The FBI has vetted cabinet picks since President Dwight D Eisenhower was in the White House.
But if he so chooses, Donald Trump, himself a convicted felon, can bypass background checks for those he has nominated for key roles in his administration.
Incoming cabinet members have traditionally faced intensive screening from the FBI with a binary purpose: to help with the Senate confirmation process and to vet nominees for security clearance.
Criminal histories, conflicts of interest, financial problems or other potentially disqualifying factors are typically investigated through this process.
But, despite established procedure, the president does have the power to bypass such checks and grant immediate security clearance to officials.
In his first term, Trump allegedly order security clearances to be granted for at least 25 people whose applications were initially denied by the FBI due to concerns they could pose a danger to national security, a White House whistleblower told a congressional hearing in 2019.
While Trump won’t officially be able to start circumventing the vetting process this time round until he is sworn in as president on January 20, 2025, sources told CNN that Trump’s transition team has already begun to sidestep initial FBI checks for several of his cabinet picks.
Instead, the transition team is said to be using private companies to look into potential candidates.
According to the sources, Trump dislikes the FBI system, claiming it is riddled with issues that could slow down plans to implement his agenda.
The president-elect is long known to have a distrust of the FBI and Justice Department, regarding them as the so-called “Deep State.” In May last year, he told Real America’s Voice that the agencies are “loaded up with thousands and thousands” of “RINOs” and Democrats.
Plans to avoid the typical procedures and checks come as Trump has made a string of controversial choices for some of the top jobs in his administration.
Former Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, who Trump nominated for attorney general on Thursday, has been the subject of investigations by the Justice Department and House Ethics Committee related to sex trafficking.
Gaetz was ultimately never charged with a crime but the House Ethics Committee was set to release a “damaging” report detailing its findings two days after Trump nominated him for the cabinet job.
Tulsi Gabbard, who was nominated as director of national intelligence, meanwhile has been known to take favorable positions of Syrian and Russian dictators.
The former Democratic congresswoman posted on X in February 2022 about “Russia’s legitimate security concerns regarding Ukraine’s becoming a member of NATO.”
Gabbard also traveled to Syria in January 2017 where she met Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.
She told MSNBC in February 2019 that Assad, who the ECCHR says is responsible for “systematic and widespread torture” in the nation, is “not the enemy of the United States.”