WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump launched a blitz of chooses his cabinetbut he took his time before settling on billionaire investor Scott Bessent as his Treasury secretary candidate.

The Republican not only wanted someone to mock him, but also an official who could execute his own economic vision and look straight out of the central casting. With his education at Yale University and his pedigree trading for Soros Fund Management before founding his own funds, Bessent will be tasked with a delicate balancing act.

Trump expects him to help reset the world trade order, Enabling, guaranteeing trillions of dollars in tax cuts inflation remains under controlmanage a rising national debt while maintaining the confidence of the financial markets.

“Scott will support my policies that will boost U.S. competitiveness and end unfair trade imbalances, and work to create an economy that puts growth at the forefront, especially through our coming global energy dominance,” Trump said in a statement.

But for all the confidence, Trump was cautious in picking the 62-year-old, a sign that he understood what was at stake after winning the presidential election, largely determined by the fact that inflation is set to hit a four-decade peak in 2022 reached. He felt comfortable making quicker decisions on Fox News presents Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense, Florida Senator Marco Rubio as Secretary of State and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. as Secretary of Health and Human Services.

His choice of Bessent went against the views of billionaire Elon Musk, who co-chairs Trump’s advisory panel known as the “Department of Government Efficiency” initiative. Before Trump’s selection, the head of Tesla and SpaceX posted on his social media site X that Bessent would be “a business-as-usual choice.”

The choice also showed the internal tensions of a candidate who won by appealing to working-class voters but who depends on a government staffed by those who, like Trump, live lives of extreme wealth.

Senate Finance Committee Chairman Ron Wyden, D-Ore., was unimpressed by Bessent.

“Donald Trump masquerades as an economic populist, but it wouldn’t be a Trump Treasury Department without a wealthy political donor running the place,” Wyden said in a statement released Friday evening immediately after the announcement. “When it comes to the economy, the Trump administration is of, by and for the ultra-rich.”

Bessent caught Trump’s attention during the campaign with his ideas for 3% growth, a reduced budget deficit equal to 3% of gross domestic product and 3 million additional barrels of oil production per day. Larry Kudlow, the TV host and director of the White House National Economic Council during Trump’s first term, endorsed him. But critics in Trump’s inner circle said Bessent was weak on tariffs.

Another one-off contender, Howard Lutnickthe billionaire CEO of investment firm Cantor Fitzgerald, was more pro-tariffs but less reassuring to some business leaders. Trump has picked him to head the Commerce Department and lead on trade issues.

Trump also looked at other candidates, including former Federal Reserve Governor Kevin Warsh, Apollo Global Management CEO Marc Rowan and Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn.

Trump’s decision on his Treasury chief is partly tied to most Republican voters’ biggest motivation for sending him back to the White House: the state of the U.S. economy and the pressure of high prices.

According to AP VoteCastAn early November survey of about 120,000 voters across the country found that about three in 10 voters wanted total unrest in the way the country is governed. Bessent has been highly critical of President Joe Biden’s economic policies, saying in remarks to the conservative Manhattan Institute that he was “alarmed” by the scale of government spending and deficits and that Biden had embraced a “central planning” mentality that he thought belonged. “the scrap heap of history.”

For his part, Biden chose Janet Yellen, the former Federal Reserve chair, as his Treasury secretary, relying on her credibility as an economist as his administration successfully pushed for $1.9 trillion in pandemic aid in 2021. But the inflation rose as the United States recovered from pandemic shutdowns caused by supply chain challenges, global conflicts and — according to critics of the Biden administration — an excessive amount of pandemic aid.

Administration officials and economists are unsure about what Trump would prioritize. The Republican campaigned on raising tariffs against China and other trading partners. But people in his economic circle personally insist that he is concerned with fair terms, where other countries like China do not disadvantage the United States by subsidizing industries, manipulating currencies and suppressing the wages of their own workers.

The president-elect wants to extend and expand his 2017 tax cuts, many of which expire after 2025. He has also proposed a series of tax cuts, such as no taxes on tips or overtime or Social Security benefits, that would lead to possible deficit increases.

The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, an independent budget watchdog, estimated that Trump could add between $1.7 trillion and $15.6 trillion to projected deficits over a decade, a sign of the uncertainty over his economic plans.

Economist Olivier Blanchard, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, exposed the contradictions of “Trumponomics” this week. Deficit-financed tax cuts and rate increases could be inflationary, yet Trump won the November election largely because of voters’ frustration with inflation. There is also his promise of deportations of illegal immigrants that could reduce employment, although it is not clear what Trump will do once in power.

“The US should be thinking about reducing the budget deficit, completely apart from Trump,” Blanchard said in a webcast. “Trump is probably going to make it worse.”

Trump’s Treasury Secretary could ultimately face the added responsibility of trying to pressure Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to do what Trump wants, as the inflationary pressures outlined by Blanchard likely mean the Fed will slow growth trying to slow down to prevent inflation from overheating, which is likely to upset Trump.

“The risk of conflict between the Trump administration and the Fed is very high,” Blanchard said in a webcast.

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