The faces of Trump’s natsec transition

Nov 07, 2024

Donald Trump points to supporters with former first lady Melania Trump.

NatSec Daily and the rest of POLITICO’s ace reporting team has spoken to former Trump officials and Republicans close to the campaign to collate a user guide for natsec wonks of transition officials and contenders for senior administration posts. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

With help from Nahal Toosi, Meredith McGraw, Jack Detsch, John Sakellariadis, Veronika Melkozerova and Daniel Lippman

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President-elect DONALD TRUMP ’s transition team is already taking shape, giving early insights into who could staff his national security and defense team once he takes office in January

The speculation around Cabinet secretary posts is hogging a lot of attention, but lower-level appointees in the National Security Council, State Department and Pentagon could have outsized influence over the direction of Trump’s foreign policy. And people who work on the transition often end up joining the administration in influential posts.

Without further ado, here’s who’s in the room or in the mix:

The State Department: BRIAN HOOK, former State Department policy planner and special envoy for Iran, has been tapped to lead the State Department transition team.

The Pentagon: ROBERT WILKIE, former Veterans Affairs secretary in the first Trump administration, is leading the Defense Department’s transition team, as our colleagues reported in today’s Morning Defense (for Pros!).

National Security Council: JOEL RAYBURN and MICHAEL ANTON are expected to play roles in Trump’s NSC transition team, several people familiar with internal campaign and transition deliberations said. Rayburn was a Trump appointee for Middle East policy in the State Department and an adviser to Sen. BILL HAGERTY (R-Tenn.). Sidebar: It’s worth noting that Hagerty is a contender for Trump’s secretary of State post, as we have previously reported. Anton was a former National Security Council spokesman under Trump. (The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment on this or other positions.)

Intel: Trump’s former director for national intelligence, JOHN RATCLIFFE, is involved in transition planning for national security policy. (POLITICO first reported his name and others on this list last week.) CLIFF SIMS, who served as deputy director of national intelligence for strategy and communications in the first Trump administration, is also playing a leading role in national security and intelligence transition matters, according to the people familiar with internal campaign and transition matters.

Global trade: Trump’s former trade representative, ROBERT LIGHTHIZER, and Lighthizer’s former chief of staff, JAMIESON GREER, are playing a leading role in economic and international trade transition policy.

Cybersecurity: JOSHUA STEINMAN , a former Trump NSC official, is a leading contender for the NSC’s top cyber policy post, as our cybersecurity colleagues report (for Pros!). Others who could be involved in the transition’s cybersecurity team and take up top administration posts include SEAN PLANKEY, a former NSC and Energy Department official, and KAREN EVANS , a former Trump Homeland Security Department official.

Technology: MICHAEL KRATSIOS and GAIL SLATER are managing tech policy during the Trump transition, as POLITICO reported today (for Pros!). Kratsios is managing director of the artificial intelligence startup Scale AI, which has secured some notable Pentagon contracts, and was former chief technology officer in the first Trump administration. Slater is another Trump administration alumni who also serves as economic policy adviser to Vice President-elect JD VANCE.

One key litmus test that could be a deciding factor for who joins Trump’s national security team once he takes office: Loyalty.

People close to the president-elect aren’t being subtle about how loyalty could matter above all else for job seekers in a second Trump term. As MIKE DAVIS — a leading contender to be Trump’s attorney general — put it in a post on X:

“Dear Trump Job Seekers: Long time, no chat. Before asking me for help, I am going to ask you to provide me specific and concrete evidence of your łoyalty to Trump. If you cannot provide a lot of that, stop asking me. Political appointments require both competency and loyalty.”

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The Inbox

MACRON’S WARNING: French President EMMANUEL MACRON has issued a fresh warning that Europe needs to take security into its own hands following Trump’s election.

“We must not delegate forever our security to America,” Macron said at the European Political Community summit in Hungary today. He added that Trump would “defend the interests of the American people” and asked: “Are we ready to defend the interests of the European people?”

He’s not the only European leader urging the continent to step it up now that Trump is bound for the White House. In Budapest, at the same gathering as Macron, NATO Secretary General MARK RUTTE said Trump is right in calling for an increase in alliance members’ defense spending and argued that members will need to increase defense spending past the current target of two percent of gross domestic product.

TRUMP’S INTERNATIONAL MINUTES: As the Trump transition enters day two, one thing is clear — Trump’s spending a lot of time on the phone.

Just Wednesday evening, British Prime Minister KEIR STARMER, French President Macron, Ukrainian President VOLODYMYR ZELENSKYY, Indian Prime Minister NARENDRA MODI, Japanese Prime Minister SHIGERU ISHIBA, South Korean President YOON SUK YEOL and Italian Prime Minister GIORGIA MELONI all announced that they had spoken with the president-elect, offering congratulations and discussing hotspots like Ukraine and the Middle East. Trump also spoke with Chinese leader XI JINPING, though the timing of their conversation is unclear.

More calls are on the agenda today. "Mexican President CLAUDIA SHEINBAUM wrote on X that she had a “very cordial” call with Trump to discuss the "great relationship that will exist between Mexico and the United States."

RUSH ON UKRAINE AID: Ukraine’s foreign ministry praised outgoing President JOE BIDEN ’s administration for military aid and underscored its continued importance in Kyiv’s fight against Russia, as a signal to the incoming Trump administration.

“For us it is the everyday struggle of our lives. We need all of the decisions to come as quickly as possible,” HEORHII TYKHYI, Ukraine’s foreign ministry spokesperson, told reporters today , as our own VERONIKA MELKOZEROVA writes in. “We see the administration’s efforts to use all of the allocated aid as fast as possible and we welcome the steps. Packages lately have been coming in bigger portions and more frequent.”

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The Complex

RECRUITING RESOLVE: Air Force leaders are claiming that making modest changes to screening guidelines for recruits is helping them meet targets, and pledging that doing so isn’t sacrificing the quality of potential new servicemembers.

What’s that mean in practice? More leniency on pot-smoking and tattoos.

Air Force official ALEX WAGNER and Brig. Gen. CHRISTOPHER AMRHEIN took to Breaking Defense today to make the case that these changes “looked at the world as it is and moved decisively to eliminate out-of-date and indefensible barriers that blocked capable recruits from joining the service." They also argue that they didn’t lower standards for eligibility.

They pointed to a pilot program where the service did not automatically reject potential recruits who tested positive for THC during the screening process and allowed a retest within 90 days. They also are highlighting a new policy whereby the force is not automatically rejecting recruits with a small tattoo on the back of their hand.

The military has struggled to meet recruiting targets during the Biden administration, as young people have shown less interest in joining the military. Concern has grown on both sides of the aisle in Congress that the U.S. needs to do more to ensure it has a proper fighting force at its disposal.

On the Hill

TRUMP’S CONFIRMATION EASE: The burgeoning Senate Republican majority is reducing anxiety on Capitol Hill that polarizing Trump appointees might face headwinds on their journeys to confirmation.

As our own JORDAIN CARNEY and KATHERINE TULLY-McMANUS report, Senate Republicans are planning on being very deferential to Trump’s picks this time around, opening the door for controversial choices like tech mogul ELON MUSK and activist ROBERT F. KENNEDY Jr., to fill major roles in the administration.

And those changes could affect the math around key diplomatic jobs, like secretary of State. Our colleagues report that at least two members of the upper chamber — Sens. MARCO RUBIO (R-Fla.) and Hagerty of Tennessee — are vying to be America’s next top diplomat. Former acting National Intelligence Director RIC GRENELL is also angling for the job. A wider Senate GOP majority could make it easier for any of the three men to be confirmed if Democrats opt to play hardball on their nominations and some Republicans express reservations.

Broadsides

A NEW SAHEL THREAT: Nigeria is warning about a burgeoning insurgency in its northwest states that emerged under the nose of Russian-backed military juntas in Niger and Mali.

As Reuters’ CAMILLUS EBOH reports, the Nigerian military issued a warning about the Lakurawas, a militia that emerged shortly after last year’s coup in Niger and has managed to infiltrate northwestern Nigeria’s Sokoto and Kebbi states.

The ideology of the group is unknown. But the emergence of this group points to the deteriorating security landscape in the Sahel and West Africa, which already faced concerted insurgency threats from Islamist groups like Boko Haram and Islamic State offshoots. And it adds another headache for the embattled central government in Abuja, which has struggled to project regional strength and resolve domestic economic woes in one of the continent’s most powerful countries.

Transitions

— ROB BERSCHINSKI is departing his role as senior adviser at U.S. Agency for International Development to become chief of staff of Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government.

— Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. MICHAEL HERZOG will leave his post in January 2025, the office of Prime Minister BENJAMIN NETANYAHU announced today. Herzog, whose replacement has yet to be announced, has been Israel’s top envoy to Washington through Israel’s military operations in the Gaza Strip and southern Lebanon.

What to Read

— JUAN PABLO SPINETTO, Bloomberg: Sheinbaum needs to prepare Mexico for Trump 2.0

— MICHAEL KIMMAGE and HANNA NOTTE, Foreign Affairs: How Ukraine became a World War

— SHAYNDI RAICE, The Wall Street Journal: Netanyahu wanted Trump back. But the Middle East has changed since 2016.

Tomorrow Today

— Atlantic Council's Global China Hub, 2 p.m.: Launch of a new report titled "Capture the (Red) Flag: An Inside Look Into China's Hacking Contest Ecosystem."

— United States Institute of Peace, 2 p.m.: The new lives of Russians in exile

— George Washington University Elliott School of International Affairs, 4:30 p.m.: A book discussion on EDWARD WONG’s "At the Edge of Empire: A Family's Reckoning with China."

Thanks to our editor, Heidi Vogt, who is blocking efforts to ensure a smooth transition to our reign of power.

Thanks to our producer, Gregory Svirnovskiy, whose loyalty to our transition team is unrivaled.

A message from Lockheed Martin:

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Seeing the whole picture is Lockheed Martin’s vision of 21st Century Security® – innovating defense tech to deliver answers exactly when and where they’re needed most. Learn more.