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WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump on Tuesday tapped billionaire professional wrestling mogul Linda McMahon to be secretary of the Education Department, tasked with overseeing an agency Trump has promised to dismantle. He also selected Dr. Mehmet Oz, a former television talk show host and heart surgeon, to head the agency that oversees health insurance programs for millions of older, poor and disabled Americans, and named Wall Street executive Howard Lutnick to lead the Commerce Department.
McMahon led the Small Business Administration during Trump’s initial term from 2017 to 2019 and twice ran unsuccessfully as a Republican for the U.S. Senate in Connecticut.
McMahon served on the Connecticut Board of Education for a year starting in 2009 and has spent years on the board of trustees for Sacred Heart University in Connecticut. She’s seen as a relative unknown in education circles, though she has expressed support for charter schools and school choice.
“Linda will use her decades of Leadership experience, and deep understanding of both Education and Business, to empower the next Generation of American Students and Workers, and make America Number One in Education in the World,” Trump said in a statement.
In nominating McMahon, Trump is rewarding a loyal backer of his movement who, along with Lutnick, has also helped lead his transition team. She was with him Tuesday as he attended a launch of SpaceX's Starship craft in Texas.
After her time in the Trump administration, McMahon became the chair of the board of the America First Policy Institute, a think tank created by Trump supporters and former officials who have been preparing for his return to government. McMahon has also been chair of the pro-Trump America First Action SuperPAC.
She is married to Vince McMahon, who stepped down as World Wrestling Entertainment's CEO in 2022 amid a company investigation into allegations that he engaged in sexual battery and trafficking. He also resigned as executive chairman of the board of TKO Group Holdings this January, though he has denied the allegations.
If confirmed by the Republican-led Senate, Linda McMahon will be asked to bring the nation’s schools and universities in line with Trump’s vision of education. Trump has made sweeping promises centered on removing what he sees as “left-wing indoctrination” in America’s schools.
Trump has vowed to cut federal money for “any school pushing Critical Race Theory, transgender insanity, and other inappropriate racial, sexual, or political content on our children.” He has promised to fight university diversity initiatives, saying he will open civil rights investigations and fine colleges “up to the entire amount of their endowment.”
Oz, who ran a failed 2022 bid to represent Pennsylvania in the U.S. Senate, has been an outspoken supporter of Trump and in recent days expressed support for Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s nomination for the nation’s top health agency, the Department of Health and Human Services.
“Dr. Oz will be a leader in incentivizing Disease Prevention, so we get the best results in the World for every dollar we spend on Healthcare in our Great Country,” Trump said in a statement. “He will also cut waste and fraud within our Country’s most expensive Government Agency, which is a third of our Nation’s Healthcare spend, and a quarter of our entire National Budget.”
As the administrator for the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Oz would report to Kennedy.
“Americans need better research on healthy lifestyle choices from unbiased scientists, and @robertfkennedyjr can help as HHS secretary,” Oz said in an Instagram post last week.
If confirmed by the Senate, Oz would be responsible for the programs — Medicaid, Medicare and the Affordable Care Act — that more than half the country relies on for health insurance.
Medicaid provides nearly-free health care coverage to millions of the poorest children and adults in the U.S., while Medicare gives older Americans and the disabled access to health insurance. The Affordable Care Act is the Obama-era program that offers health insurance plans to millions of Americans who do not qualify for government-assisted health insurance, but do not get insurance through their employer.
Trump has said he wants to overhaul the Affordable Care Act but has said he only has “concepts of a plan” for how that redesign would operate. During his first term in office, he tried unsuccessfully to scrap the program altogether. Last month, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson promised that health care reform would be a big part of Trump's second term agenda.
During his campaign for senate, Oz promised to expand Medicare Advantage, the privately run version of Medicare that has become increasingly popular but also a source of widespread fraud.
TV personality Oprah Winfrey helped launch Oz into fandom and fortune. After years of appearing on her show as a health expert, Oz landed a talk show of his own that aired for 13 seasons. Oz has been accused of hawking dubious medical treatments and products on his defunct TV show. And during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, he pressured government officials to make hydroxychloroquine widely available, despite unresolved questions about its safety and effectiveness.
He estimated his net worth to be between $100 million and $315 million, according to a federal financial disclosure he filed in 2022.
Democratic Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, the chamber's president pro tempore, said Tuesday in a statement that Oz, who has described himself as “strongly pro-life," was unqualified for the position.
“Dr. Oz has zero qualifications, pushes alarming pseudoscience, & holds extreme anti-abortion views,” she said in a post on X. “CMS is a critical agency & we need serious leaders to protect Americans’ health care and bring down costs — not TV hosts whose main qualification is their loyalty to Trump.”
Lutnick, meanwhile, will have a key role in carrying out Trump's plan to raise and enforce tariffs as commerce secretary, Trump said. Lutnick is a cryptocurrency enthusiast and head of brokerage and investment bank Cantor Fitzgerald.
Trump made the announcement on his social media platform, Truth Social. He said Lutnick “will lead our Tariff and Trade agenda, with additional direct responsibility for the Office of the United States Trade Representative."
The nomination would put Lutnick in charge of a sprawling Cabinet agency that is involved in funding new computer chip factories, imposing trade restrictions, releasing economic data and monitoring the weather. It is also a position in which connections to CEOs and the wider business community are crucial.
An advocate for imposing wide-ranging tariffs, Lutnick told CNBC in September that “tariffs are an amazing tool for the president to use — we need to protect the American worker." Trump on the campaign trail proposed a 60% tariff on goods from China — and a tariff of up to 20% on everything else the United States imports.
Mainstream economists are generally skeptical of tariffs, considering them a mostly inefficient way for governments to raise money and promote prosperity.
Lutnick had been considered for treasury secretary, a role that has been at the center of high-profile jockeying within the Trump world. At the same time, the treasury position is closely watched in financial circles, where a disruptive nominee could have immediate negative consequences on the stock market, which Trump watches closely.
Lutnick joined Cantor Fitzgerald in 1983 and rose through the ranks to be appointed president and CEO in 1991. He also chairs financial technology company BGC Group Inc. and the commercial real estate services firm Newmark Group Inc.
Lutnick has donated to both Democrats and Republicans in the past, and once appeared on Trump’s NBC reality show, “The Apprentice.” He has become a part of the president-elect’s inner circle, and has shared the stage with Trump at events in the closing days of his campaign, including a rally at Madison Square Garden.
__ Associated Press writer Matthew Perrone in Washington contributed.