Gaetz of Wrath
11:35 Share

Hey folks, Joyce Vance here. It's a special day for CAFE. We're celebrating the 300th episode of the CAFE Insider Podcast. Thank you for listening to our shows and for creating such an engaged community. The legal news isn't stopping and neither will we. Preet and I will keep doing our best to help keep you informed about the most important legal matters in our country.

In this episode, we discuss Donald Trump's controversial nominations for his cabinet and other high-profile staff members, including Matt Gaetz for attorney general, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for health secretary, and Trump's personal lawyers for other DOJ leadership positions. If you're a member of Cafe Insider, head over to the Insider feed or click the link in the show notes of this podcast to listen to the full analysis. Stay tuned, listeners. Remain here for an excerpt from our conversation.

To become a member of Cafe Insider, head to cafe.com slash November. For a limited time, get 40% off your membership for the first year. That's cafe.com slash November. And now, on to the show. Today is one of those days where, you know, we're going to spend a little bit of time and talk about the personnel that are coming in, in the next Trump administration. And boy, it's been a doozy. I've been talking with people, Joyce,

about sort of the four, somebody referred to them as the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Although one is, I guess, a horsewoman that after Marco Rubio was named, there were some people like, oh, you can do better than Marco Rubio. Like, no, you can't. No, you can't given the rest of the roster that Marco Rubio has almost like George Kennan diplomatic status given how great his stature is compared to some of these other nominees. And of the sort of four horsemen,

in the words of one of my friends, Matt Gaetz at DOJ, RFK Jr. at Health and Human Services, Tulsi Gabbard as Director of National Intelligence, the DNI, and Mr. Hegseth as Defense Secretary. Obviously, the one that's most in our wheelhouse and we'll spend the most time on is Matt Gaetz, but which one of those four worries you the most and which one of those four, if any,

might be stopped by the U.S. Senate. So look, I'm going to take a brave stand here and say, I am stunned that we are not talking about Kristi Noem, South Dakota governor, and dog killer, right? The fact that that's not the headline here. Because we can't talk about everyone. I mean, that's a real problem in my view. And I don't think we should gloss over the fact. I mean, you know, this is Hillary Clinton's bucket of deplorables incarnate.

So of the four horsemen of the apocalypse, I again find it hard to say who's the most horrible. You know, Tulsi Gabbard, there's been this lingering accusation that she's very Russia friendly. That's really concerning in that position. And this, by the way, is part of Trump's focused attack.

on the intelligence community. I think that's been discussed less than his animosity towards the military and the Justice Department, but for sure that's a feature, not a bug. But obviously, Matt Gaetz is deeply concerning to anybody who thinks that the Justice Department shouldn't be used as a political tool for the White House because that's what that appointment signifies.

Gates is completely unqualified. In fact, Gates' only experience in the criminal justice system is as a target of a federal criminal investigation, right? Never worked in a prosecutor's office, never indicted a case.

He's never managed a big organization. DOJ has 115,000 employees and 40-plus components, if my count is correct. He doesn't have the managerial experience for the job. And he doesn't have the judgment, the integrity, the credibility. This is not an appointment by Trump of someone to run the Justice Department. This is an appointment by Trump of someone to run the Justice Department into the ground.

So I begin with the premise, which I think is important to begin with, that as a general matter, based on tradition, based on separation of powers, based on how our government is organized, that a president deserves a significant amount of deference in choosing appointees. Obviously, a president not only deserves, but is entitled to legally and otherwise to a tremendous, almost unfettered amount of discretion in choosing White House staff.

Chief of Staff, counselors, White House counsel, people in those positions. When you're assembling a cabinet, significant amount of deference because you want people rowing in the same direction. The president has won a national election, whether it's this year Trump or the last time Biden or some time ago George W. Bush or Barack Obama. And they should not be needlessly and aggressively micromanaged in who gets what position.

However, there are limits to those who care about the Constitution. There's a structure that allows for one of the houses in the co-equal branch of government, the legislature, the Senate, to advise and consent. That's not a norm. That's an actual constitutional provision. And in different circumstances, there's more deference or less deference. I think it's the case, as you said very eloquently a moment ago, that when it comes to Matt Gaetz, that's a bridge too far. And the ordinary deference you give to a president

should surrender to the wise discretion and judgment of a majority of senators. And we've seen the reporting, by the way, that many, many Republican senators don't want to vote for Matt Gaetz. You need basic qualifications, you need basic experience, you need basic seasoning, and you need to be, you know, in a word, someone who would ordinarily pass a background check

And be able to get a security clearance. I doubt that Matt Gaetz would get either one of those things, right? Yeah, I mean, I think that's right. He's just the wrong choice for the Justice Department. And so that raises the notion, I don't know if you want to talk about it yet, so stop me if you want to save it for later, but this idea that Trump had tweeted or whatever he calls it on his Truth Social podcast.

platform early on that he demanded recess appointments and that Republican senators needed to line up and let him put his team in place by recess appointments. That was, by the way, before he announced that Matt Gaetz was going to DOJ. I think that, you know, what that signifies, right, is Trump understands that these are people who cannot survive a vote in the Senate and

And I'm old enough to recall when senators took advice and consent really seriously during the Obama administration. Orrin Hatch wrote a piece in The Hill midway through the Obama administration saying that that part of the Constitution was essential, that the Senate had a duty to offer its advice and consent on the president's nominees and that they couldn't take office absent a vote by the Senate in that regard.

So does all of this evaporate now? And let me just tell you, just to put it all out on the table, I have a larger concern. I think this is about more than Trump's nominees, because if you can bypass this major portion of the Constitution because the president tells you to, if the Senate is willing to bend the knee and abdicate that responsibility—

then what part of the Constitution isn't on the cutting table, right? What else might they be willing to negotiate a way to support Trump's whims? Yeah, look, the prerogatives of any institution can be waived, right? So, you know, independent journalists have a right under the Constitution, the First Amendment, to say and write what they want, so long as it's not libelous or defamatory. But you can decide, right?

to, you know, abdicate your responsibility and surrender your privileges under the First Amendment. And in response to a president or another elected official or, you know, a business person who says, don't write that thing, stop criticizing me, you can decide to do that. And same is true for another governmental body like the Senate. They have the right and the prerogative to advise and consent and to not give their consent, but they can also choose if they want

which I think would be a very terrible result and bode very ill things for the democracy as a whole going forward, they can choose not to assert those rights. By the way, it used to be the case, not only that you had this advising consent system, which is in the Constitution, but which is not a norm, although they can surrender it. There was a norm in various circumstances of presidents deciding before they nominated somebody or identified somebody they intended to nominate to kind of consult the

with people in their own party and often people in the other party. You know, when Alberto Gonzalez was the attorney general and he resigned after a lot of issues, including issues that I helped to raise when I was on a Senate investigating committee, there was a discussion about who the next attorney general should be. And my boss at the time, the number three Democrat in the Senate who had led the committee hearings in the investigation of Alberto Gonzalez and the politicization of the Justice Department, got a call from the White House

What do you think about some of these people, including Michael B. Mukasey, who ended up becoming the nominee for attorney general? In Supreme Court nominations, it used to be the case that the White House would call leading Democrats and Republicans, whichever party the White House belonged to at the time, to try to get some consensus, A, because it's good for the votes you're going to get ultimately, and B, it gives the public some confidence that you're not going out of control and reaching for nominees who are from Mars.

but people who have general bipartisan support, even if, you know, no nominee is going to be perfect for everyone. And that has gone by the wayside, and I think that's too bad. Seriously, a part of me really wonders, why are we discussing some of these nominations like they're legitimate? I mean, there was a part of me that was tempted with Gates to just say, not a serious nomination. Let's move on. Well, we're discussing it, you know, because we have to. Because in the ordinary world, Gates doesn't get confirmed.

I still don't think he does. But then you have this lingering question of the recess appointment. Thanks for listening. To hear the full episode, head to cafe.com slash November to sign up and get 40% off your membership for the first year. You'll be supporting our work and get exclusive access to full weekly podcast episodes of Insider and bonus material from Stay Tuned. That's cafe.com slash November.

Support for this podcast comes from Klaviyo. You know that feeling when your favorite brand really gets you. Deliver that feeling to your customers every time. Klaviyo turns your customer data into real-time connections across AI-powered email, SMS, and more, making every moment count.

Over 100,000 brands trust Klaviyo's unified data and marketing platform to build smarter digital relationships with their customers during Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and beyond. Make every moment count with Klaviyo. Learn more at klaviyo.com. Support for this podcast comes from Stripe.

Stripe is a payments and billing platform supporting millions of businesses around the world, including companies like Uber, BMW, and DoorDash. Stripe has helped countless startups and established companies alike reach their growth targets, make progress on their missions, and reach more customers globally.

The platform offers a suite of specialized features and tools to fast-track growth, like Stripe Billing, which makes it easy to handle subscription-based charges, invoicing, and all recurring revenue management needs. You can learn how Stripe helps companies of all sizes make progress at Stripe.com. That's Stripe.com to learn more. Stripe. Make progress.