I want to talk about the cabinet, the incoming cabinet.

We're heading into the thick of confirmation hearings soon.

Francesca, who is the cabinet pick right now who's in the most danger of not getting confirmed?

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: So, this is not going to be that exciting, but everything basically remains the same as it did before we went away.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Okay, you're right.

That's not exciting.

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: I'm sorry.

I know.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Let's move on to sports.

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: No.

But, I mean, realistically, that's what happened, right?

You had the questions about Pete Hegseth going into the winter break.

I mean, the Senate, the House, they've been out for a little bit the last couple of weeks.

Of course, there have been questions about Kash Patel.

There have been questions about, of course, Kash Patel and the FBI as well.

But now the Trump team is making this argument in light of the terrorist attack in New Orleans, that they need his national security nominees.

They need them right away.

And so they've been making this really big push to try and get them confirmed before or rather the week of when he takes office.

Now, this is key because that is where the most contentious fights are going to be is over his national security nominees.

And so now, though, you can expect the Senate to try and take those up first earlier in terms of who's the most in danger.

It also depends on do they do these on the same day.

Do they split these up into different days?

They want to get them in on January 20th.

Is that even possible -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Shock and awe, just do it all at once.

Flood the zone.

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: I mean, that could be a strategy that they employ.

They have not announced yet, other than Pete Hegseth says on the 14th, when those will be.

They have to give seven days notice, so we should know by Monday or Tuesday if they plan to have any other ones earlier in the week.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: David, let me reframe the question.

Any of these nominees in danger from your perspective?

DAVID IGNATIUS: So, I would think Tulsi Gabbard as director of National Intelligence is very unlikely.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Unlikely?

DAVID IGNATIUS: Yes.

I think the -- JEFFREY GOLDBERG: What are you hearing on the Hill?

DAVID IGNATIUS: I think the Senate Intelligence Committee is taking a very careful look.

I think they've got a lot of material to look at.

I think there are significant questions concerns people have about her.

I think Bashar al Assad, the person she went to pay court to, getting deposed in Syria didn't help her nomination.

So, I'd be surprised if she got through.

I think Pete Hegseth's nomination is going to be difficult.

It's striking after the New Orleans terrorist attack, which we're going to talk about, how we all turn to the FBI, the CIA, our national security institutions.

You know, we need them and people feel that deeply.

And I'd be surprised if there isn't a deeper discussion in the Senate about these nominees.

It really matters who's head of the Pentagon's hardest management job in government.

Is Pete Hegseth really ready to do that?

Is Kash Patel really ready to lead an FBI, which we're going to need desperately to deal with counterterrorism issues?

So, I'd be amazed if the Senate didn't really take those issues up.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.

Peter, any chance from your perspective that Kash Patel doesn't get through because people realize that, oh, you know what, maybe we need somebody with a broad investigative and antiterrorism experience?

PETER BAKER: A chance?

Yes.

It's a question of whether Trump does have the ability to discipline and impose his will on the Senate.

Now, the Senate is different than the House, right?

You have individuals there who won't be running again while Donald Trump is president.

They have six-year terms.

They have a little bit more sense of independence and a sense of their own importance.

And so there are opportunities, I think, for picking off three, four, possibly, members that would say, no, this is too much.

Kash Patel may be a fine candidate.

Political hatchet man, but putting him in charge of the nation's premier law enforcement agency at a time when 15 people are being run down in New Orleans may not be the best idea.

But they're not going to say that right away.

They're going to see how these pairings play out.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Leigh Ann, RFK Jr. in any danger?

LEIGH ANN CALDWELL: So, I get a lot of mixed, mixed responses from Republican senators about RFK Jr.

I like asked these senators to rank who's in the most trouble, and some said RFK is at the top of their list.

Others say that he's going to be totally fine.

So, it's really hard to tell.

But I will say one of the challenges for RFK Jr. is not about his, you know, vaccine skepticism or his, you know, unorthodox views on health.

It's from Republicans the abortion issue.

And so he, I am told, has been asked a lot of questions in his private meetings about the issue of abortion and what he's going to do about that, running these health agencies.

And I am told that his response is that he will do what Donald Trump's will is.

But what's important with not only RFK Jr., but all of these nominees is there's going to be public hearings, and every single senator is going to have to make a public determination in large part based on these hearings and how the public responds to those two.

These nominees could totally bomb in these hearings or they could just pass through with flying colors.

FRANCESCA CHAMBERS: And, Peter, and you brought up the six year terms, but there are a few key senators who will be up in 2026, such as Susan Collins, who has announced that she plans to run for reelection.

And she is someone who we all have our eye on to determine how she might vote.

So, some of the people won't necessarily be there for the next six years.

But as you were talking, Leigh Ann, about the hearings, I mean, that's what I was hearing from senators as well.

They really -- even the Republicans, they take their advice and consent role very seriously.

Even if they are inclined, the Republicans, to end up approving Donald Trump's cabinet nominees, they do want to see the hearings.

They do want to ask questions.

And then, you know, even some of the people who have called holdouts so far might end up coming around his side, but they're not going to do that.

We're not going to hear how Republicans plan to vote until after these hearings take place.

DAVID IGNATIUS: Don't forget that the Republican caucus in secret voted against Trump's desire to have Senator Thune as the majority leader.

That was a significant statement, I think, by Senate Republicans.

PETER BAKER: But in secret.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: In secret.

PETER BAKER: True, in secret.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: And they did it.

And in secret, they probably will vote not to have Trump as president after January 6th either.

But that would be in secret.

PETER BAKER: By the way, David's point and Leigh Ann's point is right about Gabbard and RFK Jr. Because they're Democrats or were Democrats or whatever they are now, it gives a slightly different lane for Republicans to say, no, I can't go along with that.

They're not one of us.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Let me talk about New Orleans.

David what does this attack, this deadly attack, say to you about the nature of the ISIS threat to America?

DAVID IGNATIUS: So, ISIS continues as an idea.

I've walked the streets of Raqqa, the ISIS capital in Syria.

It was obliterated.

It looked like Gaza.

Every building had been destroyed, damaged.

There was really nothing left in the center of town.

So, that enormous military power was brought to bear against ISIS.

But you can't destroy an idea.

And the ISIS idea remains powerful online.

I'm told that ISIS's influence in Africa is increasing.

An ISIS spinoff, ISIS-K, that came out of Afghanistan, attacked Iran, killed scores of people in Iran, attacked Russia, killed scores of people in Russia.

So, what I hear from counterterrorism professionals is this sense that the inspired homegrown violent extremist, which is what Shamsud-Din Jabbar is, there's no evidence of a connection other than virtually online to a network.

Those people can do enormous damage.

The technique that he used, vehicle ramming.

The head of the National Center for Counterterrorism was talking about that two months ago.

Nobody paid any attention.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: It's a more common technique in the Middle East than it is here.

DAVID IGNATIUS: In Europe, I mean, so, anyway, the problem is there.

It's different.

But the problem, you can't kill an idea.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.

I want to remind everyone around the table of Trump's confidence, President-elect Trump's confidence that he had defeated the Islamic State.

Let's listen to this for one second.

DONALD TRUMP, U.S. President-Elect: I defeated 100 percent of the ISIS caliphate.

Everyone said that couldn't be done, and I did it in a matter of weeks.

All of the presidents before me failed for 20 years.

I defeated ISIS in just a matter of weeks.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Yes.

So, that's a lot of confidence.

That's in 2023.

That's a lot of confidence.

Peter, talk about what they actually can do, especially as it relates to the defeat of an idea.

PETER BAKER: Yes.

I mean, I think, look, if he's talking about defeating the caliphate, you know, the territorial control that ISIS had in Syria and Iraq, he can claim, obviously, some credit there.

Obviously, they did not control what they did eight years ago.

But as David just said, I mean, that doesn't mean that they've gone away, or people like them.

And I think that it's one of these things where America has gotten a little contented that we haven't faced this at home in a while.

It's been 23 years now since 9/11.

We thought that we'd be seeing this all the time.

We really didn't, and we especially haven't seen it in the last number of eight, ten years here at home.

And so it only takes one guy, one, you know, radicalized guy to suddenly pick up a truck and it doesn't -- it's really hard to defeat that.

So, the intelligence networks have done a remarkable job of actually finding plenty of plots and stopping them in advance.

But are you going to be able to be 100 percent successful all the time?

That's it.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: And, Leigh Ann, quickly, do you see any sense yet from the president-elect's transition team that they have answers for homegrown but foreign-inspired terrorism?

Are we -- or is this something that they're even been talking about before this New Orleans attack?

LEIGH ANN CALDWELL: There's still mostly blaming this attack on people crossing the border, JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Which this was not, LEIGH ANN CALDWELL: Which this was not.

And so, no, there is no indication of that.

They are blaming -- placing all the blame on President Biden, unable to keep the country safe, the borders are open.

And so, no, we have not heard much from the transition.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: It's interesting because you really do set yourself up as president if you promise the level of security that Trump is promising.

DAVID IGNATIUS: So, you know, an interesting problem for -- the FBI depends on cooperation from the Muslim communities in America.

You know, the sheikh in the mosque, who says, you know, so and so has been acting strange recently.

Those people have been cooperating since 9/11.

It's one reason that there's been relatively, you know, limited domestic terrorism.

You can see -- you saw in the vote in Michigan, the anger that is in the Muslim communities in America now.

Gaza has changed the way people feel.

A county official said to me, Gaza put a jolt into the jihadist movement that's going to last for a generation.

That anger is going to persist.

And if you're the FBI trying to get that sheikh in Detroit to tell you who's acting strange, it's going to be much harder now, and that's Trump's problem.

JEFFREY GOLDBERG: Right.

And we're going to see in the coming days and weeks the degree to which the Trump administration wants to focus on, the FBI's alleged sins against Trump versus this whole range of national security and criminal threats.

But that's -- we're going to -- after January 20th, we might have a better sense of it.

Unfortunately, we do need to leave it there for now.