President-elect Donald Trump has chosen relatively conventional experts to lead his second administration’s economic policy, even as he pursues tariffs that could upend the international trade order and fills much of his Cabinet with ideologues and loyalists.
Trump tapped a former Fox News host to lead the Defense Department and a vaccine skeptic to run the Department of Health and Human Services; his choice for attorney general, former congressman Matt Gaetz (R-Florida), withdrew from consideration after even GOP senators said they doubted he could be confirmed. In contrast to those picks, Trump has received bipartisan praise for his selections to arguably the two most important economic positions in his administration — the financier Scott Bessent, chosen to be treasury secretary, and conservative economist Kevin Hassett, chosen to lead the White House National Economic Council. Democrats have policy disagreements with both men, but economists from both parties broadly see them as likely to exert a moderating influence on Trump’s most extreme impulses to upend the global trade order.
