photo by: Creators Syndicate

Keith Raffel

What does Donald Trump see when he looks at his choices for attorney general, secretary of defense, director of national intelligence and secretary of health and human services?

Himself.

To head the Department of Justice, the president-elect has tapped former member of the House of Representatives Matt Gaetz. Witnesses have testified to the House Ethics Committee that Gaetz had sex with a 17-year-old in his home state of Florida. That’s statutory rape. By nominating Gaetz, Trump is saying commission of rape does not disqualify Gaetz from being attorney general. After all, we already know Trump does not believe a New York civil jury’s finding that he raped E. Jean Carroll disqualifies him from being the nation’s chief executive and the attorney general’s boss.

(Editor’s note: Gaetz withdrew his nomination on Thursday).

Trump has picked Pete Hegseth to command the Defense Department. Hegseth’s primary qualification for the post is his tour of duty as a Fox News host. He’s never run a big complex organization. The resemblance to Trump’s own story is striking. The 45th president won election to the White House in 2016, having come to national prominence for his stint on TV’s “The Apprentice.” He had no significant business experience beyond running a family real estate firm. The fact Hegseth paid hush money to a woman who accused him of sexual assault makes him even more like his potential boss, who reached a notorious hush money agreement with adult film actor Stormy Daniels.

Former Rep. Tulsi Gabbard, Trump’s choice for director of national intelligence, has attacked American aid to Ukraine as a threat to global security. About the Russian aggression against Ukraine in 2022, she tweeted, “This war and suffering could have easily been avoided if Biden Admin/NATO had simply acknowledged Russia’s legitimate security concerns.” At that time, Sen. Mitt Romney (Rep-Utah) accused Gabbard of “parroting fake Russian propaganda,” and her former House colleague Rep. Adam Kinzinger (Rep-Ill) called her comments “traitorous.” Also in 2022, Trump declared the Russian invasion of Ukraine to be “genius” and “pretty savvy.” Romney voted twice to convict in both Trump’s impeachment trials, and Kinzinger served on the House’s Jan. 6 Committee. Trump and Gabbard then share common enemies as well as a soft spot for Putin.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a member of the royal family of American politics, won notoriety as a vaccine denier. In 2021, Kennedy called the COVID-19 vaccine the “deadliest vaccine ever made.” A 2022 note in The Journal of Paediatrics and Public Health estimated the vaccine saved over 14 million lives worldwide. Kennedy’s willingness to disregard proven science jibes with the instincts of a boss who suggested that the injection of bleach into the human body might be a means of fighting COVID-19. The stance of Kennedy’s siblings against their brother’s fake science is a plus in Trump’s book — they’d endorsed Harris in this month’s election.

Trump is not overlooking the questionable credentials of Gaetz, Hegseth, Gabbard and Kennedy. He is choosing them because pieces of their backgrounds reflect pieces of his own — whether sexual misconduct, TV celebrity, obeisance to Russia or support for medical nonsense. As they’d say in the software world, those aspects of his picks’ resumes are not bugs; they’re features.

What will matter among these selections is not competence nor is it allegiance to the Constitution. It will be their reflection of some part of Trump’s own image back at him. Trump wishes to confirm that the American people don’t care much about the alleged crimes, sins, blips or fallacies he has in common with them.

Alas. All this does not bode well for the administration of justice, the national defense, the capabilities of the intelligence community or the health of Americans over the next four years.

— Keith Raffel is a syndicated columnist with Creators.