Trump fills key slots, tapping Congress, MAGA loyalists
The president-elect continues to fill his administration with new foreign policy, environment and immigration roles assigned
What happened
President-elect Donald Trump filled in more of his administration Monday, naming Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) as his pick for United Nations ambassador, former Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.) to head the Environmental Protection Agency and immigration hardliner Stephen Miller as deputy chief of policy. Trump named former immigration enforcement chief Tom Homan as his "border czar" late Sunday, and he reportedly asked Rep. Mike Waltz (R-Fla.) to be his national security adviser and selected Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) for secretary of state.
Who said what
The prevalence of "MAGA loyalists" in Trump's early picks highlights that for his second term, "one quality is absolutely paramount: unquestioning loyalty," Reuter said. Waltz, Stefanik and Zeldin are "loyalists with deep congressional experience who back his agenda on immigration and foreign policy," The Wall Street Journal said, while Rubio "has differed with Trump over the importance of alliances and favors confronting China and Iran but, like Trump, has called for ending the war in Ukraine."
The Stefanik pick "signals a more combative U.S. posture toward the U.N.," CNN said. The "expected installation of Homan and Miller," key architects of Trump's first-term family-separation policy, "signals Trump intends to deliver on his promise of mass deportations" of undocumented immigrants as soon as possible, Politico said.
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What next?
It's unclear whether Trump will be able to continue to "raid the House for his loyalists who serve there," The New York Times said. Waltz and Stefanik both represent safe Republican districts, but the GOP's expected "razor-thin" majority will be "even thinner" without them until they are replaced in special elections. With every member Trump poaches, "each illness, family emergency, delayed flight or snowstorm will threaten to derail House leadership's plans," NOTUS said. "Elise [Stefanik] is awesome," Trump advocate Elon Musk said Monday on his X platform, "but it might be too dicey to lose her from the House, at least for now."
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