President Donald Trump and his administration have hired more than “2,000 people in these last few weeks,” Presidential Personnel Office Director Sergio Gor said Thursday. “It’s a record pace in hiring across the entire federal government, but it’s also the quality we’re looking for: Great people who will deliver on that mandate for the president.”
Gor would know, given the Presidential Personnel Office is the team tasked with assessing and vetting candidates to build up the administration’s team. “We hire across all departments, and that includes from the Cabinet level all the way down to the interns,” Gor told Sean Hannity in a Fox News interview Thursday, explaining the office’s work. That is essentially “all the political appointees.”
Those hired, he said, “are loyal to the mission, and that mission is to deliver on the mandate that the American people gave President Trump.”
The corporate press has tried to tar and feather the Trump administration’s hiring efforts by making a similar claim, but with negative connotations: Trump is only interested in loyalists and not the best candidates for the job. But a source close to the office tells The Daily Signal that “this PPO [Presidential Personnel Office] believes that the most competent people to implement the president’s agenda are the people most aligned with the mission.” There is not a dichotomy between competency and loyalty.
In order to enact the Trump agenda at a relentless pace, the administration hit the ground running. It hired a record 1,300 staffers on Day One of the administration. With that beachhead established throughout the deep state, the Presidential Personnel Office has continued its hiring work to send reinforcements to the front lines.
“It’s important to bring your own people, meaning people that will deliver on that promise that the president made to the American people,” Gor explained. “A lot of people are surprised: ‘What do you mean you’re only hiring loyal people?’ We’re hiring loyal people to the mission. He was delivered to this White House by the American people, and they gave him a mandate, and in order for him to deliver on that mandate, he deserves the best people, the highest quality people.”
The Senate, led by Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has also worked at a record pace to confirm Trump’s Cabinet. Of the 23 Cabinet positions, 21 are now filled, and Trump’s labor secretary nominee, Lori Chavez-DeRemer, is likely headed for confirmation early next week.
The final Cabinet position, U.N. ambassador, will be filled in due time. But right now, U.N. ambassador nominee, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., remains a member of the House to maintain House Republicans’ narrow majority to legislatively enact the Trump agenda.
Compared to the last administration, Gor said, “We have confirmed over 20 Cabinet-level officials now. In comparison, in five weeks, Joe Biden had 12.”