This is an adapted extract from November 11 episode of “The Rachel Maddow Show.”

Last time Donald Trump was president, of his secretary of the interior he was embroiled in a corruption scandal and ended up being referred to the Department of Justice for a potential criminal investigation. His Secretary of Transportation it was also embroiled in her own corruption scandal and also has been referred to the Department of Justice for a potential criminal investigation.

Trump’s Secretary of Labor resigned in scandal following a federal judge’s ruling that he broke the law when he signed a plea deal with Jeffrey Epstein in 2008. energy secretary, head of the Environmental Protection Agency and secretary of health and human services all resigned in corruption and ethics scandals.

Back in the day, if you had a Cabinet official involved in a major ethics and/or corruption scandal that forced them out of their jobs or led to them being referred for criminal investigations, that would be enough to mark your entire presidency as scandalous and shameful. – fixed error.

Consider Warren G. Harding – what is remembered about his presidency? Maybe he died in office? Or that he had an affair? No, it is Teapot Dome corruption scandal, which led to criminal charges against a Cabinet official. A century later, that scandal involving a Cabinet official is virtually all we remember of Harding’s presidency.

Trump’s first term had so many cabinet officials forced to resign in disgrace and go to the Justice Department for criminal charges that it’s actually hard to remember them all. However, despite an unprecedented number of Cabinet officials being referred for criminal investigations, the supposedly independent DOJ decided not to press charges against any of them.

One of the most memorable ethical debacles in this regard since Trump’s first term was a situation involving his Secretary of Veterans Affairs, Robert Wilkie. This might be the most memorable scandal because it happened right at the end of his administration on December 10, 2020, after Trump lost re-election to Joe Biden, but before the January 6 attack.

MaddowBlog’s title at the time, by Steve Benen read: “Another Trump Cabinet Secretary Caught in Scandal: As Donald Trump’s presidency nears an ignominious end, it appears it’s not too late for yet another Cabinet controversy.”

Wilkie was accused of having discredited a female veteran who said she was sexually assaulted at a VA facility. The VA inspector general investigated those allegations against him, found evidence that he appeared to have broken the law, and referred him to the Department of Justice for investigation. (Wilkie has denied questioning the woman’s credibility.)

The Justice Department didn’t charge Wilkie, just like they didn’t charge any of these guys. But more than 20 various veterans groups rose up indignantly against him. Disappearing groups of veterans with vastly different worldviews have united — everyone from the American Legion to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Veterans of America to the Veterans of Foreign Wars — all calling for Wilkie to resign or be fired.

It was just a disaster, and it was a sign that even by the very bitter and ultimately violent end of Trump’s first term, things weren’t just bad. It is not normal to have half a dozen Cabinet members sent for investigations into potential crimes committed while serving in the Cabinet.

Now that the nation has marked Veteran’s Day, a day to honor and celebrate our veterans, we have learned that Trump has decided to bring back Wilkie, tapping him to lead transition efforts for the entire Department of Defense. At a time when the country is looking to the US military for assurances that they won’t carried out against American civilians as Trump threatened, the guy in charge of the Defense Department leadership staff for the military is the same guy who left the job last time while “possible criminal behavior” was investigated by federal prosecutors.

Wilkie isn’t the only one being tapped for a second Trump administration in recent days. NBC News has learned Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who once memorably cast doubt on the size of Trump’s genitalia in a presidential debate, is expected to be the president-elect’s choice for secretary of state.

Trump also chose Rep. Mike Waltz from Florida to be his national security adviser. Walz helped in the effort to try to overthrow the government and keep Trump in power after he lost re-election in 2020. Waltz was notable for arguing that Trump was not responsible for January 6 and that Dulles Airport would should be renamed “Donald”. J. Trump International Airport.” So clearly, he checked all the boxes he needs to be national security adviser.

I learned Tom Homan, the former acting director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement during Trump’s first term, will be his administration’s “border czar.” Remember when Republicans used to claim with a straight face that it was a huge scandal and evidence of communism to call someone the czar of something?

Well, Homan will now be Trump’s “border czar.” He is one of the policy architects that had the US government deliberately and systematically separating children from their parents at the border. He also spent this interregnum, while Trump was out of office, storming the country bragging about what the man who ruthlessly comes after immigrants will be like if Trump returns to power.

Trump put another architect of family separation, Stephen Miller, responsible for all policy planning for the transition. A source told NBC News that Miller will also serve as deputy chief of staff for policy in Trump’s second White House.

So anyone who tells you that a second Trump administration will be at all moderate or normal in what they do, that person lives on a beautiful planet that I would love to visit someday, but it is not ours. planet.

Any expectation that the most extreme things Trump talked about were just talk and that normal people would come into his administration to do normal things, well, that illusion didn’t survive a week after the elections.

Rachel Maddow

Rachel Maddow is the host of the Emmy Award-winning “The Rachel Maddow Show” Mondays at 9pm ET on MSNBC. “The Rachel Maddow Show” features Maddow’s take on the day’s biggest stories, political and otherwise, including in-depth analysis and stories that other cable news shows won’t cover.

Allison Detzel contributed.