President Donald Trump has indicated that he plans to nominate the acting attorney general, Todd Blanche, to take on the role on a permanent basis, the latest move by the president to place loyalists in top jobs across the government.

Dan Scavino, one of Trump’s most trusted advisers, posted a video of the president announcing the plan Wednesday night.

“Tomorrow I’m instructing Dan and everybody else that’s involved in that very complicated process, which is going to go, I think, very quickly, that we are going to make him permanent attorney general,” Trump said of Blanche in the video.

If Trump follows through and formally nominates Blanche to the post, it would likely set off a bruising confirmation battle in the Senate.

Trump and Blanche have faced a backlash over the president’s plan to create a $1.8 billion fund to use taxpayer money to pay his allies who claim they have been politically persecuted.

Also this week, Trump named Bill Pulte, who has pressed for investigations into the president’s foes, to serve as the acting director of national intelligence, giving him oversight of U.S. intelligence agencies.

Pulte, who leads the Federal Housing Finance Agency, has no known background in intelligence, defense or national security. He has been among the most aggressive advocates for prosecuting Democrats and others perceived by Trump as having crossed him.

His appointment led Democrats to threaten to hold up reauthorization of a surveillance program used to guard against national security threats.

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This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

By The New York Times/Kenny Holston
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