…as in prudent, responsible, respectful, and competent.
President-elect Trump’s best mouthpiece, Rep. Byron Donalds, essentially humina-humina-ed the question on CNN about whether Al Sharpton’s criticism of the nomination and appointments so far emanating from Mar-A Largo was valid. Certainly Sharpton’s rationale isn’t valid: that Trump “owes” black voters more African American cabinet members, but the presence of just a single black nominee among the many selections, that being former NFL player Scott Turner nominated last week be Secretary for the Department of Housing and Urban Development, is at very least unwise. Turner was part of Trump’s executive director of the White House Opportunity and Revitalization Council; now he steps into the job held last time by Dr. Ben Carson. No, I don’t think there is any chance Turner will be rejected by the Senate.
It certainly looks like Trump has designated HUD as the slot for tokens: Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon who revealed himself during the 2016 debates to be an idiot savant, had no qualifications for HUD other than his skin color. Turner is more qualified, but still: if Trump wanted to ensure that the “Trump is racist” trope continues unabated, he could hardly have pursued a course that would have supported it more vividly. There are certainly a lot of nominations and appointments “of color,” but in the United States, for obvious reasons, blacks are in a special category.
A single black among 41 isn’t just a percentage that “doesn’t look like America,” it’s a percentage that guarantees accusations of prejudice and bias, accusations that will not be easy to counter. Even if that is not the explanation, the “optics” are terrible, and it is, again, handing Trump’s foes a metaphorical stick to beat him with, or maybe a spiked club. DEI is an unethical, indeed illegal fad when it amounts to distributing jobs and power according to group membership rather than ability, but that doesn’t change the fact that our national government must project the sense that all of those groups are respected and included in the governing process.
Nor will Donald’s argument that Trump is committed to “getting the job done” persuade in the face of less than 2.5% participation of blacks in the Trump inner circle. That is especially true when one considers several nominations that do not exactly radiate experience, qualifications or competence.
Ethics Alarms 
Jack, with respect, DEI and Affirmative Action need to die in a fire. Democrats don’t need proof or verifiable sources to spew their propaganda.
he didn’t make any promise of specific profiles and then fulfill or break that “promise”.
Merit is colorblind.
There is a reason they don’t have pictures in files for promotion boards. Well at least they didn’t back in the day.
But competent leadership requires the appearance of fairness, plus diplomacy and competent political skills. If the message is “when we seek to appoint the most qualified and able people, only 1/4 of a percent of them are black,” that’s both offensive, untrue and idiotic. The mix is almost intentionally provocative.
Ah, let ’em eat cake. Let’s make the NBA and NFL and MLB look like America while we’re at it. No more than thirteen percent players of color!
And Jack, the black people he might nominate are either going to be slammed as charlatans (Carson) or traitors to their race, i.e., they are, gasp, conservatives. Remember, the left has their knives out already. He’s trying to avoid swamp creatures this time. Not an easy task.
Nope, not seeing it. If Trump had POC that he trusted and were loyal, they would have been picked. You are strting with the assumption that it matters what sex or color Cabinet members needs to be. He would have to name 5 more POC than he did, is the Republican/MAGA deep enough for that?
I doubt Trump passed over any equally qualified anybody to jab the Democrats.
He is a lame duck so who cares what folks think of him in four years. This will be won or lost by September 2025. Get a real budget passed, get him picks confirmed. No other Congressional business until then. Let the DOGE wag the bureaucratic tail.
James, that’s just naive. Of course it matters, especially with black voters moving to the Republican side in greater numbers. Again, it looks bad, and is bad. Especially with several appointees of dubious quality. He also has an obligation not to leave his party in tatters and the Democrats on the upswing after four years. If he really has no black associates who he knows well enough to trust, then he needs to get out more. You can’t keep denying that someone is a racist or biased against a group when he appear to be keeping members of the group out of the seat of power.hell, appoint a group of A-A officials who will turn the appointments dowm—at least then it looks like he made the effort. Tell Harris she can be postmaster general. Try Condoleeza Rice. Invite Michelle Obama to be UN delegate. Or Oprah.
You are literally saying pick that one he is black over other candidates. Lipstick on a pig is still useless. Useful Cabinet Sectretaries are not interchangeable. You are advocating for Affirmative action after we just spent 4 spectacular years with the Biden clown show.
I give folks the benefit that they want effective government over appearance.
No, I’m not. It is absurd to hold that there are not qualified, trustworthy black candidates as qualified for or more so than many of Trump’s picks. Not just absurd, but denigrating to black professionals. There are black conservatives, black republicans and black academics. Many of Trump’s picks have light experience and qualifications for their jobs. Part of leadership is to engender trust: that mix of personnel, with more Asians than blacks, undermines trust and plays into destructive narratives. The EEOC would find the racial mix suspicious. If all of the picks were stars, maybe you’d have a valid argument, but even then it would be a needlessly divisive path.
I remember a quote I saw somewhere. Runs something like this:
“ It is difficult to drain the swamp when you’re up to your **** in alligators.” And I apologize for the use of the slightly offensive word.
“Swamp?” “Alligators?” “Apologize?”
Several different variations, attributed to several different wags; for no particular reason, let’s go with this one:
“When you’re up to your ass in alligators, it’s hard to remember that your purpose is draining the swamp.” — George Napper
PWS
Just a little correction, one in 41 is 2.44%. Still low, but better than .25%.
Oh, %$^**&&^%!. Fixed.
I thought we were trying to get away from arbitrary percentages?
If you start with the expectation that you will have X % of this or that for appearances you cannot condemn Biden for doing exactly that. If you nominate someone simply for appearances sake and you are not prepared to defend that nomination except to create a specific racial or gender mix that is as unethical as DEI because it is DEI.
I have stated before that we should not criticize choices unless we are prepared to offer up alternatives. Obviously, Michelle, Oprah or Harris are obviously said in jest but Condoleeze Rice despite her tremendous qualifications is too tied to the Bush/Cheney regime. That is unfortunate. It is unfortunate not because she worked in that administration it is because the top of the ticket then has worked to undermine Trump as the 45th President and did not support him now. Trump cannot risk Ms. Rice or Colin Powell in his cabinet, regardless of either’s capabilities or desire to join a Trump team because of the actions of Bushes and the Cheneys They have effectively eliminated anyone of substance from the Bush years. If Trump did nominate one and then they turned on him he would be bashed for giving them the stick with which to beat him.
There is a limited pool of prospects from which to pick. Some, like Byron Donalds, would be chastised here for something like this:
“Byron Donalds (R-Fl) Donalds has been a busy Trump surrogate this year. He also is apparently following in the footsteps of his now rich inside trading colleagues in the House and Senate. Donalds failed to disclose over 100 stock trades he made totaling about $1.6 million, which violates the Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge (STOCK) Act. “
“Today, only about one-in-ten Black adults identify with or lean toward the Republican Party. And in a Pew Research Center survey in October, only 4% of Black registered voters said they would vote for the Republican candidate for the U.S. House seat in their district, while 69% said they would back the Democratic candidate.” Pew Research https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2022/11/07/10-facts-about-black-republicans/
This actually reduces the pool of Black candidates down to 10% of 14% or 1.4% of the population and is probably substantially less if the claims that Blacks have been held back from achievement because they were excluded from opportunities. To apply a nationwide demographic value to a subset of the whole of another subset is bad math.
Without specific names we cannot evaluate whether or not the picks he has made are the best picks. Saying these are not the best choices without an alternative prevents any meaningful debate. If I sue someone, even if my claims have limited proof and the other guy does not show up I will ask for and probably get a summary judgement in my favor. The other guy cannot complain when he loses because he failed to offer a defense.
Trump gets vilified even when the Trump supporter files suit against Americans For prosperity which opposes Trump’s candidacy. Read this story and especially the last paragraph.
‘Hard to Feel Sorry for Him’: Black Trump Supporter Mocked Online After Claiming He Was Called a ‘Slave’ By the Conservative Group He Was Campaigning for
No matter what Trump does you can be sure his adversaries will find a way to condemn him. I really do not care if his picks are a majority of blacks or all Hispanics so why should I care if they are a majority of whites, Indians and Asians.
Until some names are floated I can find no fault with the choice he has made.
Chris. Government and leadership involve perceptions as well as reality, and the leader who ignores that fails. You can’t really believe that among all the many available people, there aren’t sufficient numbers of black individuals as capable or more so than many of Trump’s picks? If he’s raiding Fox News, why hot take Harris Faulkner as \his UN Secretary or White House spokesperson, for example? She’s a lot more impressive than Hegseth. Just one or two would blunt the issue, at no cost in competency. It looks horrible. It isn’t smart to look horrible. This is exactly the kind of arrogance and hubris that wrecked the Democrats.
There could be some or many. I don’t know. I also do not know who Trump has or has not reached out to among prospective black candidates. I would not have a problem with Ma Faulkner but do we know if she is contractually obligated to remain at Fox. That is the reason Larry Kudlow is not returning as his economic advisor.
Nonetheless, the pool of qualified Blacks using the 14% baseline is just wrong. We are criticizing a perceived lack of attempting to find the best possible people who will be loyal to the agenda – NOT THE MAN- without knowing what attempts were actually made. You may be absolutely correct that better candidates are in fact out there but just how many are well known enough to gain attention. Not every possibility is as well known as Thomas Sowell. Candidates have to be on someone’s RADAR to even be given a once over. All I ask is that if I am to be persuaded I need to be educated to the alternatives available. I cannot name many possibilities of any race except those in the news. I don’t follow every political philosopher to be enlightened enough to say someone was overlooked and was better qualified.
Hey, maybe a not insignificant number of black voters don’t think a person’s being black makes them preferable for a position in government. Maybe a not insignificant number of black voters were voting for his policy positions when they voted for Trump rather than getting x number of the brothers into highly compensated positions? Maybe they’re tired of being pandered to? Maybe they thought Kamala Harris was a sop that had been thrown to them by Joe Biden.