Come January 2025, Donald Trump will reclaim the White House as the 47th president of the United States. He won in a landslide of electoral and popular votes against his Democratic opponent, Vice President Kamala Harris. Now that America has spoken and Harris has conceded the presidential election, Trump’s transition is underway.
But what exactly does that process look like? Here’s a breakdown of what Trump and his team will face over the next two months.
The Associated Press predicts that Trump will want to usher in a whole new team from the one that served President Biden and Vice President Harris. Additionally, Donald’s team has reportedly pledged that the president-elect’s second term will not look like his first, which began in 2016 and ended in 2020 with Biden’s win.
Donald Trump Has To Fill 1,000s Of Positions
The president-elect now has a 75-day transition period (starting on Nov. 6) to build out his team before Inauguration Day arrives on Jan. 20.
A top item on Donald’s to-do list is filling around 4,000 government positions with political appointees. That includes everyone from the secretary of state and other heads of Cabinet departments to those selected to serve part-time on boards and commissions.
Around 1,200 of those presidential appointments require Senate confirmation. However, that process should be easier with the Senate now shifting to Republican control (45-55).
The president-elect has already suggested some names to join him at the White House and beyond. At his victory party on Wednesday (Nov. 6), Donald said that former presidential hopeful and anti-vaccination activist Robert Kennedy Jr. will be tapped to “help make America healthy again.” He added, “…we’re going to let him go to it.” Before the election, Trump didn’t reject Kennedy’s calls to end fluoridated water.
Trump has also pledged to make South African-born Elon Musk, a vocal supporter of the Trump campaign, a secretary of federal “cost-cutting.” In response, the Tesla CEO has suggested he can find trillions of dollars in government spending to wipe out.
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President-Elect Will Be Briefed Frequently On Government Affairs
Still, the transition is not just about filling jobs. Most presidents-elect also receive daily or near-daily intelligence briefings during the transition.
In 2008, outgoing President George W. Bush personally briefed President-elect Barack Obama on U.S. covert operations. When Trump was preparing to take office in 2016, Obama’s national security adviser, Susan Rice, briefed Donald’s choice, Michael Flynn. However, in 2020, Trump’s legal challenges to the election’s results delayed the start of the transition process for weeks. Presidential briefings with Biden didn’t begin until Nov. 30.
This time around, both President Biden and VP Harris pledged in their post-election speeches that they would ensure a peaceful transition of power to Trump.
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Who Will Help Trump With The Transition?
Trump’s transition is being led primarily by friends and family. Donald’s list includes Kennedy Jr. and former Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard, as well as the president-elect’s adult sons, Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, and his running mate, JD Vance.
Cantor Fitzgerald CEO Howard Lutnick and Linda McMahon, a former wrestling executive who led the Small Business Administration during Trump’s first term, are the transition co-chairs.
At the start of his first term, Trump assembled an original Cabinet that featured some more mainstream Republicans and business leaders who ultimately disappointed, or broke publicly with him, or both. This time, Trump has promised to value loyalty as much as possible.
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Trump Also Needs To Sign Agreements Before Moving Forward
Unlike Kamala Harris’ campaign, Trump’s team didn’t sign any pre-Election Day transition agreements with the General Services Administration. The agreements act as the federal government’s landlord. Therefore, Trump has already missed deadlines to agree with GSA on logistical matters like office space and tech support. There are also pending agreements with the White House on access to agencies, including documents, employees, and facilities.
The Presidential Transition Improvement Act of 2022 mandates that the transition process begin five days after the election — even if the winner is still in dispute. That is designed to avoid long delays. It means that “an ‘affirmative ascertainment’ by the GSA is no longer a prerequisite for gaining transition support services,” according to agency guidelines on the new transition rules.
Associated Press reporter Will Weissert contributed to this report.
