Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got
Till it’s gone

— Joni Mitchell, Big Yellow Taxi (1970)

Decades of my professional life have been devoted to the topic of expertise and experts — their qualifications, basis of knowledge, standards by which we evaluate them in court, and their proper role in the courtroom and in government. There has always been robust debate and disagreement about the proper role of experts and limits of expertise. Historically, though, there was little disagreement about our need for experts — whether in medicine, science, engineering, business, diplomacy, journalism, and so on. Becoming an expert in the field — whether as a physician or as a master carpenter — has been part of the American dream for generations. But over the last several years, the perception of expertise has shifted from positive to either negative or “just another opinion.” Well, until someone has a heart attack and then wants the most qualified cardiologist. Our trust in expertise has been on the wane, due in part to the internet’s firehose of information and in part to a growing resentment many have about “elites” and experts. While some scholars have presciently recognized the dangerous trend of devaluing expertise, [1] few imagined a world where the entire Republican party — which runs all branches of government — would align itself with such negative views on expertise. But here we are.

We have entered a new realm in which the government seems intent on demonizing expertise, hoiking out experts root and stem. Some actions eliminated entire blocks of government agencies. Other actions include placing unqualified figureheads at the top of critical departments of the government.

Many citizens voted for a massive reduction in government bureaucracy — a potentially worthwhile goal if done properly. Some are indeed cheering the actions of Elon Musk and his Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), who seem intent on taking a chainsaw to large swaths of our government. However, other Americans are now realizing that those “deep state” government workers (formerly known as civil servants) are the folks who make sure their social security checks arrive, who help oversee the studies that create lifesaving medications for cancer, or who provide data about the path of a hurricane. Their expertise is something we all rely on in small ways and big, even if we don’t realize it.

The unfortunate sequelae that will follow from this chain-saw approach to lopping off qualified experts in every facet of government may be catastrophic, given where the cuts are deepest. “The decision to terminate thousands of USAID and State Department foreign assistance grants is unprecedented. With the stroke of a pen, the US government has gutted decades of progress in global health, development, and humanitarian aid.” [2] Global health, as those in the field know, is intimately connected to American health, as has been clear during the Covid pandemic.

Other government entities under the axe include NOAA, which provides reliable weather data for both daily weather and extreme events — in short, the entity that provides the data for the weather channels we all turn to daily. “This loss of talent at NOAA is going to set the agency back years and compromise the integrity of missions that directly support human health and safety, economic prosperity and national security,” said one analyst. “This is not a move toward efficiency; it’s a move toward putting Americans in danger every day.” While NOAA does much more than predict the weather, imagine our lives without sufficient planning for snowstorms, hurricanes, or floods, or the airlines flying planes without accurate storm data. Why would the government do this? The point of this destruction, as stated, is to stop the so-called “climate change alarmism.” But simply not collecting and analyzing the data will not make climate change go away. It will only leave us less prepared for it.

Over 5,000 workers at the Pentagon were fired — their level of expertise irrelevant to the firings — and up to 61,000 to go. Despite the claim that it was done “carefully and smartly” — it seems clear that it was simply “last hired” who were first to go, without any focus on the expertise or concern about why they were hired in the first place.

And so it goes, hacking away at the experts in every area of the government, even those who manage our national park system and make sure those who use the parks are safe.

It is the red wedding of expertise for every government body. [3] Loyalty over competence.

So why is this administration pushing for these firings and appointments? One argument of course is government waste. But as mentioned above, this seems to be a ham-handed way to accomplish that goal. Another reason is that the decision makers are true believers in the anti-elite, anti-expert, internet-fueled anti-expertise movement. Certainly some in Congress belong to this crew.

But given that many Ivy League or elite-university graduates are at the top levels — The President, Vice-President, Mr. Musk, and others in the White House — it is hard not to assume that the death of experts, i.e., voices with knowledge, means there is only one voice of authority. And that voice is the one in the White House. As Trump famously said when he received the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, “[n]obody knows the system better than me, which is why I alone can fix it.” Back then, he promised to hire “the best people.” But he makes no such claim now.

President Trump’s voice is now increasingly connected to Christian nationalism [4] and the argument that he is ruling by divine mandate. In his inaugural address for his second administration, President Trump claimed “[j]ust a few months ago, . . . , an assassin’s bullet ripped through my ear. But I felt then and believe even more so now that my life was saved for a reason. I was saved by God to make America great again.” In his March speech before the joint session of Congress, he reiterated this claim, word for word. Eliminate the competing voices of authority in every area of specialty means leaves us with one voice. And that voice now claims the authority of God. And that authority has clearly decided he prefers loyalty over competence.

The appointment of unqualified individuals to the Cabinet positions is without compare in our lifetimes. We’ve entered a wholly new universe in which Senators knowingly voted for candidates who engage in bizarre conspiracy theories about the departments they will be running. Robert Kennedy Jr. the most obvious example of one unqualified for the role as Secretary of Health and Human Services. Indeed, he expresses views so antithetical to public health as to be laughable, were it not all happening in real time.

The role of HHS Secretary is to oversee public health emergencies, health care policy, drug and device regulation, the FDA, the CDC, and the NIH. The HHS budget oversees Medicare, Medicaid, and the Affordable Care Act — subjects in which Kennedy has no expertise.

Since the inauguration, the US has pulled out of World Health Organization, cancelled the international flu vaccine meeting to plan for next year, and stopped many NIH grants under review. The US is now in the midst of an unprecedented Measles outbreak. Vaccines had essentially eliminated Measles in the US by 2000, but due to anti-vaccine messaging (like that of Kennedy), fewer children have been getting inoculations, leading to more cases. In Gaines County, Texas, where the outbreak occurred, the exemption rate for vaccines was nearly 18%. After the first child died, Kennedy said that none of this was unusual; “we have measles outbreaks every year.” However, the last time a child died was 2003. This is not usual but truly, how would Kennedy know?

Among cabinet appointees, he is one of many who are not qualified. For example — Linda McMahon, former wrestling performer-turned-secretary of the Small Business Administration (SBA) during the first Trump administration, was appointed Secretary of Education. Trump claimed she had a “deep understanding” of education. Where she developed that deep understanding is unclear, as she lasted one year on a state board of education before resigning. She has no degree in education nor was ever affiliated with the education system. McMahon has argued that Pell Grants for college are “outdated,” says she wants the federal government out of the education business, and has said that the US is facing a labor shortage and “a multi-year degree program is not necessary for many Americans to obtain high-paying, fulfilling careers,” arguing in favor of job-training. Secretary McMahon stated in her confirmation hearing that she agreed with the President’s plan to abolish the department. The destruction of the DOE is consistent with the elimination of experts. No more eating fruit from the tree of knowledge — particularly for those who cannot afford an education without government help.

The loss of expertise at all levels will affect us in ways large and small and is a brain-drain that will not easily be repaired in our times. Replacing experts with loyal soldiers will not make America better and it will certainly not make us great.

Notes

[1] For two excellent books on the campaign against expertise, see Tom Nichols, The Death of Expertise; The Campaign Against Established Knowledge and Why it Matters (Oxford, 2024, second edition, 2017, first edition); and Gil Eyal, The Crisis of Expertise (polity press, 2020).

[2] Global Health Council, an alliance of nonprofit organizations and companies that receive US foreign aid funding, in a statement.

[3] For those who did not watch Game of Thrones, the “red wedding” was a scene in which one ruling family in an empire invited other ruling families within the empire to a wedding and then massacred them.

[4] Russell Vought, the director of the Office of Budget Management and the architect of Project 2025 “The storm clouds are upon us. . . . We need to trust that the duty is ours and the results are God’s.”

Jane Campbell Moriarty, M.A. (healthcare ethics), J.D. Moriarty is a law professor who writes about scientific evidence, public health, and legal ethics. All opinions expressed here are hers alone.