Key Agency Slots Almost
Filled – Only a Few Remain
(Agriculture, Transportation, OMB)
A few familiar faces
[click image to enlarge]
[click image to enlarge]
My
score sheet to date follows. More names and notes will be posted as
info is available and refined to fit here.
Introduction
and Background on the 15 Departments and Heads: The Executive
Branch is the President and Vice President and few others who do not require Congressional
approval (e.g., Chief of Staff, special advisers, et al).
There are 15 executive departments with Secretaries
who require Senate confirmation (not in this order – this is alphabetical): 1. Agriculture, 2. Commerce, 3. Defense, 4. Education,
5. Energy, 6. Health and Human Services, 7. Homeland Security, 8. Housing and
Urban Development, 9. Interior, 10. Justice (the AG). 11. Labor, 12. State, 13.
Transportation, 14. Treasury, and the 15. VA.
FYI: THE PRESIDENT and LINE OF SUCCESSION (Note: RED not in line):
1. Vice President
2. Speaker of the House
3. Pres. Pro Tempore of Senate
4. Secretary of State
5. Secretary of
the Treasury
6. Secretary of
Defense
7. Justice
Department (the AG)
8. Secretary of
the Interior
9. Secretary of
Agriculture
10. Secretary
of Commerce
11. Secretary
of Labor
12. Secretary
of HHS
13. Secretary
of HUD
14. Secretary
of Transportation
15. Secretary
of Energy
16. Secretary
of Education
17. Secretary
of VA
18. Secretary
of DHS
1. Rex Tillerson (ExxonMobil CEO) – Secretary of
State: Tillerson has very close personal
ties to Putin… but weakly explained one way by Kellyanne Conway who defended him
arguing that his knowledge of Russia could be an advantage adding: “We look at
it as an asset, not a liability in that it's not that he's hanging around with
Vladimir Putin on the weekend at dinner parties.” (On CBS’s This Morning). Further, Moscow awarded Tillerson their “Order of Friendship” (image here) in 2013 after he made a
deal benefiting Exxon’s access to certain Arctic resources and Russia reported
to be worth some $500 billion. That deal is now on hold due to economic sanctions. The deal was between
ExxonMobil and the Russian state-controlled
oil giant Rosneft. The friendship award
is Russia’s highest honor for a non-Russian citizen.
2. Former TX Gov. Rick “Oops” Perry – Energy Secretary.
He advocated elimination of this same department during failed 2012 WH run
with his now-famous “oops” moment when he could not name the 3rd
agency he said he would eliminate. Asked later, he said “the Energy
Department” and added: “oops.” One for the history books. He also has called Trump a “Barking Carnival
Act.” So, another “oops” moment, um, Rick?
3. Tom Price – Sec. of HHS: He
advocates legislation to ban federal funding for Planned Parenthood. Yes or
No on Federal funding of Planned Parenthood?
Total US: 57%
yes
DEMS: 82% yes
GOP: 27% yes
Price is also a strong opponent of
abortion. He has voted to ban health coverage and federal funding for abortion,
and was a co-sponsor of a bill that would grant a fetus equal protection under
the 14th Amendment. Yes or No should Abortion should be legal in most or all
cases:
Total US: 64% yes
DEMS: 84% yes
GOP: 35% yes
4. Mike Pompeo – Director of CIA: He would advise Trump on intelligence
collection. He has urged Congress to re-establish the bulk collection of
Americans’ domestic calling records, pushing for “a fundamental upgrade to
America’s surveillance capabilities.” Yes or No should government monitoring
communications of American citizens be allowed (in all cases)?
Total US:
57% no.
DEMS: 55%
no.
GOP: 59% no.
5. Betsy DeVos – Sec. of Education: Outspoken proponent of school vouchers
to allow students to attend any school, public or private, using taxpayer
money. Yes or No should tax dollars go
from public schools to vouchers for private or religious schools? (Once
supported common-core now says “Nope, no way”).
Total US:
57% no.
DEMS: 71%
no.
GOP: 46% no
(also split Yes/NO)
6. Scott Pruitt – Sec. of EPA: Big anti-climate change advocate who as
OK AG fought EPA regulations aimed at combating climate change. He is strong
ally of the fossil fuel industry. Yes or
No should there be limits on carbon
emissions from U.S. power plants aimed at reducing future global warming?
Total US:
63% yes.
DEMS: 74%
yes.
GOP: 53%
yes.
7. Sen. Jeff Sessions – for Attorney General: Some
well-known Sessions facts. He became one of the first
members of Congress to endorse Trump last February. Since, he has become a
close adviser on almost every major decision and policy proposal Trump made
during the campaign, such as:
— Helped Trump
communicate his immigration policy.
— Chaired Trump’s
national security advisory committee.
— Advised Trump on who
to choose as VP (he had been in the running, too).
He has opposed nearly every
immigration bill that has come before the Senate the past two decades and that
also includes a path to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally. He's
also fought legal immigration, including guest worker programs for
immigrants in the country illegally and visa programs for foreign workers in
science, math and high-tech saying they are taking “our jobs.” In 2007,
Sessions got a bill passed essentially banning for 10 years federal contractors
who hire illegal immigrants.
He's a debt and military hawk: He is
known for touring Alabama with charts warning of the United States “crippling” debt.
On foreign policy, Sessions has
advocated a get-tough approach, once voting against an amendment banning
“cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment” of prisoners.
He advocates significant spending ($1 trillion) on infrastructure: He also campaigned on a strong
non-interventionist worldview claiming (inaccurately) that he opposed the Iraq
War even before it started.
He's a climate change skeptic: Here is what he said in a 2015 hearing
questioning EPA chief: “Carbon pollution is CO2, and that’s really not a pollutant;
that’s a plant food, and it doesn’t harm anybody except that it might include
temperature increases.”
Accusations of racism have him for years: Actually, they almost derailed it. In 1986, a
Senate committee denied Sessions, then a 39-year-old U.S. attorney in Alabama,
a federal judgeship. His former colleagues testified Sessions used the n-word
and joked about the Ku Klux Klan, saying he thought they were “okay, until he
learned that they smoked marijuana.” By the time that testimony was finished,
Sessions' “reputation was in tatters” (wrote Stanley-Becker in the Wash Post).
In 1986, Sessions defended
himself against accusations of racism. “I am not the Jeff Sessions my
detractors have tried to create,” he told the very same Senate Judiciary
Committee he now sits on. “I am not a racist. I am not insensitive to
blacks.”
Stop by
later for updates.
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