Mystery of DOGE’s Administrator Solved . . . or Is It?

Among the strangest aspects of the new Trump administration has been the treatment of DOGE’s inner workings as if they were a state secret. A government has lots of secrets, of course — they’re a national security necessity. But the identity of the official who is running an agency — even such agencies as the CIA and other repositories of highly classified information — is not supposed to be a state secret. To turn it into one would be to impede the Senate’s constitutional duty to advise on and consent to the appointment of such officials before they are allowed to wield government power.

Since being reelected, President Trump has regarded Senate confirmation as a nuisance to be circumvented, not a mandate of the law he is sworn to faithfully execute. Recall the cockamamie scheme to contrive a recess that might allow him to appoint cabinet and other officials without a confirmation process — notwithstanding that Republicans hold a six-vote Senate majority, such that any barely qualified nominee should sail through (and, in fact, all Trump’s nominees, save the objectively unconfirmable Matt Gaetz, have so far been confirmed, though some by the slimmest of margins).