Trump’s sons aim to stop disloyal 'DC swamp rats' from serving in the White House: report

24 April 2024

Former President Donald Trump's two adult sons — Donald Jr. and Eric — have become the unofficial "loyalty czars" of their father's second presidency, should he be elected to another term in November.

That's according to a recent report in Axios, which delved into how the former president's family is playing a major role in deciding who would be allowed to serve in the White House between 2025 and 2029. Donald Jr. in particular has consistently been in his father's ear, especially concerning who he should pick to be his running mate after locking up the Republican nomination. Trump's eldest son has said he's recommended Sen. JD Vance (R-Ohio), wanting his father to select a "fighter" as his potential next vice president.

When the New York Post asked Donald Jr. about his role on his father's transition team, he summed it up by saying his job is "mostly just to make sure we stop some of the DC swamp rats and the swamp creatures from getting in there and doing their thing."

An unnamed source close to Trump's children told Axios that, as far as it concerns Trump's potential appointees, the primary function of Donald Jr. and Eric "is to keep the John Boltons of the world outside a second Trump administration." Bolton — who was UN ambassador in former President George W. Bush's administration — is now one of Trump's chief Republican critics despite briefly serving as his National Security Adviser.

The importance of loyalty to Trump and the MAGA movement has also been prioritized by the far-right Heritage Foundation in its "Project 2025" initiative. Since 2023, Heritage has been quietly assembling a database of tens of thousands of potential appointees whose screening criteria focuses on candidates' record of publicly supporting Trump. The group is also likely screening candidates' support of the policies outlined in its "Mandate for Leadership" playbook, which is a laundry list of draconian proposals with the main goal of increasing and consolidating the power of the executive branch while weakening checks and balances.

In response to Heritage's recommendations, Trump campaign senior advisors Susie Wiles and Chris LaCivita restated last fall that Trump himself would make the final call about who would serve in his administration, rather than any outside group.

"Any personnel lists, policy agendas or government plans published anywhere are merely suggestions. Policy recommendations from external allies are just that—recommendations," they said.

But should Trump win a second term, it's likely that Project 2025 would be a primary driver of at least staffing his administration, if not also driving his policy agenda. In 2023, Heritage announced the hire of MAGA loyalist John McEntee — who served as director of the Presidential Personnel Office in Trump's White House — as a senior advisor.

"The Presidential Personnel Database will be of extraordinary value for the 47th president because we are doing a lot of the incoming administration’s most important work ahead of time," McEntee stated.

If Trump is elected to a second term, it's likely he would reinstate his 2020 "schedule F" executive order that removed numerous employment protections for the federal civil service, which Biden promptly rescinded after taking office in January of 2021. Under schedule F, the number of presidential appointees would be drastically increased from roughly 5,000 to more than 50,000, and those appointees would serve in key policy-making positions in various federal agencies.

Click here to read Axios' report in full.

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