President-elect Donald Trump has started to name officials joining his incoming administration.
Many of the early announcements include prominent Republicans who have staunchly backed his agenda, especially in key policies such as immigration and the United States' role in the Middle East.
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Here is a look at who Trump has confirmed will be joining his administration. Cabinet-level positions will require Senate confirmation, while some other roles will not.
Requiring Senate confirmation:
Secretary of State
Marco Rubio: Although Sen. Rubio of Florida has been a vocal supporter of Trump in recent years, that wasn’t always the case. The two frequently sparred while competing for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination.
Secretary of Defense
Pete Hegseth: Hegseth has served in the Army National Guard since 2003. He served with his unit at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba, volunteered to serve in Iraq and was also deployed to Afghanistan. He currently holds the rank of Major. Hegseth began working for Fox News in 2014 and is a co-host on "Fox & Friends Weekend."
Secretary of Homeland Security
Kristi Noem: South Dakota Gov. Noem, a Trump loyalist, has been outspoken about problems at the southern border, noting that the impacts are being felt in her state — hundreds of miles away. Noem will likely work with immigration hardliners Tom Homan, who will serve as Trump's 'border czar,' and Stephen Miller, the future deputy chief of staff.
Attorney General
Matt Gaetz: Gaetz currently represents Florida's 1st Congressional District. He won reelection last week for what would have been his fifth term in Congress.
In Congress, Gaetz, who serves on the House Judiciary Committee, has been critical of the Department of Justice for bringing federal charges against the former president.
Gaetz is under investigation by the bipartisan House Ethics Committee for allegations including sexual misconduct and illicit drug use.
Deputy Attorney General
Todd Blanche: Blanche is an attorney who was Trump's criminal defense lawyer during his New York hush money trial, where a jury found Trump guilty on 34 felony counts of falsifying business records.
Secretary of Health and Human Services
Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.: Kennedy has espoused debunked claims that vaccines cause autism and written a book that accuses former NIH Director Anthony Fauci of controlling media and government funding for health to influence scientific research.
He is the founder of the Children's Health Defense, a nonprofit group that advocates against the use of vaccines.
Kennedy ran as an independent for the 2024 presidential nomination, and later ended his run to endorse Trump in a deal where he expected to receive a role overseeing health policy.
Secretary of Veterans Affairs
Doug Collins: Collins is a former Representative from Georgia, where he represented Georgia's 9th District from 2013 to 2021. He was for a time the ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee and also served on House committees for Appropriations, Public Safety & Homeland Security and Defense and Veterans Affairs.
Secretary of the Interior
Doug Burgum: Burgum, A Republican, was elected as governor of North Dakota in 2016 and has won reelection since. In 2023 he briefly campaigned for the 2024 presidential nomination, but he ended his campaign in December of that year to work with the Trump campaign as an energy policy advisor.
U.N. ambassador
Rep. Elise Stefanik: Stefanik was first elected to her congressional seat in 2014 after easily winning what had been a Democratic-held district. In 2018, she became the National Republican Congressional Committee's recruitment chair, leading the party's effort to get more women to run for congressional office. She then replaced Rep. Liz Cheney as House GOP conference chair.
Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency
Lee Zeldin: Zeldin is an attorney who previously represented New York's 1st District in the U.S. House from 2015 to 2023. From 2003 to 2007, he served in the U.S. Army. In 2007, he transitioned to the Army Reserve, where he currently holds the rank of Lieutenant Colonel.
Director of the Central Intelligence Agency
John Ratcliffe: Ratcliffe served in Trump's first administration as the Director of National Intelligence, winning Senate confirmation amid concerns that he would politicize national intelligence. From 2015 to 2020, Ratcliffe represented Texas' 4th District in the U.S. House.
Director of National Intelligence
Tulsi Gabbard: Gabbard, now a Republican and a member of Trump's transition team in his 2024 campaign, represented Hawaii's 2nd District in the U.S. House from 2013 to 2021. She is a Lieutenant Colonel in the U.S. Army Reserve.
Solicitor General:
Dean John Sauer: Sauer is an attorney who was Solicitor General of Missouri from 2017 to 2023. He represented Trump in Trump v. United States, the case before the Supreme Court in which the court held that presidents have absolute immunity for acts taken while discharging core constitutional powers while they serve as president.
Secretary of Energy
Chris Wright: He's the founder and CEO of Denver-based fossil fuel company Liberty Energy with education from MIT and the University of California Berkeley. Trump said Wright would also serve as a member of the "newly-formed Council of National Energy."
Secretary of Transportation
Sean Duffy: In 2010 Duffy won election to the U.S. House of Representatives for Wisconsin's Seventh Congressional District, where he remained in office until 2019. He was a member of the House Committee on Financial Services and several subcommittees.
Duffy became a Fox News contributor in 2020. He is co-host of The Bottom Line on Fox Business and gives political analysis to other Fox properties.
Secretary of Commerce
Howard Lutnick: Lutnick will oversee Trump's "tariff and trade" policy, which is part of Trump's plan to boost U.S. manufacturing by imposing steep tariffs on all imported goods. Lutnick said the U.S. was "most prosperous during the early 1900s, when there was “no income tax and all we had was tariffs.” Lutnick also came under fire recently for defending Robert F. Kennedy's view that vaccines are contributing to higher rates of autism in children.
Lutnick has served as Trump transition team's co-chair.
Other White House roles:
Chief of staff
Susie Wiles: Wiles was Trump's campaign manager for 2024, overseeing a run that saw Trump take a decisive victory in both the popular vote and electoral college, including in swing states. Wiles also worked on the Trump campaign in 2016. She will become the first female White House chief of staff.
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Deputy chief of staff
Stephen Miller: Miller has long been one of Trump's top aides, providing a key voice as a policy adviser on immigration issues during Trump's first term in office. He also served as one of Trump's top speechwriters. At age 24, Miller quickly ascended through the GOP ranks as Sen. Jeff Sessions' communications director. Sessions was later named Trump's attorney general.
White House Press Secretary
Karoline Leavitt: Leavitt previously served as Assistant Press Secretary during Trump's first term, and as national press secretary for the Trump campaign.
"Border czar"
Tom Homan: Homan is returning to a top border security role within the Trump White House after serving as acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement during the first 18 months of Trump's first term. Previously, he was in the Obama administration as the executive associate director of ICE enforcement and removal operations. He spent over three decades with ICE.
National security adviser
Rep. Mike Waltz: Waltz is a Green Beret veteran and a retired Colonel in the National Guard, who served in the U.S. armed forces for 27 years. He was elected to represent Florida's 6th District in the U.S. House of Representatives in 2018, where he succeeded Florida's now-governor, Ron DeSantis.
White House Counsel
William "Bill" McGinley: McGinley is an attorney who served as the White House Cabinet Secretary during Trump's first term until he resigned in July of 2019.
Principal Associate Deputy Attorney General
Emil Bove: Bove is an attorney who was one of Trump's criminal defense lawyers. He will serve as acting Attorney General while Todd Blanche is confirmed by the Senate.
Department of Government Efficiency
Elon Musk and Vivek Ramaswamy: The two will run a new limited government efficiency project as part of his administration. It will not be a formal U.S. government agency. It will advise from outside the regular government structure, according to Trump's explanation, and "will partner with the White House and Office of Management & Budget to drive large scale structural reform."
Assistant to the President and White House Staff Secretary
William Owen Scharf: Trump described him as a "highly-skilled attorney" with an education from Harvard Law School and Princeton. His background includes serving as a federal prosecutor and clerking for two federal appeals court judges.
