The Organization of the Executive Branch

Introduction

• The executive branch is not just the president
• Approx 2.5 million civilian employees; 3 million (2.3 mil active, 700k reservists) military
• Work in 15 cabinet departments, over 2,000 bureaus and agencies
• Only about 10% work in the D.C. area
• Complexity revealed by the Department of Commerce
• http://www.commerce.gov/

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Cabinet Departments

• Executive branch really split into two components:
• 1. The Cabinet Departments and related agencies
• The formal part, implied in the Constitution, performs the constitutional duty of executing or administering law
• Vast majority of people work here, either
• Career civil servants
• Political appointees who require Senate confirmation
• Hierarchical, formal organization—departments and agencies established and granted authority by law
• Susceptible to congressional oversight, those who work there are not usually protected from subpoena (e.g. State Dept employees & Trump investigation) by the concept of executive privilege—designed to allow frank discussions within the executive, although U.S. v. Nixon (1974)

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Cabinet Departments

• Made up of 15 departments, heads are members of the Cabinet and titled “Secretary” with the exception of Justice
• Big 4, or “inner cabinet” because of their important “portfolios”, heads provide important policy advice to the president—Defense, State, Justice, Treasury
• Others—Homeland Security (youngest, formed in 2002 as response to 9/11), HHS, Agriculture, Interior, Energy, Labor, Commerce, Education, Transportation, V.A., HUD
• Smaller agencies, not given full Cabinet rank include EPA, SBA

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Cabinet Departments

• They contain a variety of different agencies you might have heard of
• HHS—FDA
• Treasury—IRS
• DHS—Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Coast Guard
• Defense—Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines
• Justice—FBI, ATF
• State—Embassies and Consulates

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Cabinet Departments

• Presidents use various strategies when picking cabinet officials, agency heads, assistant secretaries etc—the roughly 2,000 political appointees in the executive branch that need Senate confirmation
• Perhaps the initial consideration is: Can the nominee get confirmed?

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• Despite partisan polarization and divided government (filibuster too)
• only 2 cabinet nominations since World War II have been rejected by the Senate
• 1959, Lewis Strauss to Commerce, had been controversial head of Atomic Energy Commission
• 1989, John Tower to Defense, allegations of alcohol abuse and womanizing
• Only 7 withdrew names
• Tom Daschle at HHS over conflict of interest and tax evasion charges, 2009
• Trump: Andrew Puzder at Labor over marriage problems, public statements; Ronny Jackson VA over misconduct as President’s physician; Matt Gaetz AG over allegations of sexual misconduct

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Cabinet Departments

• In November 2013, under Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), the Senate changed its rules to make “out of order” efforts to filibuster executive branch nominees
• This greatly weakens the ability of the Senate minority to block and delay confirmation

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• Trump’s 2017 cumulatively the most ‘no’ votes ever (713)
• Biden enjoyed a (slim) Democratic majority and 377 ‘no’ votes
• Trump 2025 experienced most ‘no’ votes (9) by member of president’s party

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Cabinet Departments

• 1. Subject-matter or technical expertise—does the person know the issues that the department/agency deals with?

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• 2. Political expertise—does that person know how to run a large organization and deal with Washington’s complex processes?

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• 3. Political affiliation—does the person share the president’s political views, by party, ideology

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Cabinet Departments

• 4. Loyalty—the president needs people who will be loyal to him and his program

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• 5. Political Value—does the person help broaden the president’s political appeal, either in the aggregate perhaps by making the administration seem more diverse (by gender, race, partisanship) or on this issue by pleasing the department’s/agency’s constituencies

Cabinet Departments

• Current Cabinet, March 2026—What strategy/strategies do you think Trump used when making these selections?

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• State—Marco Rubio
• Justice—Pam Bondi
• Treasury—Scott Bessent
• Defense—Pete Hegseth

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Cabinet Departments

• Interior—Doug Burgum
• Agriculture—Brooke Rollins
• Commerce—Howard Lutnick
• Labor—Lori Chavez-DeRemer
• HHS—Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.
• HUD—Scott Turner
• Transportation—Sean Duffy
• Energy—Chris Wright
• Education—Linda McMahon
• Veterans’ Affairs—Doug Collins
• Homeland Security—Kristi Noem

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Cabinet Departments

• Despite the idea that individuals in the cabinet departments work for the president, control of the executive branch is difficult for the president
• This poses an interesting question since the president is the only directly-elected official, he is accountable to the American public
• Departments and agencies make very important decisions, because of legislative delegation this includes those that have the force of law

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Cabinet Departments

• There are numerous reasons for what is called bureaucratic “disobedience” or “drift”
• Charles G. Dawes, the first director of the Bureau of the Budget said, “the members of the cabinet are a president’s natural enemies”
• Harry Truman predicted that Ike would have a terrible time with the bureaucracy: “He’ll sit here and he’ll say, ‘Do this! Do that!’ And nothing will happen. Poor Ike -it won’t be a bit like the army. He’ll find it very frustrating.”
• Trump’s idea of the “swamp”, “deep state”

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Cabinet Departments

• 1. Size—the massive size poses huge management challenges

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• 2. Congressional oversight—need for funding and desire for broad jurisdictions, testifying, producing reports etc (more when we talk about congressional oversight)

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Cabinet Departments

• 3. Civil service protection—most are protected from removal for political reasons, the White House can place pressure to get career civil servants to leave, but removal not always easy

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• This hasn’t stopped Trump and DOGE efforts to trim federal workforce
• About 300,000 laid off throughout the federal government

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Cabinet Departments

• 4. Self-interest—comes in two forms (a) protecting agency turf and funding, (b) protecting one’s own job, a very human response—in both you inflate importance and success
• 5. “Marrying the Natives”—Hugh Heclo term, political appointees who are supposed to be promote the president’s interests, get socialized into the agencies they lead and advocate for their interests or the interests of their clients
• Related to the idea of the “deep state” that some believe blocked Trump reforms

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Cabinet Departments

• The White House’s influence is felt greatest on the most important and salient issues, least on those that far from the president’s interests and agenda
• Presidents have worked to exert greater control

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• 1. Using ideological litmus tests to ensure greater loyalty, many saw Nixon and Reagan as pioneers in this

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Cabinet Departments

• 2. Use of the “recess” appointment provision in the Constitution, Article II, Section 2: “The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.”
• This is especially useful during divided government when the Senate resists appointments
• Obama did controversially, Supreme Court ruled in NLRB v. Canning (2013) that his use of them was illegal
• Trump used a lot of “acting” positions—i.e. place underlings in positions on temporary basis

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Cabinet Departments

• 3. Use of “removal” power for political appointees, the Constitution is silent on this but generally White Houses pressure some to leave when they feel it is necessary
• Trump explicitly fire—rather than force resignations
• Use of “acting” personnel as replacements—automatic promotion and do not require Senate confirmation

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• 4. Use of OMB in the rule-making process, presidents have called on OMB to review rules made by agencies to make sure they conform to the president’s general positions on policy

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• 5. Civil Service Reform—particularly in the late 1970s, rules have allowed the White House more capacity to transfer and reassign civil servants

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EOP

• The second part is the Executive Office of the President, created by the Reorganization Act of 1939, after Brownlow Commission (headed by Louis Brownlow, a political scientist) concluded “the president needs help” in performing his duties
• EOP provides the president with political and policy advice
• Very much smaller than the departments and agencies, about 4,000 people
• Some require Senate confirmation, but most hired and fired at the president’s discretion
• Protected by executive privilege
• Arrayed by the president to best suit his interests

EOP

• EOP has several important components
• Office of Management and Budget—OMB prepares the president’s annual budget that he must offer by law and effectively coordinates fiscal policy for him, Russell Vought
• National Security Council—chaired by the president, it coordinates security policy, other members include VP, Secretaries of State and Defense, Chair of the Joint Chiefs, DNI, CIA director (John Radcliffe), National Security Advisor (Marco Rubio, temp.)
• Council of Economic Advisers—an economic version (effectively vacant)

EOP

• White House staff, which includes:
• Domestic and foreign policy advisors, counsels
• Press office and legislative liaison
• Headed by Chief of Staff—Susie Wiles

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• Office of the Vice President
• We’ve only really talked about with regards succession and his role as President of the Senate with the power to break ties

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EOP

• Vice President historically not seen as a very important position
• John Nance Garner, FDR VP, “not worth a pitcher of warm spit”
• Daniel Webster, asked to be Zachary Taylor’s running mate in 1848, “I do not wish to be buried until I am well and truly dead”
• John Adams, 1^st VP, “the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived of his imagination conceived”
• William T. Sherman, “I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected.”
• John McCain in 2000, “The Vice-President’s job is to check on the health of the president and attend the funerals of third world dictators”

EOP

• But recent Vice Presidents have been given important roles by the president
• Al Gore provided the president with important assistance and policy advice on technology and environmental policy, reducing the size of the federal government, worked on relations with Russia
• Dick Cheney was extremely influential, and was a very important source of advice on foreign policy
• Joe Biden important to Obama in a political sense—working with core Democratic constituencies, communicating the administration’s agenda—also important liaison with Congress
• Mike Pence important bridge to traditional conservatives, led Coronavirus Task Force
• Kamala Harris?, J.D. Vance?

EOP

• Office of the First Lady

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• First ladies tend to have philanthropic “causes”, Jackie Kennedy & the arts, Laura Bush & literacy, Michelle Obama & childhood obesity, Melania Trump, “Be Best” children’s emotional and physical well-being, Jill Biden kept teaching
• Some have had power—Hillary Clinton working on health care reform, Eleanor Roosevelt on civil rights, Edith Wilson was effectively president for the last 6 months of her husband’s second term as he was very ill

Independent Regulatory Commissions

• There are also independent regulatory commissions that are not really in any branch of government
• They have significant power to regulate in their policy areas—examples include FCC (communications), FTC (trade), NTSB (transportation), NRC (nuclear), SEC (financial markets), Fed (banks), SSA (Social Security)
• Said to have quasi-legislative, -executive, and -judicial powers

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Independent Regulatory Commissions

• For example, FCC issues licenses to broadcasters (legislative), makes sure broadcasters are in compliance with the terms of their license (executive), and then determines whether or not this is correct (judicial)
• However, they are accountable—Commissioners appointed by the president, confirmed by the Senate; established, abolished, and jurisdictions altered by law; final determinations can be appealed to the federal courts

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