Washington (AP)As he concluded the workweek, President-elect Donald Trump made a number of personnel announcements, including the announcement on Friday that he would appoint billionaire hedge fund manager Scott Bessent, a proponent of deficit reduction, as his next Treasury secretary.
Additionally, Trump said that he will appoint Russell Vought, who served in the same capacity during his first term as president, to head the Office of Management and Budget. Throughout the campaign, Vought worked closely with Project 2025, a conservative plan for Trump’s second term that the Republican nominee attempted to disassociate himself from.
As Trump pursues a strong and somewhat conflicting economic plan that includes decreasing taxes, reducing government spending, imposing tariffs on foreign goods, and lowering prices for American consumers, the statements demonstrated his attempt to strike a compromise between opposing viewpoints.
While Vought is regarded as a Republican hardliner on cultural and budgetary issues, Bessent is closely associated with Wall Street and could garner bipartisan support.
While Vought is well-equipped to destroy the Deep State and put an end to Weaponized Government, Trump claimed that Bessent will assist him in bringing about a new Golden Age for the United States.
FILE – President Donald Trump, left, listens as acting director of the Office of Management and Budget Russel Vought speaks during an event on “transparency in Federal guidance and enforcement” in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Oct. 9, 2019, in Washington. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
Image: Evan Vucci/Associated Press
Trump continued the rapid transition process after revealing his selections for important financial positions.
As his labor secretary, Trump appointed Rep. Lori Chavez-DeRemer of Oregon, a rare Republican who is regarded as a staunch union loyalist. Scott Turner, a former football player who served in Trump’s first administration, will be his nominee for housing secretary, he added.
Additional candidates were listed for national security and health roles. Trump has made judgments for nearly his whole Cabinet in less than three weeks after the election.
Bessent, 62, founded Key Square Capital Management, a hedge fund, after intermittently working for Soros Fund Management since 1991. He would be the first openly gay Treasury Secretary in the country if the Senate confirmed him.
In August, he told Bloomberg that cutting government programs and other spending should be a top focus in order to combat the U.S. national debt.
He then stated that this election cycle is the last opportunity for the United States to grow its way out of this debt mountain without turning into a socialist democracy akin to that of Europe.
Both the Trump and Biden administrations contributed to the nation’s $35.94 trillion debt as of November 8. The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a fiscal watchdog, estimates that the Biden administration increased the national debt by $4.3 trillion, while Trump’s actions increased it by $8.4 trillion.
Bessent has supported extending portions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which Trump signed into law in his first year in office, even as he works to reduce the national debt by halting spending. The expenses of the various tax cuts are estimated to be between over $6 trillion and $10 trillion over a ten-year period by various economic evaluations. By the end of 2025, almost all of the law’s provisions will have expired.
Bessent made contributions to a number of Democratic causes in the early 2000s, most notably Al Gore’s presidential campaign, before joining Trump as an adviser and donor. Additionally, he was employed by George Soros, a prominent Democrat backer. His well-known 1992 wager against the pound, which produced enormous profits on Black Wednesday when the pound was decoupled from European currencies, was one of Bessent’s significant contributions to Soros’ London activities.
In an earlier interview with Bloomberg, Bessent stated that he believes tariffs are a one-time price adjustment rather than an inflationary measure and that they would mostly target China if they were implemented during a second Trump administration. Additionally, he stated in an opinion piece on Fox News this week that tariffs are a helpful instrument for accomplishing the president’s foreign policy goals, such persuading partners to increase defense spending or discouraging military aggressiveness.
Bessent has also offered suggestions on how Trump may exert pressure on Jerome Powell, the chair of the Federal Reserve, whose tenure ends in May 2026. In an attempt to effectively sideline Powell, Bessent proposed last month that Trump designate a new chair early and allow that individual to serve as a shadow chair.
However, Bessent apparently abandoned that plan following the election. Powell has stated that he would not resign if Trump asked him to, and that Trump would not have the power to fire him in his capacity as president.
Powell was frequently criticized by Trump for hiking the Fed’s benchmark rate in 2017 and 2018 during his first time in office. He stated during the 2024 campaign that he ought to have a say in the central bank’s interest rate choices in his capacity as president. Historically, presidents have refrained from discussing the Fed’s policies.
After serving as the acting director and deputy director of the Office of Management and Budget, Vought, 48, led the agency from the middle of 2020 until the end of Trump’s first term in 2021. He has combined his personal Christian faith with a thorough understanding of government finances.
Following the conclusion of Trump’s first term, Vought established the Center for Renewing America, a think tank whose goal is to “renew a consensus of America as a nation under God.”
The Center for Renewing America unveiled A Commitment to End Woke and Weaponized Government, its own budget proposal for 2023. To bring the budget into balance by 2032, the idea called for around $2 trillion in income tax cuts and $11.3 trillion in spending cutbacks over a ten-year period.
According to Vought’s introduction, the country’s current concern is that the government is becoming more and more militarized against the people it is supposed to represent, rather than the people themselves governing the country.
The Agriculture Department’s expenditure on food assistance would be reduced under Vought’s proposed budget plan. The distribution of Medicaid and Medicare funds would be a major factor in the $3.3 trillion in spending cuts in the Health and Human Services Department. It also includes cuts to the Affordable Care Act totaling roughly $642 billion. Additionally, the budgets for the departments of education and housing and urban development would be reduced.
Trump has not fully outlined his economic goals, thus Vought’s budget views were not influenced by him.
Chavez-DeRemer, 56, Trump’s pick for labor secretary, lost her reelection attempt by a slim margin earlier this month. Union members in her district strongly supported her.
Chavez-DeRemer is one of a few House Republicans to endorsethe Protecting the Right to Organize or PRO Actthat would allow more workers to conduct organizing campaigns and would add penalties for companies that violate workers rights. The act would also weaken right-to-work laws that allow employees in more than half the states to avoid participating in or paying dues to unions that represent workers at their places of employment.
Trump said in a statement that she would help ensure that the Labor Department can unite Americans of all backgrounds behind our Agenda for unprecedented National Success.
In addition, Trump added to his health team on Friday evening. He chose Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, a general practitioner and Fox News contributor, to be surgeon general; Dr. Dave Weldon, a former Republican congressman from Florida, to lead the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention; andDr. Marty Makary, a Johns Hopkins surgeon, as head of the Food and Drug Administration.
Trump previously said he would nominateRobert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime spreader of conspiracy theories about vaccines, as health secretary.
Alex Wong was named as principal deputy national security adviser, while Sebastian Gorka will serve as senior director for counterterrorism. Wong worked on issues involving Asia during Trump s first term, and Gorka is a conservative commentator who spent less than a year in Trump s first White House.
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