WASHINGTON (AP) – Donald Trump elicited wild cheers on the campaign trail by pledging to “drain the swamp” in Washington, but the president-elect’s transition team is populated largely with creatures of the capital, including former federal bureaucrats, think-tank academics, corporate lawyers and special-interest lobbyists.
An internal organisational chart for the Trump transition team lists more than 30 names, some well-known within the GOP establishment. They are tasked with helping to select and vet Trump’s Cabinet, as well as map out the key policy initiatives the new administration will pursue.
Their areas of experience and policy expertise on the chart hint at future efforts to restrict abortion, strip away consumer protections, boost defence spending and dismantle environmental regulations. Key members of Trump’s team are also advocates for sweeping privatisation of government programmes, including Social Security.
“Personnel is policy,” said Republican operative Ron Kaufman, who also served in George W Bush’s White House.
The team will not necessarily carry over into the Trump administration – though members of past transition teams often have. Instead, they are in charge of putting together hiring recommendations, working with outgoing appointees and laying the groundwork for administration’s opening months.
“For people who voted for him thinking that he’d shake things up, I don’t think they thought he was going to privatise everything,” said Dean Baker, a progressive economist and founder of the Center for Economic and Policy Research. “He runs this populist, anti-Wall Street campaign, and he turns to Wall Street and lobbying guys.”
The behind-the-scenes transition operation is being run by Ron Nichol, a senior partner at The Boston Group, a management consulting firm where 2012 Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney launched his business career. A former nuclear submarine officer, Nichol oversees five teams targeted at “Agency Transformation and Innovation”.
This combination of pictures shows recent portraits of the President-elect’s children (from L) Eric Trump, Donald Trump Jr, Ivanka Trump and her husband Jared Kushner. The four family members were named to the transition team’s executive committee. – AFP
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