Answer This: Jim Lehrer

The latest episode of Trial Balloon is live for members. What Trump is doing with his transition and where Democrats go from here. .memberful-global-teaser-content p:last-child{ -webkit-mask-image: linear-gradient(180deg, #000 0%, transparent); mask-image: linear-gradient(180deg, #000 0%, transparent); } Join now to continue reading. Members get exclusive analysis, bonus features and no advertising. Learn more. If you’re already a member, sign in to your account.

“People who are casually following the recent announcements from President-elect Donald Trump about how he intends to staff the upper ranks of the executive branch could be forgiven for thinking they were reading about a beauty contest, not political appointments,” the New York Times reports. “If, during his first administration, Mr.

“Donald Trump’s second administration risks being rife with potential conflicts of interests given the sprawling business and financial interests of several cabinet picks and allies, warn ethics watchdogs and experts,” the Financial Times reports. “Trump’s cabinet is shaping up to be one of the wealthiest on record after he tapped a number of financiers and business executives, including nominees Scott Bessent as Treasury secretary, Howard Lutnick to lead the commerce department, and Chris Wright as energy secretary.” “Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, has also become a close adviser and confidant of the president-elect.”

“Donald Trump’s picks for the incoming administration are being shaped by a combination of different power centers including one-man influences like top Trump adviser Boris Epshteyn and combined groups led by chief of staff Susie Wiles and vice-president-elect JD Vance,” The Guardian reports. “The president-elect appears to have settled on a number of cabinet nominees himself without being aggressively pushed by advisers, including Pete Hegseth for defense secretary, Marco Rubio for secretary of state and Russ Vought to lead the Office of Management and Budget.” “But for other cabinet roles or major White House positions for which Trump did not have a clear preference or a frontrunner in mind, a handful of individuals with outsized influence have come to dominate the decision-making in meetings and interviews being held at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida.”

“China wields new powers as it confronts the prospect of another trade conflict with the US, expanding its retaliatory reach in recent years to include tools capable of wreaking havoc on global commerce and finance,” Bloomberg reports. “Six years after Donald Trump started the first trade war with China, the US president-elect has named a series of China hawks to his administration and threatened 60% tariffs on Chinese goods, a level that would decimate trade between the two countries.

New York Times: “To offset gains that Donald Trump made in rural and suburban America in 2024, Kamala Harris needed to do better than Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s strong 2020 electoral performance in cities. But she ended up doing worse in urban America — getting 15 percent fewer votes than Mr.