New book details infighting behind Trump’s ‘obviously unqualified’ cabinet picks

Donald Trump picked Kristi Noem as homeland security secretary as a personal favour to his former campaign manager Corey Lewandowski despite objections that she was “obviously unqualified”, according to a new book.

The factional infighting behind Trump’s cabinet selection, where inexperience was no barrier to success, is detailed by journalist Jonathan Karl in Retribution: Donald Trump and the Campaign That Changed America. The Guardian obtained a copy.

Soon after his election victory last November, the book recounts, Trump picked Noem to run the Department of Homeland Security, central to fulfilling his campaign promise of the mass deportation of undocumented immigrants.

Like Pete Hegseth, who landed the job of defense secretary, Noem, then the governor of South Dakota – who faced an outcry over her admission in a book that she once shot a pet dog – had not been on the transition team’s list of possible candidates and had not gone through vetting for the job, Karl writes in Retribution.

“When a surprised Trump advisor asked the president-elect why he had decided to nominate Noem to be secretary of Homeland Security, he had a simple answer. ‘I did it for Corey,’ he said. ‘It’s the only thing Corey asked me for.’”

Lewandowski was Trump’s campaign manager until he was fired in June 2016 after a string of controversies that included being accused of forcibly yanking the arm of a female reporter. Rumours of an affair between Lewandowski and Noem have swirled in Washington for years, though both deny the relationship.

Karl notes that even some of Trump’s closest allies were uncomfortable with putting Noem in charge of a sprawling department that includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema).

Steve Bannon, an influential podcaster and former White House chief strategist, told the author two days after Trump made the announcement: “We still got the global war on terror. She runs the whole thing? She runs the fucking Secret Service? It’s all of it. It’s the global war on terror. It’s all that. What are you talking about? She’s never been in law enforcement!”

But Bannon did not blame Trump for making what he considered a terrible choice, Karl adds. “He blamed Lewandowski for convincing the president-elect to do it. ‘This motherfucker asked for somebody who’s obviously unqualified – and it’s dangerous. This is dangerous. What are you doing?’”

Noem was confirmed by the Senate in January. She has since been criticised for controversial spending, immigration policy overreach and bureaucratic delays in disaster aid. Her series of photo ops and glossy videos at locations including the southern border and a mega-prison in El Salvador have been described as “authoritarian cosplay”.

Noem was not the only cabinet pick who proved divisive, according to the book. Sean Duffy, a former Republican member of Congress and Fox Business anchor, wanted the job of US ambassador to the United Nations despite having no background in foreign policy. But Trump had already decided to offer the job to the House representative Elise Stefanik.

Duffy was considered for transportation secretary instead but again lacked relevant experience. Karl writes: “When Trump asked a friend of Duffy’s if he knew anything about transportation, the friend answered, ‘Of course he does, he has nine kids!’ Moving a family that large around, the friend joked, requires at least some transportation expertise.”

Howard Lutnick, who would become Trump’s commerce secretary, recommended Emil Michael, a former senior executive at Uber, for the transportation role, an idea endorsed by the tech entrepreneur Elon Musk. “Trump, however, had never heard of the guy – and that made him a nonstarter.”

Lutnick, meanwhile, tried to block the nomination of Duffy by digging up dirt on him. He asked his team to search through hundreds of Duffy’s TV appearances to find an example of him saying something critical of Trump that might turn the president-elect against him.

Karl writes: “Lutnick’s team had to go back nearly a decade – to the early days of the 2016 Republican presidential primary – to find anything Duffy had said that was remotely negative about Donald Trump. He finally found a September 2015 interview in which the then congressman had said he didn’t believe Trump was a real conservative and didn’t think he would win the party’s nomination.”

The sabotage nearly worked: one stray comment from a decade ago nearly cost Duffy the job. But not quite. “Trump, reconsidering the pick, called Duffy and his wife, Rachel, and they were able to convince the president-elect that Sean had long since changed his views on Trump’s conservative bona fides.”

On 18 November Trump announced that Duffy would be transportation secretary. In July this year the president said Duffy would serve as acting Nasa administrator too. On Wednesday Musk posted on X: “Having a NASA Administrator who knows literally ZERO about rockets & spacecraft undermines the American space program and endangers our astronauts.”