OpenFeds Analysis
Political Appointees: The 4,000 People Who Actually Run the Government
Out of 2.2 million federal civilian employees, roughly 4,000 are political appointees — chosen by the President to lead agencies, set policy, and direct the bureaucracy. They represent 0.2% of the workforce but control 100% of the direction.
🏛️Types of Political Appointees
Not all political appointees are created equal. The "Plum Book" — published after each presidential election — lists every policy and supporting position appointed by the President. They fall into distinct categories with very different levels of power and accountability.
PAS — Presidential Appointees with Senate Confirmation
~1,200 positionsExamples: Cabinet secretaries, agency heads, ambassadors, federal judges, U.S. Attorneys
The most senior positions. Require Senate confirmation, which can take 6-18 months. These are the roles that make headlines — and the vacancies that create leadership voids.
PA — Presidential Appointees (No Senate Confirmation)
~500 positionsExamples: Senior White House staff, some commission members, special envoys
The President's inner circle and trusted operatives. No Senate vetting means faster placement but less oversight.
Schedule C — Confidential/Policy-Determining
~1,500 positionsExamples: Chiefs of staff, special assistants, policy advisors, press secretaries at agencies
The real machinery of political control. Schedule C appointees serve at agency heads' pleasure and can be hired and fired at will. They're the political layer between Senate-confirmed leaders and career civil servants.
SES — Non-Career Senior Executive Service
~700 positionsExamples: Deputy assistant secretaries, senior policy officials, program directors
Senior executives who serve at the pleasure of agency heads. Limited to 10% of total SES positions per agency. They bridge the gap between political leadership and career management.
The United States has more political appointees than any other developed democracy. The UK has about 100 ministerial appointments. Germany has roughly 500. The US has 4,000. Whether that's democratic accountability or political patronage depends on your priors.
— Brookings Institution, 2024
📊By the Numbers
The number of political appointee positions has grown steadily over the decades, even as reformers periodically call for reduction. Each administration adds positions; few are ever eliminated.
~4,000
Total Appointee Positions
Listed in the Plum Book
~1,200
Require Senate Confirmation
PAS positions
0.2%
Share of Federal Workforce
4,000 of 2.2 million
237
Avg Days to Confirm
Senate-confirmed nominees
| Agency | PAS Positions | Total Appointees | Total Employees |
|---|---|---|---|
| Department of Defense | 53 | 350+ | 750,000+ |
| Department of State | 189 | 280+ | 77,000 |
| Department of Justice | 120+ | 310+ | 115,000 |
| Department of HHS | 24 | 180+ | 90,000 |
| Department of Treasury | 28 | 160+ | 95,000 |
| Department of Homeland Security | 22 | 200+ | 240,000 |
| White House / EOP | 25+ | 400+ | 1,800 |
State Department stands out with 189 PAS positions — mostly ambassadorships. Historically, about 30% of ambassadors are political appointees (often major donors) rather than career Foreign Service officers. The practice of rewarding donors with ambassadorships to cushy European postings is bipartisan and has persisted for over a century.
🚪The Turnover Problem
Political appointees don't stick around. The average tenure for a Senate-confirmed appointee is just 2.5 years — barely enough to learn the job, let alone transform an agency. For Schedule C appointees, it's even shorter at about 18 months.
The Vacancy Problem
- At the 1-year mark: New administrations typically have only 30-40% of PAS positions filled. The rest operate with "acting" officials or career placeholders.
- At the 2-year mark: About 70% filled — but early appointees are already leaving.
- Year 3-4: Turnover accelerates. Many positions are filled 2-3 times in a single term. Average tenure of just 2.5 years means constant churn.
- Senate obstruction: Confirmation takes an average of 237 days. Some nominees wait over a year. Many withdraw before confirmation.
The typical political appointee arrives knowing little about their agency, spends a year learning, implements for a year, and then starts planning their exit. Career staff call it the 'turkey farm' — appointees rotate through while the permanent bureaucracy waits them out.
📌 The "Acting" Loophole
When PAS positions sit vacant, agencies rely on "acting" officials under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act. An acting official can serve for 210 days — but administrations routinely exploit loopholes to extend acting service indefinitely. At any given time, 20-30% of Senate-confirmed positions are filled by acting officials who never faced Senate scrutiny. It's an end-run around the confirmation process that both parties use and neither wants to fix.
💰What Appointees Earn
Political appointee salaries are set by the Executive Schedule (EX) for top officials and vary for lower-level appointees. Compared to what most could earn in the private sector, government pay is a substantial pay cut — which creates its own problems.
| Level | Positions | 2025 Salary |
|---|---|---|
| EX Level I | Cabinet Secretaries | $246,400 |
| EX Level II | Deputy Secretaries, agency heads | $221,900 |
| EX Level III | Under Secretaries, agency heads | $204,000 |
| EX Level IV | Assistant Secretaries, General Counsels | $191,900 |
| EX Level V | Administrators, Commissioners | $179,700 |
| Non-career SES | Deputy Assistant Secretaries | $147K–$212K |
| Schedule C (typical) | Special Assistants, Advisors | $60K–$155K |
A Cabinet secretary earns $246,400 overseeing agencies with budgets exceeding $100 billion and workforces of hundreds of thousands. The CEO of a comparably-sized private organization would earn $10-50 million. The pay gap means appointees are either independently wealthy, ideologically motivated, or — most commonly — planning to cash in on the private sector afterward.
🔄 The Revolving Door
A 2022 study found that 65% of former political appointees at financial regulatory agencies took jobs in the industries they regulated within two years of leaving government. Former DOD appointees routinely join defense contractors. Former HHS appointees join pharmaceutical companies. Government service has become an investment — low pay now, high returns later from the relationships and knowledge gained in office.
⚖️Too Many Chiefs?
The United States appoints more political officials than any peer democracy — by an order of magnitude. Whether that produces better governance is debatable. What's clear is that it produces constant churn, extended vacancies, and a patronage system that serves political parties more than the public.
Questions Worth Asking:
- →Do we need 4,000 political appointees? The UK runs with ~100. Germany with ~500. Most democracies entrust career civil servants with roles we politicize.
- →Does the confirmation process work? When it takes 237 days to confirm a nominee and 30% of positions are vacant at the one-year mark, the system is broken by design.
- →Should Schedule C positions be reduced? The 1,500 Schedule C appointees exist to ensure political loyalty, not expertise. Many are 20-somethings whose primary qualification is campaign work.
- →Is the revolving door acceptable? If government service is primarily a stepping stone to industry riches, the public interest is secondary to private career advancement.
The appointee system reflects a fundamental tension in American governance: the desire for democratic control of the bureaucracy versus the need for competent, stable management of complex institutions. The 438 federal agencies and their 2.2 million employees need leadership. But leadership that turns over every 2.5 years, arrives without expertise, and leaves for K Street isn't leadership — it's tourism.
The career civil service exists precisely because we learned that patronage doesn't work — a lesson from the 1883 Pendleton Act, passed after a disappointed office-seeker assassinated President Garfield. A century and a half later, we're still debating how much political control is too much. The data suggests we passed that threshold a long time ago.