Donald Trump on Saturday announced his pick for agriculture secretary – the final top post in his incoming cabinet – as policy advocate Brooke Rollins, a loyalist from his first term.
Ahead of his return to power in January, the Republican has moved swiftly to name the inner circle who will lead key government agencies, with his picks ranging from TV hosts to U.S. senators and governors.
Rollins, 52, is the CEO of the America First Policy Institute, a non-profit organization dedicated to promoting Trump's agenda that is often described as his "White House in waiting."
Several other Trump nominees have close ties to the group. With his agriculture pick on Saturday, he has now chosen someone for all of the top cabinet posts.
The president-elect has handed top roles in his future administration to a mix of loyalists, provocateurs and a few relatively conventional figures.
Trump said he would nominate prominent investor Scott Bessent as U.S. Treasury secretary, a key cabinet position with vast influence over economic, regulatory and international affairs.
A long-time hedge fund investor who taught at Yale University for several years, Bessent has a warm relationship with the president-elect.
While Bessent has long favored laissez-faire policies popular in the pre-Trump Republican Party, he has also spoken highly of Trump's use of tariffs as a negotiating tool.
He has praised the president-elect's economic philosophy, which rests on a skepticism of both regulation and international trade.
U.S. Senator Marco Rubio was tapped to be the secretary of state, putting the Florida-born politician on track to be the first Latino to serve as the United States' top diplomat.
Rubio, 53, was arguably the most hawkish option on Trump's shortlist for secretary of state. The senator has in past years advocated for a muscular foreign policy with respect to U.S. geopolitical foes, including China, Iran and Cuba.
Over the last several years he has softened some of his stances to align more closely with Trump's views. The president-elect accuses past U.S. presidents of leading the U.S. into costly and futile wars and has pushed for a less interventionist foreign policy.
Trump has picked Fox News commentator Pete Hegseth as his secretary of defense. Hegseth, 44, is a veteran who has expressed disdain for the so-called "woke" policies of Pentagon leaders, including its top military officer.
If confirmed by the Senate, Hegseth could make good on Trump's campaign promises to rid the U.S. military of generals whom he accuses of pursuing progressive policies on diversity in the ranks that conservatives have rallied against.
It could also set up a collision course between Hegseth and the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Air Force General C.Q. Brown, whom Hegseth accused of "pursuing the radical positions of left-wing politicians."
Hegseth has denied allegations made in a newly released police report that he sexually assaulted a woman in 2017.
Trump has named Tulsi Gabbard, a former Democratic representative and critic of the Biden administration, as his director of national intelligence.
Gabbard, 43, left the Democratic Party in 2022 to become an independent, then joined the Republican Party, and has little direct experience with intelligence work.
If confirmed, she would become the top official in the U.S. intelligence community after Trump starts his second term in January.
Trump chose former independent presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr., an environmental activist who has spread misinformation about the dangers of vaccines, to lead the United States' top health agency.
Kennedy, 70, has suggested he would gut the 18,000-employee Food and Drug Administration, which ensures the safety of food, drugs and medical devices, and replace hundreds of employees at the National Institutes of Health.
The Department of Health and Human Services oversees the Food and Drug Administration, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the National Institutes of Health and the massive Medicare and Medicaid Services programs, which provide health coverage for the poor, those aged 65 and older, and the disabled.
South Dakota Governor Kristi Noem has been picked to serve as the next homeland security secretary, Trump said.
Noem, 52, once seen as a possible running mate for Trump, is currently serving her second four-year term as South Dakota's governor. She rose to national prominence after refusing to impose a statewide mask mandate during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for everything from border protection and immigration to disaster response and the U.S. Secret Service.
Trump said Tom Homan, the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement during Trump's first administration, will be in charge of the country's borders.
Trump made cracking down on people in the country illegally a central element of his campaign, promising mass deportations.
Homan, 62, said he would prioritize deporting immigrants illegally in the U.S. who posed safety and security threats as well as those working at job sites.
The co-chair of Trump's transition effort and the longtime chief executive of financial services firm Cantor Fitzgerald, Howard Lutnick has been picked to head the Commerce Department, the agency that has become the U.S. weapon of choice against China's tech sector.
A bombastic New Yorker like Trump, Lutnick, 63, has uniformly praised the president-elect's economic policies, including his use of tariffs.
He has at times given elaborate, unvarnished opinions about what policies will be enacted in Trump's second term. Some Trump allies complained privately that he too often presented himself as speaking on behalf of the campaign.
Trump named tech billionaire Elon Musk and former Republican presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy to lead a newly created Department of Government Efficiency, rewarding two of his well-known supporters from the private sector.
He said Musk, 53, and Ramaswamy, 39, will reduce government bureaucracy, slash excess regulations, cut waste and restructure federal agencies. Trump said the new department would bring in external expertise and work with the White House and the Office of Management and Budget.
The president-elect picked former Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi on the day his previous choice Matt Gaetz withdrew from consideration in the face of opposition from Senate Republicans over his past conduct.
Bondi was the top law enforcement officer of the country's third most populous state from 2011 to 2019. She served on Trump's Opioid and Drug Abuse Commission during his first administration.
Trump's inner circle has described the attorney general as the most important member of the administration after Trump himself, key to his plans to carry out mass deportations, pardon Jan. 6, 2021 rioters, and seek retribution against those who prosecuted him over the past four years.
Mike Waltz, a Republican U.S. representative, will be Trump's national security adviser. Waltz, 50, is a retired Army Green Beret who has been a leading critic of China.
Waltz, a Trump loyalist who also served in the National Guard as a colonel, has criticized Chinese activity in the Asia-Pacific and has voiced the need for the U.S. to be ready for a potential conflict in the region.
The national security adviser is a powerful role that does not require Senate confirmation. Waltz will be responsible for briefing Trump on key national security issues and coordinating with different agencies.
Trump announced that Susie Wiles, one of his two campaign managers, will be his White House chief of staff. While the specifics of her political views are somewhat unclear, Wiles, 67, is credited with running a successful and efficient campaign. Supporters hope she will instill a sense of order and discipline that was often lacking during Trump's first four-year term, when he cycled through a number of chiefs of staff.
Elise Stefanik, a Republican congresswoman and staunch Trump supporter, would be his ambassador to the United Nations.
Stefanik, 40, a U.S. representative from New York state and House Republican conference chair, took a leadership position in the House of Representatives in 2021 when she was elected to replace then-Representative Liz Cheney, who was ousted for criticizing Trump's false claims of election fraud. Stefanik will arrive at the U.N. after bold promises by Trump to end the Russia-Ukraine war and Israel's war in Gaza.
Trump said he had picked John Ratcliffe, who was director of national intelligence at the end of Trump's first term, to serve as director of the Central Intelligence Agency in his second administration. A former congressman and prosecutor, Ratcliffe, 59, is seen as a Trump loyalist who could likely win Senate confirmation.
Still, during his time as director of national intelligence, Ratcliffe often contradicted the assessments of career civil servants, drawing criticism from Democrats who said he politicized the role.
Meanwhile, Trump tapped Linda McMahon, a co-chair of his transition effort and the co-founder of the professional wrestling franchise WWE, to be his education secretary.
In this role, McMahon, 76, who served as the chief of the Small Business Administration during Trump's first term, will oversee a department that Trump has pledged to eliminate.
A former member of the Connecticut State Board of Education, McMahon has been critical of DEI programs, which are meant to boost diversity in workplaces, universities and other institutions.
