Note: I wanted this to go up on Inauguration Day, but I had some server issues last week. And while I got everything back for Friday and Monday, I didn’t want to wait too long to post this. You’ll note at the end that I have questions about General Austin and whether he could be confirmed as Defence Secretary. Spoiler: He was.
Today is Inauguration Day and at noon, President Trump returns to being a citizen and Joe Biden assumes the office of the presidency. He comes to office with arguably the most diverse cabinet in American history supporting him and his agenda.
CNN took a look at that diversity with this piece, which uses an interactive, animated stacked bar chart.
I took a screenshot at the ethnic/racial diversity. At the top, each bar represents one member of cabinet who you can reveal after mousing over the bar. Below is a stacked bar chart showing the racial makeup of the United States. You can see how it does resemble, and in some cases exceeds, the diversity of the broader United States.
One thing to note, however, is that we see 26 members of Cabinet. Some of those are the heads of the big executive departments like Treasury and Defence. But I’m not certain everyone is technically a cabinet-level position, e.g. Celia Rouse, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors. It could be that the position is being elevated to cabinet level like John Kerry’s role as climate envoy. And if I just missed the press announcement, that’s on me. But that could affect the overall numbers.
Regardless, the nominated cabinet is more diverse than the previous two administrations as the CNN piece also shows.
I should point out that usually an incoming administration usually has a few of its national security positions already confirmed or confirmed on the first day, e.g. Defence and State. However, the Republican Senate, obsessed with the lie of a fraudulent election, has only just begun to start the confirmation process. In fact, as of late last night, only Avril Haines has been confirmed by the Senate (84–10) for Director of National Intelligence.
Furthermore, almost every administration has one or two nominations that fail to pass the Senate. George W Bush had Linda Chavez, Barack Obama had Tom Daschle, and Donald Trump had Andrew Puzder, just to give one from each of the last three administrations.
With a 50–50 Senate, I would expect there to be a few nominees who fail to make it over the line. Austin could be one, there appears to be some bipartisan agreement that we ought not nominate recent military officials as civilian heads of said military. Another to keep an eye out for is Neera Tanden. She riles conservatives and angers Bernie Sanders supporters, so whether the Senate will confirm her as Director of the Office of Management and Budget remains an open question in my mind.
Credit for the piece goes to Priya Krishnakumar, Catherine E. Shoichet, Janie Boschma and Kenneth Uzquiano.
