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January 25, 2025 we have all earned a break for this week, but as some of you have heard me say, I write these letters with an eye to what a graduate student will need to know in 150 years. Two things from last night belong in the record of this time, not least because they illustrate President Donald Trump's deliberate demonstration of dominance over Republican lawmaker Last night, the Senate confirmed former Fox News Channel weekend host Pete Hegseth as the Defense Secretary of the United States of America. As Tom Bowman of NPR notes, since Congress created the position in 1947 in the wake of World War II, every person who has held it has come from a senior position in elected office, industry or the military. Hegseth has been accused of financial mismanagement at the small nonprofits he directed, has demonstrated alcohol abuse, and paid $50,000 to a woman who accused him of sexual assault as part of a non disclosure agreement. He has experience primarily on the Fox News Channel, where his attacks on WOKE caught Trump's eye. The Secretary of defense oversees an organization of almost 3 million people and a budget of more than $800 billion, as well as advising the president and working with both allies and rivals around the globe to prevent war. It should go without saying that a candidate like Hegseth could never have been nominated, let alone confirmed under any other president. But Republicans caved, even on this most vital position for the American people's safety. The chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Roger Wicker, a Republican of Mississippi, tried to spin Hegseth's lack of relevant experience as a plus. We must not underestimate the importance of having a top shelf communicator as Secretary of defense. Other than the president, no official plays a larger role in telling the men and women in uniform, the Congress and the public about the threats we face and the need for a peace through strength defense policy. Vice President J.D. vance had to break a 5050 tie to confirm Hegseth as Republican. Senators Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky joined all the Democrats and independents in voting no. Hegseth was sworn in early this morning. That timing mattered, as MSNBC host Rachel Maddow noted, as soon as Senator Joni Ernst, a Republican of Iowa whose yes was secured only through an intense pressure campaign, had voted in favor. President Trump informed at least 15 independent inspectors general of US government departments that they were fired, including, as David Nakamura, Lisa Rain and Matt Visor of the Washington Post noted, those from the Departments of Defense, State, Transportation, Labor, Health and Human Services, Veterans Affairs, Housing and Urban Development, Interior, Energy, Commerce and Agriculture, as well as the Environmental Protection Agency, Small Business Administration and the Social Security Administration. Most were Trump's own appointees from his first term put in when he purged the inspectors general more gradually after his first impeachment. Project 2025 called for the removal of the inspectors general. Just a week ago, Ernst and her fellow Iowa Republican Senator Chuck Grassley co founded a bipartisan caucus, the Inspector General Caucus, to support those inspectors general. Grassley told Politico in November that he intends to defend the inspectors general. Congress passed a law in 1978 to create inspectors general in 12 government departments, according to Jen Kirby, who explained inspectors general for Vox in 2020, a movement to combat waste in government had been building for a while, and the fraud and misuse of offices in the administration of President Richard M. Nixon made it clear that such protections were necessary. Essentially, inspectors general are watchdogs keeping Congress informed of what's going on within departments. Kirby notes that when he took office in 1981, President Ronald Reagan promptly fired all the inspectors general, claiming he wanted to appoint his own people. Congress members of both parties pushed back, and Reagan rehired at least five of those he had fired. George H.W. bush also tried to fire the inspectors general, but backed down when Congress backed up their protests that they must be independent. In 2008, Congress expanded the law by creating the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and efficiency. By 2010, that council covered 68 offices. During his first term. In the wake of his first impeachment, Trump fired at least five inspectors general he considered disloyal to him. And in 2022, Congress amended the law to require any president who sought to get rid of an inspector general to communicate in writing the reasons for any such removal or transfer to both houses of Congress. Not later than 30 days before the removal or transfer, Congress called the law the Securing Inspector General Independence act of 2022. The chair of the Council of Inspectors General on Integrity and Efficiency, Hannibal or Mike Ware, responded immediately to the information that Trump wanted to fire inspectors general. Ware recommended that Director of Presidential Personnel Sergio Gore, who had sent the email firing the inspectors general, reach out to White House counsel to discuss your intended course of action. At this point, we do not believe the actions taken are legally sufficient to dismiss the inspectors general because of the requirements of the 2022 law. This evening, Nakamura, Raine and Visor reported in the Washington Post that Democrats are outraged at the illegal firings and even some Republicans are expressing concern and have asked the White House for an explanation. For his part, Trump said incorrectly that firing inspector generals is a very standard thing to do. Several of the inspector generals Trump tried to fire are standing firm on the illegality of the order and plan to show up to work on Monday. The framers of the Constitution designed impeachment to enable Congress to remove a chief executive who deliberately breaks the law, believing that the determination of senators to hold onto their own power would keep them from allowing a president to seize more than the Constitution had assigned him. In Federalist 69, Alexander Hamilton tried to reassure those nervous about the centralization of power in the new Constitution that no man could ever become a dictator because, unlike a king, the president of the United States would be liable to be impeached, tried, and upon conviction of treason, bribery, or other high crimes or misdemeanors, removed from office, and would afterward be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of the law. But the framers did not anticipate the rise of political parties. Partisanship would push politicians to put party over country and eventually would induce even senators to bow to a rogue president. MAGA Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming told the Fox News Channel today that he is unconcerned about Trump's breaking the law, written just two years ago. Well, sometimes inspector generals don't do the job that they're supposed to do. Some of them deserve to be fired, and the president is going to make wise decisions on those. There's one more story you'll be hearing more about from me going forward, but it's important enough to call out tonight because it indicates an important shift in American politics. In an Associated Press NORC poll released yesterday, only 12% of those polled thought the president relying on billionaires for policy advice is a good thing. Even Among Republicans, only 20% think it's a good thing. Since the very earliest days of the United States, class was a central lens through which Americans interpreted politics. And yet in the 1960s, politicians began to focus on race and gender, and we talked very little about class. Now, with Trump embracing the world's richest man, who invested more than $250 million in his election, and with Trump making it clear through the arrangement of the seating at his inauguration that he is elevating the interests of billionaires to the top of his agenda, class appears to be back on the table.
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Letters from an American was produced at Soundscape Productions, Dedham, Massachusetts, recorded with music composed by Michael Moss.