The Trump transition continues to take shape. With 10 weeks to go before his second inauguration and speculation swirling about how far he will go to implement his campaign agenda, President-elect Donald Trump has begun fleshing out the top ranks of his administration. Following last week’s appointment of campaign manager Susie Wiles as his White House chief of staff, Trump has also named:
* Tom Homan, who was acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement in Trump’s first term, to be “Border Czar.” Homan, who was also a contributor to Project 2025, is likely to be the point person tasked with carrying out Trump’s promised crackdown on illegal immigration, including Trump’s oft-repeated pledge to deport millions of undocumented migrants.
“It’s not going to be a mass sweep of neighborhoods. It’s not going to be building concentration camps. I’ve read it all. It’s ridiculous,” Homan told CBS News’s “60 Minutes” in a recent interview. But when asked if it would be possible to deport undocumented immigrants without separating families, Homan suggested that “families could be deported together.”
* Rep. Elise Stefanik of New York to serve as ambassador to the United Nations. Stefanik has been the chair of the House Republican Conference since 2021. She replaced Rep. Liz Cheney as a member of House GOP leadership after Cheney was ousted from the role for her criticism of Trump.
“The choice of Stefanik signals a more combative US posture toward the UN,” CNN’s Kaitlan Collins reports. “Stefanik has frequently criticized the international organization, particularly over its criticism of Israel, and last month said the Biden administration should consider a “complete reassessment” of US funding for the UN if the Palestinian Authority continues to pursue a push to revoke Israel’s UN membership.”
* Lee Zeldin, a former congressman from New York, as the head of the Environmental Protection Agency. Zeldin is expected to try to roll back the Biden administration’s environmental and climate regulations. “He will ensure fair and swift deregulatory decisions that will be enacted in a way to unleash the power of American businesses, while at the same time maintaining the highest environmental standards, including the cleanest air and water on the planet,” Trump said in a statement. “He will set new standards on environmental review and maintenance, that will allow the United States to grow in a healthy and well-structured way.”
The League of Conservation Voters said that Zeldin had voted against key climate legislation and, as a member of Congress, had a lifetime score of just 14% on their environmental scorecard.
Trump is also reportedly set to name Stephen Miller as deputy chief of staff for policy. Miller is known for his hardline stance on immigration and reportedly was a key architect of Trump’s plans for mass deportations. He’s been called a white nationalist.
As Trump continues to staff up, he’s reportedly been soliciting input from friends and allies — and is publicly pressing the Senate Republicans vying to take over Sen. Mitch McConnell’s leadership position to agree to recess appointments, essentially a way to avoid Senate confirmation and the associated vetting process for appointees to his administration and the courts.
As he looks to reward loyalists, Trump also announced that he would not be asking Nikki Haley, his former U.N. Ambassador and rival for the Republican presidential nomination, or former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to join his second administration.
Why it matters: We’ve heard some Trump supporters posit that he wouldn’t fully follow through on his campaign promises if elected, harkening back to arguments that he should be taken seriously, not literally. His appointments so far suggest otherwise, though in a new interview with The Washington Post, Homan declined to commit to deporting millions right away, saying he would look at the available budget and focus on recent arrivals and threats to public safety. “We’ve got to go for the worst first. And that’s what we’re going to do,” he said.
