One week after winning the presidency in a stunning upset, Donald Trump is already botching the transition, insiders say.
The daunting task of filling top Cabinet posts appears to be a chaotic scramble inside Trump Tower, with competing power centers jockeying for position and influence as a steady stream of names both realistic and not gets floated to a baffled media.
“It’s an absolute knife fight,” said one Trump insider. “But that just makes it Tuesday.”
Through it all, Trump has remained uncharacteristically quiet, secluded in his penthouse apartment and office space on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. His only public comments came in the form of a 60 Minutes interview on Sunday night and a few stray tweets each day.
There’s very little pushback from his ramshackle transition infrastructure to damaging stories about one of his first two appointees, Breitbart News chief Steve Bannon. Campaign loyalists and well-wishers ranging from Ted Cruz to Marla Maples to Tommy Hilfiger float in and out of Trump Tower like ghosts -- 30 seconds in the marbled orange lobby, then they’re gone.
Controversy, meanwhile, continues to swirl. Republicans and Democrats alike sounded the alarms about both of Trump’s finalists to serve as his Secretary of State.
Rudy Giuliani, rumored to be Trump’s top choice, is facing new scrutiny following a POLITCO report detailing his paid consulting work for foreign governments that would create a massive conflict of interest should he be confirmed as the country’s top diplomat.