Donald Trump said Thursday he’ll nominate North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum as Secretary of the Interior.
Trump made the announcement at Mar-a-Lago during a star-studded event for the America First Policy Institute.
Burgum, who has been governor of the midwest state since 2016, ran for president in the Republican primary, only to drop out before any votes were cast. He later endorsed Trump, and advised the Trump campaign on its energy policy.
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Trump’s announcement came after he picked former Georgia congressman Doug Collins as secretary of Veterans' Affairs.
An Iraq War veteran and a current Air Force Reserve chaplain, Collins served on the House Judiciary Committee during Trump’s first term. He was a staunch defender of Trump during special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election. Collins also had the president-elect’s back during his first impeachment, quickly becoming the face of Trump’s defense.
In 2020, Collins launched a campaign for Senate in Georgia, but lost in the primary to then-Sen. Kelly Loeffler.
Also on Thursday, Trump rewarded two of his personal attorneys in some of his criminal cases with key jobs in the Department of Justice.
Todd Blanche, who represented Trump in his election interference case in Washington, D.C., his classified documents case in Florida, and his business fraud case in New York, will be nominated as deputy attorney general.
Emil Bove, who worked with Blanche in the New York case—which saw Trump convicted on all 34 felony counts,—will be principal associate deputy attorney general, Trump said.
Until Blanche is confirmed by the Senate, Bove will be acting deputy attorney general, he added.
The two were federal prosecutors in the Southern District of New York before entering private practice.
Trump’s transformation of the Justice Department didn’t stop there.
John Sauer, who argued for sweeping presidential immunity before a receptive Supreme Court, will be solicitor general, Trump said. There, he will continue to argue cases before the court.
