'Worst in history': Ex-Trump adviser challenges GOP to 'stand up' against cabinet picks

Donald Trump's former national security adviser denounced the president-elect's latest nominees as two of the worst in history.

John Bolton, who frequently clashed with Trump during his 18-month tenure as national security adviser and has been an outspoken critic after leaving his administration, condemned the former and incoming president's choices of Tulsi Gabbard as director of national intelligence and Matt Gaetz as attorney general.

"I thought [Gabbard] was the worst Cabinet-level appointment in history until I heard the Matt Gaetz appointment," Bolton said. "Really, my reaction was that this is like the legend of Caligula, the Roman emperor who wanted to nominate his horse as a Roman consul. You had to be a Roman senator at the time to be a consul, and it was intended to show how demeaned and degraded the Roman Senate had become. Now we will see whether the American Senate can stand up and reject two people who are totally unqualified, unfit professionally and really lacking in moral characteristics, the character you need to hold these jobs. I think this vote should be 100-0 against both of them."

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Trump's team has floated a proposal to sidestep the standard process of FBI background checks for potential appointees during the transition period and instead contracting with a private firm to conduct the investigations, and the president-elect has also demanded that Republican senators abdicate their role in the confirmation process.

"It is typical for most senior nominations that people get a full field FBI investigation," Bolton said. "I can't count how many I have had, updates and all the rest of it. By the way, those investigations on all the Cabinet nominees can begin right now. The way the FBI conversation with somebody starts off is to say, 'Mr. X is being considered for a senior government official, I'd like to ask you questions about him.' So you can begin the FBI investigations now and be ready for confirmation hearings even before Donald Trump is sworn in. There's no question here delaying things, so it's very typical. It should be for everybody, but especially for those two."

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