I commend news agency columnists who publish research-based and value-added (versus “my opinion”) op-eds on a daily or frequent basis. Submitting an occasional essay allows me time to ponder contemporary issues and explore the latest hot topic.
Since Aug. 6, Perplexity and Google have helped me examine over 30 documents to determine the best and worst U.S. presidential cabinets. Based upon academic studies and expert analysis, here are the results.
Judging presidential cabinet strengths and weaknesses
While determining cabinet strengths and weaknesses can be debatable, broad research-based consensus, historical investigation, and political science scholarship supports a generally accepted conclusion to judging the quality of a presidential cabinet. Some key components include: expertise, competence, experience, operational effectiveness, ethical standards, scandals, internal White House diversity, and the ability for cabinet members to challenge the president without repercussions.
Several other dimensions to assess cabinet performance across U.S. presidencies include: turnover rates, public opinion and approval ratings, vacancy rates, delays in appointments, effectiveness of cabinet members’ actions, and the ability to maintain stability and implement policy.
Cabinet findings synopsis
Five different and independent research studies summarized that U.S. presidential cabinets can be compared, contrasted, and evaluated based upon three factors: 1) stable, low-turnover, and well-staffed cabinets are generally seen as higher performing, 2) high-turnover and high-vacancy cabinets are associated with decreased effectiveness, and 3) appointment of experts and diverse talent correlates with improved policy outcomes and cabinet success.
Best presidential cabinets
The following presidential cabinets are widely regarded as among the best in U.S. history:
1. Abraham Lincoln’s (Rep., 1861-1865) cabinet—known as the Team of Rivals—with people like William Seward, Salmon Chase, and Edwin Stanton, challenged yet complemented Lincoln, helping with the Union’s victory and abolition of slavery.
2. George Washington’s (no political party, 1789-1797) cabinet included Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Henry Knox, and Edmund Randolph, which Lindsay Chervinsky and other historians point to as a foundational model for effective executive leadership.
3. Franklin D. Roosevelt’s (Dem., 1933-1945) cabinet included Frances Perkins (first female cabinet secretary) and Henry Morgenthau Jr., who helped shape and implement the New Deal policies and guide America through World War II.
Worst presidential cabinets
Historical surveys cite the following presidential cabinets among the worst in U.S. history, predominantly due to issues of incompetence, corruption, and scandal:
1. Warren G. Harding’s (Rep., 1921-1923) cabinet is widely regarded as the worst of the worst due to the infamous Teapot Dome scandal, widespread corruption among cabinet members, and for exemplifying poor cabinet selection due to cronyism and misconduct.
2. Ulysses S. Grant’s (Rep., 1869-1877) cabinet was plagued by corruption, the Whiskey Ring scandal, the Crédit Mobilier affair, and unethical governance.
3. Donald J. Trump’s (Rep., 2017-2021 and 2025-2029) cabinets have been widely criticized for their lack of qualifications, record-setting high turnover rates, appointments based on loyalty over capability, conflicts of interest, stark public dissatisfaction, and poorly vetted appointees, but approved by Republican Senators.
Turnover of appointees is a proxy for performance and stability
Research is replete that turnover rates of presidential appointments are an indicator of presidential performance and a concrete indicator of stability. High cabinet turnover has significant negative consequences for governance and leadership effectiveness, such as loss of institutional memory, loss of expertise, lack of cohesion, and stalled initiatives.
Frequent cabinet turnover has serious consequences. It disrupts policy formation, diminishes efficiency, harms morale, undermines public trust, and weakens agency autonomy and long-term strategic capabilities.
During Trump’s first presidency, a record turnover occurred with 20 of his 24 cabinet picks either quitting or being “de-hired” by Trump. Furthermore, 92 percent of the 65 people who were on Trump’s 2017-2021 “A Team” left their appointed office.
During the first 220 days of Trump’s 2.0 administration, he’s already had turnover in 13 key positions, notably Dr. Demetre Daskalakis, Cameron Hamilton, Dr. Carla Hayden, Dr. Debra Houry, Dr. Daniel Jernigan, Dr. Peter Marks, Dr. Susan Monarez, Elon Musk, Shira Perlmutter, Dr. Vinay Prasad, Vivek Ramaswamy, Dr. Drew Snyder and Mike Waltz. Furthermore, at least 148,000 federal employees have left Trump’s 2.0 workforce.
Trump 1.0 and 2.0
From a cabinet member’s perspective, Trump’s two attempts at being president are near the bottom of 47 presidencies. Rigorous historical research would suggest this does not bode well that the 2025-2029 time period will be successful.
With all of the chaos, uncertainty, dictatorial behavior, flip-flopping, and 192 executive orders, 47 memoranda, and 79 proclamations brought to the table by Mr. Trump since Jan. 20 and controversial cabinet member actions, the proverb “hope springs eternal” has to be Americans’ guide to find optimism. A second proverb—“you reap what you sow”—is before Mr. Trump and the GOP Senators who approved the cabinet nominations.
Let’s face reality. A cabinet that ranks historically low with respect to competence, ethical standards, experience, and other competency criteria makes the U.S. vulnerable to a multitude of operational inefficiencies, policy blunders, ethical mishaps, scandals, conflicts of interest, conspiracies, and foreign intervention. Americans are in a situation where only time will tell the outcome.
Americans across the political spectrum have continued to ask about the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein’s connections among the political elite. (Angela Weiss/AFP)
A view of the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., on June 25, 2026. President Donald Trump jolted Republicans during a fiery appearance at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, scrapping a housing bill signing ceremony and clashing behind closed doors with a party rebel who challenged him over the Iran war. Trump had been expected to sign the bipartisan housing.
Only Trump doesn’t care about housing
It was August 15, 2024. Then candidate Donald Trump stepped out of his Bedminster, New Jersey, golf club’s columned clubhouse to a gaggle of reporters. He was flanked by tables of groceries and signs showing the rising cost of food. Also on one of the tables was a dollhouse, meant to represent the equally alarming rise in housing prices.
It was a speech about the economy, the single most important issue of the 2024 election cycle, full of promises that went right to the heart of Americans’ anxieties. While former President Joe Biden and then Vice President Kamala Harris were contorting themselves to posture a good economy that just needed more time to recover from the pandemic, Trump was preying on voters’ very real fears of unaffordable gas, groceries, and homes. It was obviously a winning message.
In that speech, Trump promised, “We’re going to open up tracts of federal land for housing construction. We desperately need housing for people who can’t afford what’s going on now.”
As of mid-2023, there had been a housing shortage of nearly four million homes, according to the National Association of Realtors. Americans all over the country were either priced out of buying new homes due to low inventory, trapped in their existing homes by sky-high mortgage rates, or facing exorbitant rent hikes thanks to corporate investors buying up rental properties. Americans needed help, and Trump promised it.
Cut to March of 2026, when Trump reportedly told House Speaker Mike Johnson, “No one gives a sh*t about housing.”
That kind of thinking may explain why Trump this week suddenly announced he was canceling a signing ceremony for the bipartisan “21st Century ROAD to Housing Act,” a housing bill co-sponsored by Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Tim Scott that passed the House 358-32 and was approved in the Senate on Monday.
Trump instead demanded Congress pass the SAVE America Act, his controversial election grievance bill that doesn’t have enough Republican support to get passed in the Senate.
It’s just the latest in a line of policy self-owns where Trump has seemingly intentionally made life more difficult for Republicans hoping to keep their majority. Despite midterm elections occurring in the midst of a blistering economy and an unpopular war, they were surely hoping the housing bill would give them something — anything — to brag about when they returned home to their districts.
And very much to the contrary, Americans do give a sh*t about housing. According to a recent survey by the Bipartisan Policy Center, a whopping 79% say the cost of housing is extremely or very important to them. Eighty-three percent say Congress should take action on the issue — like it just did. Eighty-nine percent say the House and Senate need to work together to pass affordable housing legislation — like they just did. And 63% say they would be more likely to vote for a lawmaker if they helped pass legislation to build more affordable homes and lower housing costs — like they just did.
There aren’t many issues that unite Americans like housing does, and very few bipartisan policy wins Congress can point to, and yet, Trump is holding that bill hostage in order to get his pet project — which doesn’t even have the support of his own party — pushed through.
If you’re trying to make sense of something so nonsensical, as I’m sure many Republican lawmakers are, it’s certainly sad but not actually all that complicated. Trump said what he needed to get reelected and then promptly abandoned his promises in order to pursue his own self-interests, even if those interests are bad for Republicans and bad for voters.
That’s just the kind of guy he is.
S.E. Cupp is the host of "S.E. Cupp Unfiltered" on CNN.