Donald Trump’s critics have a new line of attack (do these people ever take a day off?). Their latest complaint is that he’s burning through his top staffers too quickly. This is actually an old-school criticism—they…
Donald Trump’s critics have a new line of attack (do these people ever take a day off?). Their latest complaint is that he’s burning through his top staffers too quickly.
This is actually an old-school criticism—they said the same thing during his first term, accusing him of creating “personnel chaos” and running a “Game of Thrones” cabinet.
It’s true the Trump team has seen some turnover in recent weeks. Attorney General Pam Bondi was let go while Kristi Noem was ousted from the Department of Homeland Security. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt is also rumored to be on her way out.
But let’s not pretend this is “Trump’s purge,” as an Atlantic article declares. Trump’s core cabinet is ironclad, a team of stalwarts that shows no signs of wilting under pressure.
Some of the turnover rumors are to be expected. Leavitt is due to have a baby next month and is in a job known for its high burnout rate. White House press secretaries tend to last a year and a half to two years. If Leavitt does decide to depart, the duration of her tenure will have been completely normal.
A better indicator is the White House chief of staff, arguably an even more grueling position than the press secretary. Yet despite a breast cancer diagnosis, Susie Wiles shows no signs of slowing down.
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Neither do any of the president’s other major players. Marco Rubio has become a formidable secretary of state and a leader on the Iran war. Pete Hegseth is the most recognizable secretary of defense since Donald Rumsfeld. Lee Zeldin and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. may be the most influential EPA and HHS heads of my lifetime.
The difference this time around is that Trump understands how Washington works. In his first term, Trump truly was an outsider and sometimes reliant on establishment voices who would advise him to bring on this friend or that associate. Only for Trump to discover the new hire didn’t fit with his vision for the country.
But Trump knows better now. He’s drawn from outside the D.C. mainstream to bring on a loyal team that’s determined to implement his agenda. And when a rare hire proves a dud, he isn’t afraid to find someone better.
This isn’t chaos; it’s competence, yet you wouldn’t know it from all the media coverage. An article in The Hill recently blared, “Which apprentice is ‘fired’ next from Trump’s Cabinet?”
These people haven’t come up with a new line since 2017.
Another thing the media ignores is that when a top staffer has been fired, there’s often a very good reason.
Take Gail Slater, the president’s former antitrust chief at the Justice Department, who was pushed out back in February. Democrats in Congress promptly demanded answers while a fawning write-up in the Wall Street Journal depicted her as a heroine who’d fallen victim to MAGA “threats and bare-knuckle tactics.”
The reality? Slater had lied to Attorney General Bondi in an attempt to stop a proposed merger between tech companies Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) and Juniper Networks. Trump’s intelligence agencies had concluded that the merger was essential for U.S. national security—creating a new competitor to Chinese tech giant Huawei, which is widely considered an espionage threat—yet Slater didn’t like the deal and tried to cover this up.
If lying to your boss about a matter of national security isn’t a firing offense, then what is?
At the end of the day, the president has a right to decide who works for him. He’s the only person at the cabinet table (other than the vice president) who’s been elected by the American people. In a representative democracy, his unelected staffers serve at his pleasure.
One of Trump’s greatest successes in his second term has been puncturing the notion that government workers are owed a job for life. By changing the regulations governing the civil service, he’s slimmed down the federal bureaucracy, made it more efficient, and ensured it answers to the president and the president alone.
All while his cabinet has remained tough and stable. Trump might like the catchphrase “you’re fired,” but he hasn’t had to say it a lot lately.
Ed Woodson is a lawyer and conservative talk radio host who guest hosts for Laura Ingraham.
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