The Donald Trump hiring crisis means America's got no talent From investigations to humiliations, the reputational risk of working for this administration is enormous.

Brian Klaas | Opinion contributor

The United States government is suffering from a new phenomenon: the Trump Brain Drain. For the first time in memory, the American government is having difficulty recruiting the best and the brightest at the highest levels of power.

Qualified public servants are turning down plum government jobs because they don't want to be exposed to the risks of serving in President Trump's White House. West Wing power-brokers are lawyering up (even Trump’s lawyer has hired a lawyer). A special counsel is reportedly investigating the president himself for possibly obstructing justice.

The reputational risk of working for Trump’s administration is enormous, and it's not just because of the endless spiraling scandals. There's also the now routine Trumpian ritual of sacrificing his staff on his altar of self-sabotage. We all know the drill: Sean Spicer or Sarah Huckabee Sanders or another sacrificial lamb offers up a flimsy lie to protect Trump. (He fired Comey because he was too hard on Hillary Clinton!) Trump repays the favor by contradicting his staff almost immediately on Twitter or TV. (I fired him because of “the Russia thing.”)

Yet working for this president has become a bewildering exercise in trying to figure out what’s worse: paying exorbitant legal fees, being tossed under the proverbial bus by your boss, or risking becoming a national punchline (we almost feel sorry for you, Sean). The loyalty that Trump infamously demands from subordinates is clearly not a two-way street.

At least there are job perks. Build your CV with the unique experience of being subpoenaed by Congress. Practice your leader worship skills as you’re forced to proclaim your fawning admiration for Trump during a public Cabinet meeting. And if those don’t entice you, who wouldn’t jump at the chance to work for a beleaguered president with record low approval ratings, a hot temper, and a stalled legislative agenda?

The United States is less safe and government is less effective when top talent must think twice about serving the president.

Less than five months into the Trump presidency, there is a record number of vacancies. Of 558 key presidential appointments requiring Senate confirmation, only 43 have been filled (less than 8% of the total). And before you echo the frequently tweeted but incorrect Trump accusation that this is due to Democrat "OBSTRUCTIONISTS”, remember that 405 of the 558 positions don’t even have a nominee yet. This snail’s pace of selecting people — which involves getting them to agree to serve — is unprecedented in modern history.

When the post of FBI director opened up (through, shall we say, questionable means), at least five dedicated public servants publicly withdrew from consideration. Several seasoned veterans pulled themselves out of the running to replace Michael Flynn as national security adviser. Even Kellyanne Conway’s husband withdrew from consideration for a powerful Justice Department role (perhaps he had learned some alternative facts life inside the Trump administration from a well-placed counselor?).

The Trump Brain Drain is sapping talent beyond the White House, too. Six cyber security executives told Reuters that Trump’s caustic attacks on intelligence agencies had provoked a marked surge in skilled hackers and cyber talent leaving government agencies to pursue careers in the private sector. Even lawyers, who used to flock to Trump like moths to a litigious orange flame, are now staying away. Four different law firms declined to represent Trump not only because they feared that Trump won’t listen to their legal advice but also because working with Trump would kill recruitment for their firms — the trickle-down economics of the Trump Brain Drain in action.

Of course, there are many, many excellent and experienced public servants in the Trump administration (Defense Secretary James Mattis, National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster and Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao spring to mind). But Trump’s top day-to-day advisers are no dream team. We must call an unqualified spade an unqualified spade.

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There's hardly anyone on Trump's senior staff who has ushered a bill through Congress. White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, the former Republican Party chairman, has never held elective office and came to his job with virtually no experience at the federal level. Two of Trump’s top advisers — now some of the most influential people in the world — are woefully unqualified relatives. And former Breitbart chief Steve Bannon has as much business being in the Oval Office as Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, yet here we are.

It gets worse. You could start a joke by saying “A neurosurgeon and a wedding planner walked into a bar…” but there's a real-world punchline. Last week, Trump appointed his family’s wedding planner to run federal housing in New York. Her boss, Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson, is an impressive neurosurgeon, but it’s hard to see how operating on brains is a relevant qualification for his post.

In other words, Trump’s hiring decisions are compounding the recruitment brain drain because many people he selects are unprepared for their roles. Unless he changes his ways, his presidency will continue to languish from the one-two punch of his own incompetence and the government’s inability to recruit top talent.

Brian Klaas is a fellow in comparative politics at the London School of Economics and Political Science and author ofThe Despot's Accomplice: How the West is Aiding and Abetting the Decline of Democracy. Follow him on Twitter @brianklaas.

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