President Donald Trump’s loyalty test has become so intense that open positions within the White House are getting difficult to fill.
During the interview process, applicants have been asked questions like, “Who won the 2020 presidential election?” But now questions are getting even more specific—and difficult to answer.
To land a gig in Trump’s White House, interviewees need to answer which executive order is their favorite and whether they would be willing to act as a spokesperson on mass deportations.
At the helm of this screening process is Sergio Gor, the director of the White House Presidential Personnel Office.
It’s not unheard of for administrations to seek top officials who align with their goals, and Trump has a track record of his own staff leaking information and turning their backs on him.
But Gor’s interview process for White House jobs has gotten so intense that even the best of the best can’t get through without a recommendation from someone in Trump’s most trusted inner circle.
Trump has been beefing up his staff with loyalists since before taking office, appointing people who are arguably outright unqualified for their positions. Former Fox News host Pete Hegseth is now somehow in charge of the Department of Defense, while notorious anti-vaxxer Robert F. Kennedy Jr. now leads the Department of Health and Human Services—overseeing the growing measles outbreak and bird flu crisis.
But his focus isn’t just on hiring MAGA loyalists. He has made it his mission this term to weed out anyone who he believes to be disloyal.
Since taking office, Trump has mass fired top-ranked officials who don’t align with his political ideology—and in some cases, it’s already coming back to bite him.
On Thursday, a federal judge ruled that Trump’s firing of attorney Gwynne Wilcox from the National Labor Relations Board was illegal, stating that her job should be reinstated immediately.
In the ruling, Judge Beryl Howell wrote that the framers of the Constitution “made clear that no one in our system of government was meant to be king – the President included – and not just in name only.”
“A president who touts an image of himself as a ‘king’ or a ‘dictator,’ perhaps as his vision of effective leadership, fundamentally misapprehends the role under Article II of the US Constitution,” Howell wrote.
The reason behind Trump’s abrupt removal of Wilcox was that a “far-left appointee” and “had no place” in his administration.
Wilcox’s firing is just one example of the Trump administration taking aim at federal workers with left-leaning ideologies as an effort to remove any signs of diversity, equity, or inclusion in the federal government.
But Trump isn’t just shaping his White House into a loyalist regime—he’s also co-opting the arts, education, language, and culture.
The Kennedy Center for Performing Arts, a once bipartisan cultural center graced with musical legends, has experienced a chaotic shakeup since Trump appointed himself chairman, beginning with firing longtime President Deborah F. Rutter and replacing multiple board members with MAGA loyalists.
Trump also established a task force to “eradicate anti-Christian bias” and a new White House Faith Office led by right-wing televangelist and Trump spiritual adviser Paula White.
And though Trump has paused signing an executive order that would begin dismantling the Department of Education, his attacks against education and students are numerous.
In his executive order, “Ending Radical Indoctrination in K-12 Schools,” Trump threatens public schools that teach about gender or anything that does not align with the president’s idea of “patriotic administration.”
Whether in the arts, education, or his own White House, nothing seems to satisfy Trump.