The Politicization of Federal Leadership: Record Non-Senate Confirmed Presidential Appointments and the Hollowing Out of Career Leadership 

The federal government now has the largest political workforce in at least 40 years and the smallest career senior leadership in at least 25 years—simultaneously. 

In the first year of his second term, President Donald Trump placed more non-Senate confirmed political appointees across agencies than any modern president and did so at a historically fast pace. There are now 1,835 Schedule C nonconfirmed political appointees currently serving—a level no other modern president approached until well into their administration. At the same time, the career Senior Executive Service leadership of the federal government sharply contracted by 30%. Together, they mark a striking shift in who leads the federal government and how agencies are run. 

The administration has also moved to create new categories of political appointments and at-will employees that could push these trends further—most notably Schedule Policy/Career, a new classification that is expected to strip civil service protections from tens of thousands of federal employees in policy-influencing roles, and Schedule G, an entirely new class of political appointments.  

Traditionally, presidents have relied on career civil servants as the backbone of the government’s workforce due to their consistency across elections, experience and expertise. Political appointees, in contrast, occupy a relatively small slice at the top of organizations and have a relatively high turnover rate.1 Trump is turning this norm on its head—shrinking the ranks of career leadership while expanding the layer of political appointees at the top of agencies.  

Record levels of political appointments raise concerns on three fronts: the concentration of presidential control over federal agencies, the risk of mismanagement and diminished organizational capacity and the potential decline in the quality of government programs and services. The concern is not that political appointees are inherently unqualified—many bring valuable expertise and leadership—but that agencies primarily led by officials selected for political loyalty rather than managerial competence can leave agencies without the expertise and experience needed to deliver results. 

High appointee turnover compounds this risk, as continuity of leadership is essential to long-term organizational performance. Research consistently shows that programs led by political appointees perform worse than those managed by career officials,2 and that appointee leadership vacancies lead to diminished organizational performance.3 

The sharp increase of non-confirmed political appointees, combined with the hollowing out of career leadership, point to a clear need for reform. The laws governing political appointments—which set statutory caps on certain appointment categories while granting broad executive authority to create additional ones—were written for a different era and have not kept pace with how presidential appointment authority is being exercised today. 

The United States stands out among advanced democracies in the scale of its political appointment system. While most countries have only a few dozen to a few hundred political appointees,4 U.S. presidents can make more than 4,000 appointments.  

Unlike career SES officials, who are selected through a rigorous competitive process, or Senate-confirmed appointees, who face scrutiny through the Senate committee process, non-Senate confirmed political leaders have little to no independent vetting or standards to ensure they have the skills necessary to do the jobs they are given. Each appointee is selected by the White House Presidential Personnel Office with varying degrees of consultation with agency appointees.  

There are three categories of positions that do not require Senate confirmation: 

• Non-career SES: Members of SES can be career or political appointees, but by law, political appointees cannot exceed 10% of filled SES positions or 25% of the allocated SES positions in a specific agency.5

• Schedule C: Schedule C is a class of positions that are of a confidential or policy-determining nature. These include special or confidential assistants to Senate-confirmed officials, chiefs of staff, policy advisors, directors of communications and legislative liaisons. The Office of Personnel Management authorizes the establishment of each Schedule C position.  

• Presidential appointments: Around two thirds of these positions are within commissions, councils, committees, boards or foundations. The remaining third serve in advisory or administrative positions within the Executive Office of the President. PA positions are typically either established by statute, in the case of multi-member entities, or authorized by congressional appropriations, in the case of EOP appointees.6  

President Trump made record numbers of non-Senate confirmed appointments (Schedule C and non-career SES)7 at a historically high pace during the first year of his administration.  

By the end of March 2025, Trump made 1,121 appointments across the executive branch, a record high since the Clinton administration. President Joe Biden made nearly as many appointments in the first quarter of his administration (1,113), but he did not keep pace through the remainder of the year.  

Trump continued his strong pace over the subsequent three months, making 926 additional appointments, nearly three times as many as the average president between Clinton and Biden.

By the end of his first year, Trump had 2,571 Schedule C and non-career SES appointees serving—approximately 800 more than Biden (1,793) and over 1,000 more than Trump in his first term (1,533). 

Trump’s non-Senate confirmed appointments are not only historically high for a president’s first year, but for any period in an administration. By the end of his first year, there were more Schedule C appointees in place than at any point in the last 40 years.  

At the end of January 2026, there were 1,835 Schedule C appointees serving, over 50 more than the previous record set under President George H.W. Bush (1,783) and nearly 200 more than the high-water mark of Trump’s first term (1,642).

The non-career SES picture is similar. The number of non-career SES in place at the end of January 2026 (770) was only eight fewer than the record number in the last 40 years, set under the Clinton administration (778). 

The trajectory raises an important question: how much further will this go? Because neither Schedule C nor non-career SES appointees require Senate confirmation and both categories have room to grow under current law,8 the president faces no formal constraint on further expanding the political workforce.

The SES was designed to be a critical bridge between the career workforce and political appointees, serving as a layer of senior managers with deep expertise who could faithfully implement policy while maintaining professional standards. Career SES officials are not only selected through a rigorous competitive process, they are subject to ongoing accountability mechanisms that political appointees largely are not, including annual performance reviews and performance improvement procedures.   

The first year of the second Trump administration was characterized by mass departures among the career workforce of the federal government, with particularly severe attrition among career members of the SES. Resignations, retirements and terminations drove the number of career SES from 8,127 at the end of the Biden administration to 5,837 as of January 2026, a record low since at least 1998. This represents a nearly 30% decrease. 

In other words, the federal government is experiencing the largest surge in political appointees in decades alongside one of the sharpest collapses in career leadership on record. 

Political appointees now occupy 11.7% of filled SES positions. The level had never been greater than 10% since at least 1998. 

This is precisely the situation the non-career SES cap was designed to prevent: political appointees now constitute an outsized and historically unprecedented share of the SES. As additional career officials continue to depart and the administration continues to fill vacant positions with appointees, this share will likely grow further. 

The institutional consequences are substantial. When the bridge between the career workforce and appointees is hollowed out, agencies lose institutional memory, technical capacity and independent professional judgment that prevents mismanagement, policy failures and political overreach.  

The current situation—record levels of political appointments placed at record speed and a shrinking career SES—raises the question about what the right mix of career versus political appointees is needed to ensure government is both responsive to a president’s agenda and able to deliver consistent services to the public.  

The administration’s creation of Schedule Policy/Career and Schedule G compounds these concerns. Schedule Policy/Career—which is expected to strip civil service protections from tens of thousands of employees in policy-influencing roles—could accelerate the hollowing out of career leadership that is already underway. The employees most likely to be reclassified are senior career staff who sit at the interface of political direction and agency operations: exactly the people whose expertise and institutional knowledge are hardest to replace. Schedule G represents a different but related problem. Like Schedule C, it is an uncapped appointment authority, meaning there is no statutory limit on how many positions the administration can create. Together, these two new categories represent a significant expansion of presidential control over the workforce beyond what existing law was designed to permit, and they are not accounted for in any of the record numbers described above. 

Federal agencies are large, complex organizations that must manage staffing, budgets and major programs—much like any large private sector enterprise. Political appointees set policy direction; career officials provide the management expertise and operational continuity needed to run these organizations day to day. Both roles matter, but they are not interchangeable. The evidence points clearly toward an expert, professional civil service with a small number of political appointees to guide policy—and that requires reform. Options that should be explored include: 

Cap Schedule C appointments
Congress could establish an overall cap on Schedule C political appointments. With 1,835 already in place, more than any point in the past 40 years, a statutory ceiling around historical norms would restore a meaningful guardrail. Based on historical usage, a reasonable ceiling could be placed at 1,600 or as a percentage of career employees government-wide or by agency.  

Prevent end-runs through new appointment categories
Caps on existing categories are only useful if they cannot be circumvented through new ones. The Trump administration’s creation of Schedule Policy/Career and Schedule G demonstrate how a determined executive can manufacture new classes of de facto or de jure political appointments outside existing constraints. Any reform should include a general prohibition on the creation of new categories of political appointments or at-will employment without explicit congressional authorization.

Change the non-career SES limit
The current statutory cap, 10% of allocated SES positions, has proven easy to circumvent through the simple expedient of allowing career SES vacancies to accumulate. Changing the limit to apply to occupied positions rather than allocations ensures the cap functions as intended regardless of how many career SES positions are filled at any given time.

Require greater transparency
The public and Congress cannot effectively oversee what they cannot see. Occupants of politically appointed positions are only reported annually through the “Plum Book” data produced by the Office of Personnel Management, leaving significant gaps in real-time visibility. OPM should be required to report on these occupants at least quarterly.  

These changes would not limit the president’s fundamental authority to appoint officials who share the administration’s agenda. However, statutory limits have not kept pace with how that authority is being exercised. Those limits need to be updated to restore the guardrails that Congress originally intended, and to ensure effective management of federal programs and personnel.