Republican lawyer Boris Epshteyn, who in June pleaded not guilty to nine felony charges related to his 2020 effort to overturn Arizona’s electoral vote in favor of former president Donald Trump, lobbied the president-elect to pick Matt Gaetz as attorney general, Politico’s Meridith McGraw reports.
Trump shocked officials at the Department of Justice Wednesday when he announced Gaetz as his pick for attorney general. Shortly after, Gaetz resigned from the House of Representatives where he served four terms as representative for Florida’s 1st congressional district.
The Bulwark’s Marc Caputo on Wednesday reported Trump sees Gaetz as “a loyal, longtime adviser, an acid-tongued debate champ, and an aggrieved target of the feds.” And, according to McGraw, the plan to nominate Gaetz for attorney general came together “just hours before it was announced.”
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“[The plan] was hatched aboard Trump’s airplane en route to Washington, on which Gaetz was a passenger,” Politico reports. “… Boris Epshteyn played a central role in the development, lobbying Trump to choose Gaetz.”
Trump’s chief of staff, Susan Wiles, “was in a different, adjacent room on the plane, apparently unaware,” Politico adds.
Trump tapped Wiles as chief of staff last week, making her the “first woman to ever hold the title,” CNN reports.
At the time, Trump’s selection of Wiles “eased some worries from the left about the president-elect’s early intentions.”
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According to CNN, “Wiles is credited with running what many viewed as Trump’s most disciplined and strategic campaign — one that managed to keep many of the fringe voices in his orbit at a distance.”
“Throughout much of the campaign, she held a crucial yet thankless role: Overseeing the flight manifest for Trump’s private plane, a position that often required her to act as the gatekeeper when the former president was reluctant to turn people away himself,” CNN adds.
Of course, there’s only so much one can do from a “different, adjacent room on the plane.”