Like any other would-be autocrat, President-elect Donald Trump is selecting people for key positions overseeing the military and legal system based not on objective merits but their personal loyalty to one man: in this case, a 78-year-old Republican who felt betrayed in his first term when more-or-less qualified cabinet officials would balk at some of his more extreme demands. This time, he’s saying with his early picks, there will be no one second guessing the leader or, in the words of his son, thinking they “know better” than a man with the nuclear codes.
The nomination of former Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., who resigned from Congress on Wednesday, is the clearest sign yet that Trump intends to govern as an authoritarian who will use all the levers of the state to harass his critics and avowed opponents. Gaetz graduated from William & Mary Law School but otherwise has no experience that would suggest he’s qualified to lead the Department of Justice.
