Donald Trump Targets Civil Service Members who Aren’t On Board with his Agenda as he Assembles his Cabinet

President-elect Donald Trump will not repeat the same mistakes of his first administration. Some of the people who undermined Trump and the MAGA movement the most from 2016 to 2020 were individuals inside of his administration such as Brey and Fauci. The forty-seventh President won’t let this happen again. I have criticized Trump recently for some of his less experienced picks for key positions such as Pete Hegseth for Secretary of Defense , since these individuals are unlikely to be able to take on the deep state and reform the massive D.C. bureaucracy. Still, what appears to be the President’s overall strategy with his cabinet picks seems to be a clear intent to disrupt the inner workings of a broken system in Washington D.C by targeting certain members of the civil service.

What Trump is doing is putting pressure on the civil servants and the bureaucracy throughout Washington to resign if they don’t want to serve under people who are fully onboard with his governing perspective. In the President-elect’s first term he relied on advisers such Chris Christie when he appointed people such as FBI Director Brey. Many civil servants who hated Trump stayed on when he was President to subvert his agenda. These individuals were also likely willing to remain in government despite their opposition Trump’s agenda since these bureaucrats did not dislike the Department heads they served under during his first term. The deep state was confident that Trump’s cabinet would not be able to fully implement his MAGA agenda in his first term with individuals such as Tillerson, Brey, and Fauci. Even Bob Barr, who did some good work, was a former Bush official who many in the Justice Department who disliked Trump and his agenda saw as being acceptable. The President-elect is making sure that his cabinet is going to be completely loyal in his second term and he wants to send a clear message to those in government who dislike him and his agenda.

Trump cannot fire the civil servants, making the DC bureaucracy and the deep state who were often successful at subverting his agenda in the President-elect’s first term difficult to remove. Under Title 5 federal employees who are not political appointments can only be fired for cause after they are employed for more than a year, they are not classified as at-will employees. The Biden administration also put in regulations to further protect these individuals, but Trump could rescind these new laws since these policies were not passed by Congress.

There was an active and coordinated effort to undermine President-elect Trump in his first term. One individual, who revealed himself to be Miles Taylor, the Deputy Chief of Staff in the Department of Homeland of Security, wrote essays in the New York Times and called himself the resistance. Taylor even openly admitted that key officials throughout the previous Trump administration were refusing to carry out orders by Trump and his top cabinet members. The DC bureaucracy did not like or respect Trump, and these individuals also knew because of the President elect’s lack of experience that these people could likely get away with subverting his agenda. Trump comes into government much more seasoned and with a stronger mandate for his policies as well, he won’t make the same mistakes.

The country voted for change on November 5th and President-elect Trump comes into his second term with a very differently approach than the President had in 2016. The FBI was able to infiltrate Trump’s campaign even before he got elected to his first term, and they targeted Flynn during his transition time. This won’t happen again. While some of Trump’s cabinet picks do likely lack the experience necessary to immediately implement the many significant reforms the country desperately needs, the impact of his appointments should be to flush out the bureaucrats who dislike Trump and don’t approve of his agenda.