Newsletter: Tracking Donald Trump’s Nominees

President-elect Donald Trump has continued to fill his incoming administration with allies and loyalists, an indication of his desire to be surrounded by people unlikely to constrain him.

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President-elect Donald Trump has continued to fill his incoming administration with allies and loyalists, an indication of his desire to be surrounded by people unlikely to constrain him.

Several applicants recently told the New York Times that they were asked questions seemingly aimed at determining their loyalty — including what they thought about the Jan. 6 insurrection or whether the 2020 election was stolen. “The sense they got was that there was only one right answer to each question,” the Times reported.

Earlier this week, Trump said he’d asked conservative lawyer Mark Paoletta to serve as general counsel at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB).

American Oversight has been fighting for the release of documents from OMB related to Schedule F, Trump’s 2020 executive order aimed at turning the federal workforce into a bureaucracy of loyalists by stripping federal employees of certain protections and making it easier to fire them.
Paoletta is a close friend of Justice Clarence Thomas, and joined Thomas on the infamous island-hopping trip to Indonesia in 2019 with billionaire GOP megadonor Harlan Crow, which was first reported by ProPublica last year.
We previously obtained emails from OMB in which Paoletta sought approval or informed an ethics officer about the Indonesia trip, as well as a 2019 trip to Jackson Hole. See the records and more details here.

Trump also announced that Kari Lake was his pick for director of Voice of America (VOA), the government-funded news broadcasting channel. VOA journalists have expressed serious concern about whether Lake — who falsely claimed fraud in both Trump’s 2020 loss and her defeat in Arizona’s 2022 gubernatorial race — will seek to use the outlet to promote Trump or his political goals.

VOA was a target during the first Trump administration. We previously sued the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) — the entity that oversees VOA — for the communications of former CEO Michael Pack, who, during less than eight months as head of the agency, took a number of actions that threatened to undermine the agency’s work and to turn it into a pro-Trump political operation.
Records we obtained shed light on internal turmoil at USAGM thanks to Pack’s controversial personnel decisions and his and other Trump allies’ efforts to delay the J-1 visa renewal process for USAGM journalists.
We also obtained communication records sent by Trump loyalists who were hired by Pack to work in various senior positions at USAGM. A federal investigation into Pack’s tenure later revealed his extensive abuses of power in the role.

On the Records

Religious Education in Oklahoma Public Schools

Oklahoma State Superintendent Ryan Walters has drawn major scrutiny for his efforts to enshrine religion in public school curriculum, including his recent mandate that state schools teach the Bible.

Records we obtained, cited in a New York Times Magazine article published this week, include a draft document titled “Putting God Back in the Classroom” that was circulated by Walters’ staff in October 2023.

The document touts Walters’ creation of the Oklahoma Advisory Committee on Founding Principles, the passing of rules that could limit discussions of sexuality and gender, and the state’s partnership with right-wing media organization PragerU.
We also obtained records that indicate Walters was invited last year to serve on the Heritage Foundation Advisory Council on Education Reform.
We have filed requests for Walters’ communications related to curriculum reviews and with far-right groups or other state education agencies, and in August sent a letter demanding the release of these documents.

Oshkosh Defense’s Electric Mail Truck Fleet Contract

In February 2021, the U.S. Postal Service awarded a highly coveted, multibillion-dollar contract for a new fleet of mail trucks to Oshkosh Defense, a company that primarily makes gas-fueled military vehicles. This week, the Washington Post reported that the contractor has delivered just 93 electric trucks as of November. It was originally expected to deliver 3,000.

Oshkosh Defense’s design drew criticism for not going far enough in making the agency’s fleet more environmentally friendly. American Oversight previously obtained records highlighting the gap between the 2021 plan and USPS’s environmental evaluation criteria.

The documents include the original evaluation criteria that USPS used to select a new fleet manufacturer. The criteria explicitly mentioned fuel efficiency and a “path to alternate fuel vehicles” among the factors USPS would be considering.
We also obtained Oshkosh’s initial contract of nearly $482 million.

Newsletter: Tracking Donald Trump’s Nominees

On the Records

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