By Sapna 
CNN —
A common thread weaves through many of Donald Trump’s picks for his incoming administration, a quality the president-elect values as highly as loyalty and perhaps even more than conventional qualifications: a flair for television.
He has plucked two Fox News stars from their airwaves – Sean Duffy for Transportation secretary and Pete Hegseth to lead the Pentagon. For the agency overseeing Medicare and Medicaid, Trump has turned to Dr. Mehmet Oz, the celebrity physician known for his health show that aired for 13 seasons. His pick for the Department of Education, meanwhile, is Linda McMahon, who co-founded and built a professional wrestling and entertainment empire alongside her husband.
Trump’s choice for ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, had a six-year run hosting a Fox News show. Tulsi Gabbard, his selection for director of national intelligence, was a contributor on the conservative network after she left Congress and once subbed for its former primetime host Tucker Carlson.
As a former reality TV star, Trump is deeply attuned to the power of the small screen. His selection process has centered on people who can not only articulate his message but also defend him in the kind of high-stakes, combative settings that define modern media.
His transition team, operating in a war-room style setup at Mar-a-Lago, has embraced this focus. On large screens, his advisers play video clips of potential appointees’ media performances, including footage of them defending Trump but also their past criticism of him, underscoring the centrality of media strategy in his decision-making.
The outcome is a made-for-TV Cabinet who he thinks will sell his agenda to Americans and defend the administration against media scrutiny on their networks. Meanwhile, in some departments, the expectation is that deputies and top staff will oversee the day-to-day operations.
In announcing his selections, Trump has elevated the media backgrounds of many of his choices. In promoting Duffy, a four-term Wisconsin congressman-turned-Fox Business host, Trump cited just one example of his credentials to oversee America’s highways, airports and railroads: a road and bridge he helped secure funding for in Minnesota.
But Trump was sure to note that Duffy’s wife, Rachel Campos-Duffy, is “a STAR on Fox News.” The Duffys met as contestants on MTV’s “Road Rules: All Stars,” a spinoff of the cable station’s “Real World” franchise.
Trump called Oz a “world-class communicator” in announcing his selection as the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services administrator and said the doctor’s syndicated television show “taught millions of Americans how to make healthier lifestyle choices.”
Oz’s TV background previously factored into Trump’s endorsement of him for the 2022 Republican Senate nomination in Pennsylvania. Trump remarked at a campaign event that Oz was “on that screen” and “in the bedrooms of all those women telling them the good and bad.”
Even Trump’s selections who have more conventional backgrounds have demonstrated their cable news bonafides.