Maginot Line
What could a putative Trump-Vance administration do to cut the bureaucracy quickly?
A key assumption that seems to underlie all the media coverage of the Trump GOP is that they are the same naive ideologues who showed up in DC with straw sticking out of their teeth. Sure, it was impressive to see him cut regulations in the Federal Register, but, at best, he only slowed the growth of the administrative state. If his pledge to transform the bureaucracy was a war, it would have been the quagmire of Vietnam or, perhaps, the frustration of Afghanistan. In both cases, the enemy had full confidence the United States would withdraw; it was just a matter of time. They would make us bleed without anything to show for it.
This assumption of static thinking may be wrong.
In 2016, men and women who showed up at the Assistant Secretary level and above, appointed by Trump, saw the obstacles the permanent staff threw up. These political appointees paid attention. Some of them came from distinguished, successful careers in the private sector. It was bracing for them to see this kind of chaotic dysfunction and unusual governance. The leadership of the Executive Branch was stymied routinely by the boots on the ground. It was as if the Generals and their staffs in Kabul sought to implement a strategy, only to have the battalion senior enlisted leadership in Kandahar refuse to follow their orders because, well, we have our own way of picking targets and we attack where and when we want to, sir.
Everyone in the Trump entourage, from the old man down the line, has learned. You can say a lot of things about him, but Trump is tough and he isn’t stupid. His entire career is a set of large-scale mistakes from which he has learned, only to rebound to ever greater subsequent pinnacles of success.
L’audace, l’audace. Toujours, l’audace.
The rational thing here is to assume that he and his staff understand exactly how DC works after four years in it and four years fighting to get back inside. We should assume that he wants to run for office again and win so that he can apply the lessons he has acquired. He has paid a hefty tuition to figure things out and resurrect himself. If we’re wrong and he is just a blowhard with an ego, then there are limits to how much he can accomplish. In that case, the Deep State doesn’t need to worry if Trump succeeds in his re-election bid. However, it doesn’t sound like the civil service is sanguine about the prospects of a turnover in administration.
At the time of its installation in the years leading up to World War II, the Maginot Line was seen as a brilliant strategy for the defense of France. It was a set of highly built-up defensive positions and other installations along the German and Italian borders meant to slow down Fascist invasion forces long enough for the French Army to mobilize and engage. It was elaborate, well-stocked, and efficient. It didn’t cost a ton of money. The French weren’t shy about concealing the project. Its existence was meant to deter.
Notice I said that it was built to cover the borders with Germany and Italy. It didn’t span the borders with allies including the Low Countries. Do you see the flaw here? The Germans did. The Blitzkrieg was a German lightning strike that pierced through Belgium with ruthless efficiency. They went around the Maginot line. It was untouched. Once they broke the Low Countries, they were able to overwhelm allied forces quickly.
There are two things of note here. First, the French tried to frame the future conflict. But, the enemy gets a say, too. The Germans let the French lull themselves into a false confidence, only to upend the board with a different paradigm. Second, the speed of the German advance was as important for the conquest of France as the strategic decision to play a different game than the French. The First World War, with its brutal trench warfare, hung heavy in the background. The Germans weren’t going to repeat that pain when it came time to the rematch. They intended to succeed where their grandfathers hadn’t, having internalized the lessons from the prior defeat.
The theory here is that the first Trump Administration’s engagement with the upper civil service mirrored the stagnation of the First World War’s trench warfare and that the Trump team is preparing its own lightning strike on the bureaucracy. The Maginot Line has been the upper levels of the permanent civil service, the experts. They were the ones who took the administration’s initiatives into committees to be suffocated slowly and out of sight.
Trump realized this towards the end of his first term and signed the executive order for Schedule F which would have replaced these experts with political appointees. It is notable that this was the first of his orders that President Biden reversed.
There has been much kvelling about Schedule F from the beautiful people in DC, arguing that it would be the reincarnation of the patronage system. Here’s the thing. We have had a concealed, de facto patronage system for decades in this country. It’s just been one-sided and persistent. The civil service is aligned with one party and, not at all, with the other. There is little to no diversity in the political views or the policy inclinations of these permanent professionals. An explicit, de jure patronage system allowing the governing party to choose might be preferable if we actually believed that the role of the Executive Branch was to do what the constitution says it’s entitled to do. The President is not just there to provide convenient cover for the administrative Brahmins.
There are only complaints about Schedule F from one side of the aisle.
The problem with resuscitating Schedule F is that it will take months to implement, if not longer. Even if Trump signed the order on day one, there would be litigation and other roadblocks to overcome.
Here’s JD Vance, as we cited in Burn Bag.
‘“I think that what Trump should—like, if I was giving him one piece of advice—fire every single mid-level bureaucrat, every civil servant in the administrative state,” Vance said on a 2021 podcast appearance. “Replace them with our people. And when the courts—because you will get taken to court—and when the courts stop you, stand before the country like Andrew Jackson did and say, ‘The chief justice has made his ruling. Now let him enforce it.’”
Is it possible that Trump has in mind a Blitzkrieg on the bureaucracy in mind? Others like Vivek (“I’d cut the Education Department on Day One!”) Ramaswamy have advocated for it. Project 2025 is screening for the right kind of political appointees potentially at lower levels. Javier Milei is beta testing this strategy in Argentina.
Vance is right. There would be litigation.
If you can’t fire a civil servant, say because of union constraints, what do you do? In New York City, they stick teachers who aren’t allowed in the classroom in a rubber room reassignment center where they sit for hours a day, scrolling their phones or whatever. They don’t work. In Japan, employees who cannot be fired are retained on the payroll to wait out their time. They’re called “window watchers.” Lehman Brothers had the better part of a floor full of Managing Directors who weren’t allowed to touch any business, but they were kept on the payroll while they waited for their equity to vest. They were called “Friends of Dick” (for Dick Fuld). Call it what you will. It is purgatory.
The lightning strike here would be to cut the senior civil service in every department on day one, not by firing them, but by putting them into a box. Take them out of the line and stick them in a Faraday rubber room without Internet access. Replace them with political appointees straightaway. It’s a way to implement Schedule F overnight. Call it “Schedule F - Modified,” in an ironic form of bureaucratic mockery. You’re not firing them. They still receive their paychecks. They still vest their pensions. They still have their ample benefits. Then, proceed with Schedule F and the attendant litigation.
Nobody is entitled to a particular position. Everyone is replaceable.
It has the merit of speed. The GOP knows that they don’t want to be stuck in the quagmire again. Seize and maintain the initiative. Go around their bureaucratic Maginot Line. If this is the plan, the GOP is preparing for it now. Maybe that’s Project 2025.
The US Navy seems to fire ship captains frequently, citing some vague language about “loss of confidence in leadership.” This is no different. The Navy doesn’t like Captain A, so they replace him with Captain B. Captain A goes off to mark time as the Base Assistant Photocopy Officer at Pearl Harbor.
One ancillary benefit of this massive culling could be a significant reduction in complexity. In Bonfire of the Brahmins, we discussed Friedman’s three bureaucratic obstacles: elite promotion of their own self-interests, dilution of expertise and authority across agencies, and the complexity of competitive relationships among regulatory entities and also between administrators and private actors.
Elon Musk showed us that it was possible to cut upwards of 80% of the Twitter workforce. Not only did he keep the site up, he seems to be able to push features at a much faster cadence than the prior regime. He certainly “encouraged the others.” Did he make it easier for the remainders to do their jobs? Was it really addition by subtraction?
I’m not saying that this is the plan. I’m saying it could be the plan.