Maggie Haberman Says Trump Plans May Be Derailed By Agencies Trump Hasn’t Staffed

CNN commentator and New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said she has heard concerns that President-elect Donald Trump’s day-one plans could be derailed by agencies that haven’t been properly staffed below the cabinet level, which has been the primary focus of Trump’s transition.

CNN anchor Jake Tapper was joined by a galaxy of CNN anchors and personalities like John King, Dana Bash, Kaitlan Collins, Anderson Cooper, Haberman, and many more for CNN’s live coverage of Trump’s inauguration to a second term.

Hours before Trump was set to begin a flurry of actions to start his term, Haberman said the weeks-long focus on cabinet-level nominees has led to a “big question mark” about staffing of mid- and lower-level positions at agencies that will be tasked with carrying out Trump’s plans:

MAGGIE HABERMAN: Can I make a point, Anderson?

One thing that we’ve been hearing concerns about for four days now is how well-staffed these agencies are, how able they are going to be to go through with these executive orders.

Yes, there will be court challenges, but they will still try to implement them.

I think we’re going to see a lot, once this new administration comes in, about how prepared they are at the agency level. There was a lot of focus on senior level cabinet jobs, far less so on individual agencies and staffing.

That is really where a lot of the mechanical work takes place. And so that’s a big question mark for me on how this all goes.

ANDERSON COOPER: So you’re saying that they are more organized on that?

MAGGIE HABERMAN: No, I’m saying they’re not. I’m saying that there has been, as we understand it, a pretty significant personnel bottleneck.

Now, again, the proof will be how many passes get issued, what this ends up looking like.

Could it be that they very quickly stocked up in the last couple of days and we just haven’t seen it? Entirely possible. But there have been concerns about this for the last few days.

Watch above via CNN’s live coverage of Trump’s inauguration.

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