'Soap opera': Trump administration threatens to devolve into a battle of egos

During his first term as U.S. president, Donald Trump had bitter conflicts with many of the traditional conservatives in his administration — including Rex Tillerson (former secretary of state), Jeff Sessions (ex-U.S. attorney general), and John F. Kelly (former White House chief of staff).

Some Republicans who served in the first Trump Administration ended up endorsing Kamala Harris for president in the 2024 election. Among them: former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci, former White House Press Secretary Stephanie Grisham, and Olivia Troye (who served as a national security aide to former Vice President Mike Pence).

Trump is hoping to avoid such conflicts in 2025 by making sure that his second administration is dominated by ultra-MAGA loyalists. But according to Politico's Megan Messerly, the MAGA Republicans Trump has in mind for his second term may turn on each other.

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"Donald Trump's Cabinet is shaping up to be a who's-who of MAGA World alpha types, among the most aggressive and boisterous on the campaign trail," Messerly explains in an article published on December 8. "Now that they're heading into the administration, those traits could prove their downfall. The president-elect has stacked his Cabinet with outsize personalities — who, in some cases, have conflicting ideological approaches and policy preferences — that threaten to outshine Trump."

The Politico reporter adds, "And while the bunch is widely seen as far more loyal to Trump than his first Cabinet — whose interests often clashed with the president's — it raises the specter of whether this group will be able to avoid the drama from the first term…. In a world of alphas, don't forget one alpha rules them all."

GOP strategist Matthew Bartlett noted the possibility of conflicts among MAGA Republicans in Trump's second administration.

Bartlett told Politico, "This has the potential to turn right back into a New York City soap opera. With all these personalities, there's an opportunity to remake some of the workings of government and make it work better for the people — but that's not necessarily a given with everyone's different perspectives and how they came to be."

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Read Politico's full article at this link.