NEWSWEEK.COM 35
comfort to people who are concerned about a poten-
tially problematic transition period.” Agreed Lissner:
“He’s not like Clinton coming from Arkansas or even
Bush coming from Texas. He already probably had a
pretty good idea of who he can put into whatever po-
sitions. And it’s not just him, it’s that he has around
him, a group of people who are very well-versed in
administration and in transitions.”
The latest recalcitrance, Lissner says, is especially
unfortunate because Trump had followed the law
on transitions until the election. “Based on public
reports, it does seem that they have met the statu-
torily mandated deadlines that have come up thus
far,” she says. “They have a White House Transition
Coordinating Council, which is chaired by [Chief of
Staff] Mark Meadows. Each agency has designated
some official who is overseeing transition efforts.
But we don’t know much about what the content of
those efforts are. A transition will only be smoothif there is robust information sharing between an
outgoing team and an incoming team. Much of that
is discretionary.”
Moe says he is clinging to hope that Trump even-
tually will curb his most vengeful instincts. “I do
think that in his own perverse way, he cares about
his legacy,” Moe says. “I don’t think he wants to be
regarded as the worst president the country’s ever
had. He wants to be on Mount Rushmore, you know,
in his own head, that’s what he thinks. And so that
could constrain him from doing something really
dangerous or really, really disruptive through his
unilateral action, like start starting a war or attack-
ing another country.”
Lissner is more pessimistic. “The inability to make
Donald Trump play by the rules, especially the nor-
mative rules rather than the legal rules, is minimal,
so we do need to brace for the most hostile transi-
tion in recent memory—maybe ever in history.”FR
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