Trump appoints veteran FCC Republican as new chairman

President-elect Donald Trump on Sunday selected Brendan Carr as his pick to be the new chairman of the Federal Communications Commission. He currently serves as the senior Republican on the commission, having been previously appointed by both Trump and Biden, according to his biography on the FCC website. Trump described Carr as a defender of free speech and promised he would roll back regulations stifling Americans’ ability to create. As a longtime commission member, he has been confirmed by the U.S. Senate three times.

Did Trump nominate anyone else recently? Trump named Chris Wright as his pick for secretary of energy. The Colorado resident is the chief executive officer of Liberty Energy and describes himself as a tech nerd and entrepreneur. Wright would also serve as a member of a new entity, a Council of National Energy, Trump said. The council would feature the heads of several departments and agencies related to energy and would oversee the United States’ path to energy dominance, the president-elect explained.

Trump also nominated William Owen Scharf as assistant to the president and White House staff secretary. Trump credited Scharf with defeating legal motions against him during the 2024 presidential elections—what Trump and other leading Republicans are referring to as lawfare. Specifically, Trump credited Scharf with persuading the Supreme Court to decide that former presidents enjoyed criminal immunity from official acts they made while in office.

Dig deeper: Read my report from Friday about how Trump’s nomination of former Rep. Matt Gaetz for the position of attorney general has raised questions among evangelicals.