past, Ms Gabbard has also been on the receiving end of sharp Republican criticism for her social media posts containing pro-Kremlin narratives. She has been branded “traitorous” and accused of “parroting fake Russian propaganda”.
But Mr Trump may have a strategy up his sleeve to ram through his nominations without any scrutiny.
The president-elect has demanded that the next Senate majority leader allow for recess appointments, which would allow him to unilaterally install members of his top team.
The powers to make recess appointments dates back to the era of horse-and-cart travel, when the Senate was often out of action for months at a time because of the time it took to move around the country.
To avoid key appointments being held up, the founding fathers wrote an exception into the Constitution, permitting presidents to fill vacancies during a period of recess.
George W Bush made 171 recess appointments, Bill Clinton made 139 and Barack Obama made at least 32, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The controversial tactic, which usually attracts allegations of a power grab, was not used by either Mr Trump or Mr Biden.
In 2014, the Supreme Court ruled against a number of Mr Obama’s appointments, branding them unconstitutional.
By squeezing his three controversial picks into office, Mr Trump would move a step closer to carrying out his “deep state” revenge.
The president-elect has long demonised the intelligence community, especially after it accused Russia of being behind a campaign to help him beat Hillary Clinton in 2016. Mr Trump later sided with Putin when asked if he believed his own intelligence agencies or the Russian president at a joint press conference two years later in Helsinki.
A supportive attorney general could also agree to publish the names of the Department of Justice and FBI officials behind the probe into Mr Trump’s alleged removal of confidential documents from the White House, which ended with him being charged with felonies.
It has unnerved many serving DoJ officials, who have spoken of their fears over Mr Gaetz becoming their boss in less than two months.
Dave Laufman, a former top official, said the Republican would turn the department into a “petting zoo for Trump”.
While an anonymous official, still serving in the department, told ABC News that there would be “mass resignations if he gets sworn in”.
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