In
The
Hunt
for
Red
October,
we
learn
that
Soviet
submarine
carried
a
“political
officer,”
a
Communist
Party
appointee
whose
job
wasn’t
navigating
or
torpedoing
things,
but
making
sure
everyone
on
board
remained
sufficiently
loyal
to
the
regime.
Not
to
spoil
a
42-year-old
book,
but
the
Red
October
had
—
against
all
odds
in
the
Soviet
Navy
—
been
staffed
by
officers
who
had
slipped
through
the
thought
police
cracks,
rising
through
the
ranks
and
now
wanting
to
defect.
And
so
the
political
officer
“slipped
on
some
tea”
a
few
pages
in.
But
“political
officer”
concept
struck
American
audiences
at
the
time
as
both
absurd
and
a
testament
to
the
USSR’s
ultimate
fragility.
The
government’s
hold
on
power
had
grown
so
flimsy
that
it
willingly
traded
competence
for
lockstep
compliance.
The
political
officer
served
as
a
symbol
of
the
USSR’s
institutional
rot.
Anyway,
in
2026,
the
Trump
administration
is
conducting
1L
job
interviews
with
a
White
House
official
sitting
in
to
vet
the
political
loyalty
of
each
candidate.
An
email
sent
to
Liberty
University
School
of
Law
students
over
the
weekend
lays
out,
in
refreshingly
unvarnished
terms,
what
the
administration’s
hiring
pipeline
actually
looks
like.
And
it’s
exactly
as
bad
as
everyone
suspected:
The
two
most
important
requirements
are
you
MUST
be
aligned
politically
with
President
Trump
and
his
administration
and
you
must
be
willing
to
work
hard.
Don’t
be
scared
off
by
the
transcript
requirement.
GPA
is
not
a
strong
factor.
If
you
meet
those
two
requirements,
you
have
a
shot.
Imagine
a
career
services
office
writing
this
paragraph
and
not
expecting
it
making
a
laughingstock
of
the
law
school?
“GPA
is
not
a
strong
factor”
doesn’t
make
for
a
ringing
endorsement
of
any
law
school’s
mission.
Telling
students
at
a
law
school
ranked
in
the
140s
that
their
GPAs
don’t
matter
if
a
candidate
is
politically
correct
enough
is
just
open
mockery
of
the
curriculum.
But
that’s
the
“anti-DEI
meritocracy”
for
ya.
It’s
also
why
the
Pentagon
doesn’t
want
its
future
lawyers
to
be
the
sort
of
people
capable
of
a
T14
education.
Government
jobs
used
to
be
the
province
of
high
achievement.
Or
nepotism.
Now
it’s
about
rewarding
FedSoc’s
weakest
warriors.
And
nepotism.
And
political
alignment
almost
certainly
trumps
“willing
to
work
hard,”
because
it’s
not
even
clear
what
hard
work
would
look
like
at
this
ironically
named
Department
of
Labor.
Secretary
Lori
Chavez-DeRemer
is
the
subject
of
an
inspector
general
investigation
into
travel
fraud,
alleged
inappropriate
relationships
with
subordinates,
drinking
on
the
job,
and
staff
trips
to
strip
clubs.
Her
chief
of
staff
and
deputy
chief
of
staff
have
both
been
placed
on
leave
during
the
probe,
and
investigators
have
now
expanded
their
examination
to
whether
grants
were
improperly
directed
to
favored
political
operatives.
Oh,
and
her
husband
has
been
banned
from
the
Department
of
Labor’s
headquarters
after
multiple
female
staffers
accused
him
of
sexual
assault.
Those
selected
for
interviews
will
meet
with
a
2025
Liberty
graduate
currently
working
as
a
Policy
Advisor
at
the
Department
of
Labor
as
well
as
“a
representative
of
the
White
House
Liaison
Office.”
According
to
the
email,
this
dynamic
duo
—
a
first-year
graduate
and
some
cross
between
the
Red
October
political
officer
and
ersatz
Jonah
Ryan
—
will
conduct
interviews
that:
will
be
a
combination
of
traditional
interview
questions
and
political
questions
(i.e.,
did
you
vote
for
President
Trump?
Do
you
disagree
with
the
President
on
anything?
What
do
you
think
about
XYZ
executive
order?).
If
you
get
selected
for
an
interview,
Ms.
Smith
or
I
are
happy
to
meet
with
you
to
help
prepare.
I
don’t
know
what’s
more
disturbing:
probing
candidates
about
their
secret
ballot
as
a
condition
of
government
employment
or
that
anyone
would
need
interview
prep
for
this.
Q:
Did
you
vote
for
President
Trump?
A:
No…
oh,
fuck,
can
I
try
that
one
again?
That
might
be
unfair
though.
For
a
school
that
bills
itself
as
“Training
Champions
for
Christ
since
1971”
it
must
take
some
work
to
tune
out
the
hush
money
for
sex
with
a
porn
star
and
the
sexual
assault
adjudication
and
everything
about
the
Epstein
files
when
answering,
“Do
you
disagree
with
the
President
on
anything?”
The
email
closes
with
an
encouragement
that
Liberty
Law
would
love
to
get
“double
digit”
students
into
the
program
this
summer.
That’s
going
to
take
a
level
of
denying
that
would
make
Peter
blush!
Now,
the
email
does
note
that
“this
is
a
political
position
in
which
interns
will
serve
the
Trump
Administration
for
the
duration
of
their
internships,”
which
means
the
administration
will
argue
these
are
political
appointee
positions.
But
this
is,
in
itself,
bogus.
The
Department
of
Labor
doesn’t
need
1L
summer
political
positions.
Or,
maybe
they
do,
if
they’re
just
looking
for
anyone
over
there
able
to
make
it
through
a
day
on
the
job
without
getting
drunk
at
a
strip
club.
But
in
the
normal
course
of
business,
bottom
rung
interns
aren’t
political
roles.
They
might
have
been
expected
to
perform
work
for
political
appointees,
but
they
were
not
expected
to
swear
that
they’re
in
the
bag
with
every
unrelated
presidential
directive.
And
the
email
begins
by
noting
that
the
Department
seeks
“students
(1Ls
&
2Ls)
interested
in
all
kinds
of
areas:
litigation,
appeals,
regulations,
policy,
etc.”
Right
off
the
top,
the
email
acknowledges
that
they’re
looking
at
roles
that
are
traditionally
handled
by
apolitical
career
employees.
But
this
is
consistent
with
the
Trump
OPM
“merit
hiring
plan,”
which
replaces
merit
with
essay
questions
about
advancing
Trump’s
executive
orders
for
positions
GS-5
and
above.
It’s
the
human
resources
blueprint
that
landed
a
22-year-old
Trump
campaign
worker
with
no
national
security
expertise
who
got
promoted
to
lead
terrorism
prevention
at
the
Department
of
Homeland
Security.
Legal
scholars
have
noted,
this
approach
runs
headlong
into
Elrod
v.
Burns,
where
the
Supreme
Court
held
that
only
policymaking
positions
could
be
assessed
based
on
political
loyalty,
and
explicitly
rejected
“efficiency”
and
“loyalty”
as
justifications
strong
enough
to
overcome
First
Amendment
protections
for
government
employees.
But
if
you
redefine
a
1L
summer
job
as
“policymaking,”
you
can
redirect
work
to
give
a
career
boost
to
political
acolytes
from
TTT
programs.
The
LSAT
is
probably
woke
anyway,
amirite?
This
is
the
whole
government
hiring
endgame.
The
conservative
legal
movement
fought
for
years
to
reclassify
career
government
positions
as
at-will
political
employees
through
Schedule
F
and
various
rebrands.
Now
they’re
filling
those
positions
with
ideological
loyalists
—
people
screened
not
for
competence
but
for
their
willingness
to
answer
“did
you
vote
for
President
Trump?”
correctly.
Don’t
be
surprised
when
a
future
Democratic
administration
tries
to
replace
these
hires
and
the
very
same
conservatives
howl
about
“politicization
of
the
civil
service”
and
“illegal
purges.”
It’s
a
heads-I-win-tails-you-lose
proposition
designed
to
populate
the
government
bureaucracy
with
a
Fifth
Column
to
frustrate
future
policy
action.
A
summer
position
isn’t
embedding
itself
like
a
chigger
into
agency
roots,
but
it’s
representative
of
the
staffing
philosophy
transforming
tasks,
no
matter
how
mundane,
into
political
positions.
Someone
needs
to
train
the
future
Red
October
political
officers
of
tomorrow!
And
to
stan
for
this
administration,
a
good
GPA
is
not
only
not
a
strong
factor,
it’s
certainly
a
detriment.
Joe
Patrice is
a
senior
editor
at
Above
the
Law
and
co-host
of
Thinking
Like
A
Lawyer.
Feel
free
to email
any
tips,
questions,
or
comments.
Follow
him
on Twitter or
Bluesky
if
you’re
interested
in
law,
politics,
and
a
healthy
dose
of
college
sports
news.
Joe
also
serves
as
a
Managing
Director
at
RPN
Executive
Search.