Klaus Solko, staff writer

On Tuesday, Nov. 5, Donald Trump was elected as the 47th president of the United States. With an election comes the new president electing the members of his cabinet. All 15 members that Trump elects will have to go through Congress approval in January. 

The Secretary of State is the position that carries out foreign policies. Trump is electing Marco Rubio, a senator from Florida, for the job. While many of Rubio’s opinions on foreign policies are unknown at this time, he has said quite a bit about the Russia-Ukraine conflict. On March 3, 2022, he was quoted at a press release as saying, “No Russian state-owned enterprises should have access to American capital while a bloodthirsty dictator is waging an invasion against Ukraine.”

For the Attorney General, Trump is suggesting Matt Gaetz, possibly his most controversial pick. NBC News claims that multiple anonymous sources have confirmed that more than half of the Republicans in the Senate don’t support Gaetz. This could be due to multiple factors, such as Gaetz having a complicated history of being suspended from practicing law in 2021 (which he has since been reinstated to do) or his sexual misconduct charges. 

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., one of the third-party candidates during the 2024 presidential election, is now up for the Secretary of Health and Human Services, a position that is in charge of the CDC and the FDC. In July, on the Lex Fridman podcast, Kennedy stated that he believes “no vaccine” is safe and effective. He has also said on X, “FDA’s war on public health is about to end.”

The role of Defense Secretary has been one highly talked about, as Trump has elected former Fox News host Pete Hegseth. He formerly served in the Army National Guard for 12 years. The book he published in 2024, “The War on Warriors,” gives many examples of Hegseth’s ideas about the military. One passage states “Every unit knows that social justice, transgender, woke training is the top priority.”

Trump claims to be creating a new department called the Department of Government Efficiency. In the statement about the department, the Trump-Vance administration said, “The Department of Government Efficiency will provide advice and guidance from outside the Government.” This statement seems to suggest that the department will not be an official position and therefore will not need to be elected. This department will be co-chaired by Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy. CBS News pointed out the connection between the nickname for the department, DOGE, and the cryptocurrency Elon Musk promotes, Dogecoin. 

Lastly, it is important to acknowledge his pick for the Secretary of Education. According to the New York Times, Trump has indicated that he would be appointing Linda McMahon, former CEO of the WWE, to the position. According to ABC News, McMahon’s experience in education is limited but Trump has stated that she “will fight tirelessly to expand ‘Choice’ to every State in America.” In a party platform draft that was approved by the RNC in July, it states, “We are going to close the Department of Education in Washington, D.C. and send it back to the States, where it belongs.” This follows in Trump’s own opinion as he said in a campaign video from 2023, “the administration is closing up the Department of Education in Washington, D.C., and sending all education and education work it needs back to the states.”

It will be interesting to see how Trump fills his remaining cabinet positions and how their appointments impact the U.S. after he takes office in January.