Donald Trump’s Cabinet picks, so far

Donald Trump on Friday nominated three conservative stalwarts to take key posts in his administration, including Senator Jeff Sessions as attorney general, suggesting the United States president-elect will take a hard line on immigration and promote a hawkish foreign policy. He told the committee (of which he is now a member), “I am not the Jeff Sessions my detractors have tried to create”.

The pick was disclosed Friday by a senior Trump official who wasn’t authorized to speak publicly about it.

One of the earliest Republican lawmakers to support Trump’s White House candidacy, Sessions opposes any path to citizenship for illegal immigrants and was an enthusiastic backer of Trump’s campaign promise to build a wall on the border with Mexico.

He has taken positions that are at odds with Trump’s, notably on Russia’s actions in Ukraine and its military support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who also is supported by Iran. Republicans will have 52 votes in the Senate and (thanks to Democrats changing Senate rules three years ago to discontinue the 60-vote confirmation threshold) Sessions will only need a simple majority to win his appointment. Strange, in a letter this month to the committee chairman, said his office was doing “related work” but did not elaborate. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, praised Sessions as someone who worked “across the aisle on major legislation” and said he was confident he’d be approved by the panel.

Senate Democrats are not going to be able to block Alabama Sen.

Civil rights leaders are calling on Trump to rescind Sessions’ nomination or for the Senate to reject him. “I believe if he were to become the attorney general, he would be just what the doctor ordered to not only clean up that agency but to effectuate all the laws in this country to the best of his ability.” .

President-elect Donald Trump’s picks for staff positions in his administration are alarming civil rights leaders who say his choices could turn back the clock on social issues.

Sessions has denounced the 1965 Voting Rights Act and had labeled the ACLU and the NAACP “un-American” and said the organizations “forced civil rights down the throats of people”.

When Feinstein’s report was released in December 2014, Pompeo said that Feinstein “has put American lives at risk”, and made the nation less secure.

Unlike the Obama administration, Sessions would be less likely to equate larger companies with trouble for competition, Haines said, when considering the Senator’s career. And he’s been protective of certain surveillance powers, telling Holder in one committee hearing that when it comes to warrantless wiretapping, “we’ve exaggerated the extent to which this is somehow violative of our Constitution”. I think you forgot to mention in there, Mr. Blakeman, that the Senate once denied Sessions a federal judgeship for being too racist.

Since America is now divided into red and blue states, the classification that began in 2000 and is now seemingly permanent, it is appropriate to use Civil War references when considering the next Attorney General, the ultimate neo-Confederate. Even then, Sessions insisted he harbored no racial bias and disputed the allegations made against during hearings on his nomination to be a federal judge. Sessions denied the accusation, but withdrew from consideration.

Sessions would be unable to serve as Attorney General and U.S. Senator.

Secretary of State Merrill said that there are dozens of people who have indicated their interest in the seat. “I’ll wake u up when it’s over”, Navarro tweeted.