Michael Lewis: Many Trump Appointees Are Uninterested In The Agencies They Head Up : NPR
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. You might know our guest  journalist Michael Lewis  from some of his books  such as "Moneyball" and "The Big Short " both of which were adapted into movies. Lewis has spent a lot of this year exploring the ways the  Trump  administration is changing the federal government at the ground level.
Lewis has spoken to many career employees of the departments of energy and agriculture. He says they found  Trump  appointees ill-prepared for the jobs they have and uninterested in the work of the departments they're running. In a series of articles for Vanity Fair  Lewis reports that the consequences of such ill-informed leadership could be troubling in areas as critical as maintenance of the nation's nuclear arsenal and managing nuclear waste  both functions of the Energy Department. Lewis spoke to FRESH AIR's Dave Davies about his series and about his latest book  "The Undoing Project " which is now out in paperback.
MICHAEL LEWIS: Well  my mind when  Trump  was elected was on the subject of risk because I just finished a book  "The Undoing Project " about people's - the difficulty people had processing risk  in evaluating risk. And I was wondering what risks  Trump  brought with  him . I then saw that the transition from the Obama administration to the  Trump  administration basically didn't happen  (laughter) that - what normally happens after a new president comes in is that the day after the election  dozens of people roll into each of the agencies and start getting briefings from the people who are on their way out or from the career civil servants.
And then days passed  and they finally kind of get word that  well  they're a little disorganized  and nobody's coming. And it was actually the better part of two months before anybody shows up who's going to be - who's going to represent  Trump 's transition to the Department of Agriculture. So they had - they were just left waiting for a long time.
LEWIS: He's not the first person who's appointed by  Trump  to go in and be the transition person. But the first two people I think had problems because they were a lobbyist for  like  the soda industry. (Laughter) And there was protests about that person being involved in such an enterprise because  among other things  the USDA is responsible for the nation's nutrition and understanding it and promoting good nutrition. So the first guy who actually shows up and is still there is named Klippenstein  and he comes from an operation called Protect The Harvest.
LEWIS: That kind of - yes  dogfighting and circuses and  you know  poultry farming. And wherever animals might be mistreated  the USDA has some responsibility to monitor it. And anyway  so this guy - but he's a one-man transition team. And the thing that's bewildering to the people inside the USDA who thought they were going to be passing the baton and explaining to the  Trump  administration how the Department of Agriculture works is that they thought this is a job for 20 people to be done over 80 days  not one person over a couple of weeks. So the feeling generally inside the institution was that the transition never really happened  and the people who eventually come in never really got the briefings.
Essentially there was a witch hunt across the government for scientists  policy people who were responsible for responding to climate change because the position of the  Trump  administration was that basically it didn't exist. And so the career civil servant who was asked for the names of people in the Department of Agriculture who might be involved in  say  researching climate change refused to give up names. So that got shut down right away.
DAVIES: Eventually a larger team of  Trump  appointees did arrive at the Department of Agriculture. Who were they? What kind of backgrounds did they bring?
What concerned her was  first  who  Trump  had nominated to be her replacement - an Iowa right-wing talk show radio host named Sam Clovis  who had absolutely no background in science  whose chief qualification seems to have been he was just really loyal to  Trump . He was co-chairman of  Trump 's campaign. And she  like everybody else  was mystified because while you can understand why political loyalists need to find their homes inside of an administration  why put him in a place where you actually have to know something? You know  why put him in charge of the science end of the Department of Agriculture  especially since so much of that research that's being done is one way or another related to climate change? And he doesn't think climate change exists.
DAVIES: I want to come back to Sam Clovis  the guy that the  Trump  administration nominated as the chief scientist for the Department of Agriculture who you say didn't have a background in science  was a talk show host. What do we know about his effect on the science program in the Department of Agriculture so far?
So this is to me - there's a theme in the sort of risks that the  Trump  administration are taking by putting people who are not suited for jobs into the jobs. And one of the themes is that they're - a willingness to tax the distant future for the political present because the distant future really doesn't have a voice at the table.
DAVIES: My guest is Michael Lewis. His article is about the  Trump  administration's impact on departments of the federal government appear in Vanity Fair. Since our interview was recorded  the president's pick to be chief scientist of the Agriculture Department  Sam Clovis  has withdrawn his nomination. It was revealed that last year  Clovis was the  Trump  campaign supervisor of George Papadopoulos  who tried to broker a relationship between the campaign and Russian officials and has admitted lying about it to the FBI. We'll hear more of our interview with Michael Lewis after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. And we're speaking with Michael Lewis  the author of "Moneyball" and other books. His latest is "The Undoing Project." He has some articles now in Vanity Fair about how the  Trump  administration is reshaping the work of several federal departments  among them the Departments of Agriculture and the Department of Energy. I want to talk about the energy department. The energy department had reams of briefing material ready for the  Trump  team when they arrived. Who showed up  if anyone?
LEWIS: Nobody showed up the day after the election. They - and they were  too - were expecting 20 to 30 people roll in. And they were especially alarmed because like the Department of Agriculture  the energy department is misnamed. It really is misleading. You think it's about energy. It's really more about nuclear weapons. It's where the nuclear stockpile is maintained. And because they're in the middle of national security issues - and they were terrified that the  Trump  administration was not going to know what it needed to know.
It'd be like  how do we maintain the nuclear stockpile  or  what's going on with a nuclear cleanup in Eastern Washington - very technical things. And I would also give you guidance on how the place runs. But the  Trump  administration took - clearly took the view that they had nothing to learn at all from the people who had been running the place for the last eight years.
DAVIES: You write that there was - what was called as a beachhead team  some group of  Trump  staffers who showed up. What did you hear that they did?
This is FRESH AIR. I'm Terry Gross. You might know our guest  journalist Michael Lewis  from some of his books  such as "Moneyball" and "The Big Short " both of which were adapted into movies. Lewis has spent a lot of this year exploring the ways the   [TGT]   administration is changing the federal government at the ground level.
Lewis has spoken to many career employees of the departments of energy and agriculture. He says they found   [TGT]   appointees ill-prepared for the jobs they have and uninterested in the work of the departments they're running. In a series of articles for Vanity Fair  Lewis reports that the consequences of such ill-informed leadership could be troubling in areas as critical as maintenance of the nation's nuclear arsenal and managing nuclear waste  both functions of the Energy Department. Lewis spoke to FRESH AIR's Dave Davies about his series and about his latest book  "The Undoing Project " which is now out in paperback.
MICHAEL LEWIS: Well  my mind when  Trump  was elected was on the subject of risk because I just finished a book  "The Undoing Project " about people's - the difficulty people had processing risk  in evaluating risk. And I was wondering what risks  Trump  brought with  him . I then saw that the transition from the Obama administration to the  Trump  administration basically didn't happen  (laughter) that - what normally happens after a new president comes in is that the day after the election  dozens of people roll into each of the agencies and start getting briefings from the people who are on their way out or from the career civil servants.
And then days passed  and they finally kind of get word that  well  they're a little disorganized  and nobody's coming. And it was actually the better part of two months before anybody shows up who's going to be - who's going to represent  Trump 's transition to the Department of Agriculture. So they had - they were just left waiting for a long time.
LEWIS: He's not the first person who's appointed by  Trump  to go in and be the transition person. But the first two people I think had problems because they were a lobbyist for  like  the soda industry. (Laughter) And there was protests about that person being involved in such an enterprise because  among other things  the USDA is responsible for the nation's nutrition and understanding it and promoting good nutrition. So the first guy who actually shows up and is still there is named Klippenstein  and he comes from an operation called Protect The Harvest.
LEWIS: That kind of - yes  dogfighting and circuses and  you know  poultry farming. And wherever animals might be mistreated  the USDA has some responsibility to monitor it. And anyway  so this guy - but he's a one-man transition team. And the thing that's bewildering to the people inside the USDA who thought they were going to be passing the baton and explaining to the  Trump  administration how the Department of Agriculture works is that they thought this is a job for 20 people to be done over 80 days  not one person over a couple of weeks. So the feeling generally inside the institution was that the transition never really happened  and the people who eventually come in never really got the briefings.
Essentially there was a witch hunt across the government for scientists  policy people who were responsible for responding to climate change because the position of the   [TGT]   administration was that basically it didn't exist. And so the career civil servant who was asked for the names of people in the Department of Agriculture who might be involved in  say  researching climate change refused to give up names. So that got shut down right away.
DAVIES: Eventually a larger team of   [TGT]   appointees did arrive at the Department of Agriculture. Who were they? What kind of backgrounds did they bring?
What concerned her was  first  who  Trump  had nominated to be her replacement - an Iowa right-wing talk show radio host named Sam Clovis  who had absolutely no background in science  whose chief qualification seems to have been he was just really loyal to   [TGT]  . He was co-chairman of   [TGT]  's campaign. And she  like everybody else  was mystified because while you can understand why political loyalists need to find their homes inside of an administration  why put him in a place where you actually have to know something? You know  why put him in charge of the science end of the Department of Agriculture  especially since so much of that research that's being done is one way or another related to climate change? And he doesn't think climate change exists.
DAVIES: I want to come back to Sam Clovis  the guy that the  Trump  administration nominated as the chief scientist for the Department of Agriculture who you say didn't have a background in science  was a talk show host. What do we know about his effect on the science program in the Department of Agriculture so far?
So this is to me - there's a theme in the sort of risks that the  Trump  administration are taking by putting people who are not suited for jobs into the jobs. And one of the themes is that they're - a willingness to tax the distant future for the political present because the distant future really doesn't have a voice at the table.
DAVIES: My guest is Michael Lewis. His article is about the  Trump  administration's impact on departments of the federal government appear in Vanity Fair. Since our interview was recorded  the president's pick to be chief scientist of the Agriculture Department  Sam Clovis  has withdrawn his nomination. It was revealed that last year  Clovis was the  Trump  campaign supervisor of George Papadopoulos  who tried to broker a relationship between the campaign and Russian officials and has admitted lying about it to the FBI. We'll hear more of our interview with Michael Lewis after a break. This is FRESH AIR.
DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR. And we're speaking with Michael Lewis  the author of "Moneyball" and other books. His latest is "The Undoing Project." He has some articles now in Vanity Fair about how the  Trump  administration is reshaping the work of several federal departments  among them the Departments of Agriculture and the Department of Energy. I want to talk about the energy department. The energy department had reams of briefing material ready for the  Trump  team when they arrived. Who showed up  if anyone?
LEWIS: Nobody showed up the day after the election. They - and they were  too - were expecting 20 to 30 people roll in. And they were especially alarmed because like the Department of Agriculture  the energy department is misnamed. It really is misleading. You think it's about energy. It's really more about nuclear weapons. It's where the nuclear stockpile is maintained. And because they're in the middle of national security issues - and they were terrified that the   [TGT]   administration was not going to know what it needed to know.
It'd be like  how do we maintain the nuclear stockpile  or  what's going on with a nuclear cleanup in Eastern Washington - very technical things. And I would also give you guidance on how the place runs. But the  Trump  administration took - clearly took the view that they had nothing to learn at all from the people who had been running the place for the last eight years.
DAVIES: You write that there was - what was called as a beachhead team  some group of   [TGT]   staffers who showed up. What did you hear that they did?