President-elect Donald Trump’s transition team is wasting no time building out his next administration.
The former president announced on Thursday that he selected well-respected GOP operative Susan Summerall Wiles to be his White House chief of staff come January, a decision that was praised by many in the Republican Party.
But according to Trump’s former national security adviser, John Bolton, Trump’s administration is poised to be just as “chaotic” as the first time, despite picking Wiles—who’s nicknamed the “ice maiden”—to run his staff.
Speaking with CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Friday, Bolton reacted to news that Trump’s call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky earlier in the week was joined by billionaire Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk, who backed Trump’s 2024 presidential campaign.
“You know, my first reaction when I heard it was, ‘Well, so what … what’s unusual about having the vice president-elect sitting with the president-elect on a call?” Bolton said during an appearance on The Source with Kaitlan Collins. “And then I realized, of course, Elon Musk wasn’t the vice president-elect.”
“This is really, I think, typical of Trump,” Bolton continued. “This happened in the transition to his first term in 2016-17. Sort of bounds and norms are not Trump’s strength, as we know. I wouldn’t get too hyperthyroid about it too quickly, but it’s certainly not a sign that order and stability have suddenly appeared at Mar-a-Lago.”
“Despite what everybody’s talking about these early appointments, to me, it looks like the same chaotic ‘do-what-you-want-to-do’ Donald Trump, with his latest bright, shiny object, Elon Musk.”
John Bolton, former national security adviser, participates in a public discussion at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina, on February 17, 2020. Bolton told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins on Friday that President-elect Donald Trump appears just as “chaotic” as during his first term in office.
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Newsweek reached out to Trump’s team via email for comment late Friday.
Musk has been floated as a potential pick for Trump’s Cabinet. While on the campaign trail, the former president said that he was open to letting Musk lead cost-cutting measures in his administration. Musk boosted Trump’s campaign in several key swing states through his political action committee, America PAC, which funneled millions into political ads and other measures to support the former president.
According to multiple media reports, Musk sat in on Trump’s call with Zelensky on Wednesday, during which the Ukrainian leader congratulated Trump on his victory in Tuesday’s election. Sources who spoke with The Washington Post said that Zelensky reportedly talked about how valuable Musk’s Starlink satellite internet service was for Ukraine amid Russia’s invasion.
Bolton served as Trump’s national security adviser for 17 months, until, he said, he resigned from his post in September 2019. Trump claims he fired Bolton, who has served with every Republican presidential administration since Ronald Reagan.
Bolton has been incredibly critical of his former boss, including telling CNN in September that Trump was not an “acceptable” presidential candidate for Republicans.
“I think people shouldn’t get into politics for the jobs they want,” Bolton added. “They get in it for philosophy, and Donald Trump doesn’t have one.”
On Friday, Collins asked Bolton if he had any suggestions for Trump’s future national security adviser, to which he said the “first thing is to remember that the national security adviser really should do whatever he or she can to put information in front of the president that is helpful in making decisions.”
“If the president doesn’t take your advice, then that goes with the job,” Bolton added. “You’re the national security adviser, not the national security decision-maker.”
“But most assuredly, what your job is not is simply to say, ‘yes, sir,'” he added. “When the president says something, you have to do what you can … to make sure that all of the information is available, all of the feasible options are laid out.”
“And if you fail to do that, simply by saying, ‘yes, sir,’ every time the president speaks, you’re not serving the president, you’re not serving the country.”
