Trump’s Unconventional Cabinet Picks: Successful Diversity or a Risky Experiment?

From Republicans with neoconservative track records to disenfranchised left-wingers, the unconventional nature of President-elect Trump’s cabinet appointments has drawn media dialogue on what his selections could mean for the nation’s future.

Bad Experiment: Rich Lowry (Right bias) of National Review (Right bias) pointed to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who was nominated to head the Department of Health and Human Services, and former Democratic congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard, who was nominated to be director of national intelligence, as being “totally at odds with the institutions that they want to run.” Lowry pointed to other anti-establishment nominations as well and claimed that if they are all confirmed, “the experiment is likely to end badly” because of the lack of “experience” of the nominees.

Authoritarian Method: Jeremy D. Mayer, writing for The Hill (Center bias) pointed to Trump’s more unconventional and controversial nominees, also saying that their lack of managerial experience “may end up costing the nation quite a lot.” Mayer likened the fashion in which Trump selected nominees to how “authoritarians around the globe often appoint inexperienced or even clownish figures” to key roles so they must remain dependent on and loyal to the leader who appointed them.

Liberal & Diverse: Axios (Lean Left bias) co-founders Mike Allen and Jim VandeHei analyzed the breadth of Trump’s cabinet picks, claiming, “the simple, undebatable fact that this might be the most ideologically diverse cabinet of modern times.” The two also highlighted Trump’s transformation of the Republican Party from a traditional conservative party into a populist one, where “lifelong (Republican) advocates” have been “neutered to the point of irrelevance.”