No experience needed: Trump taps Carson for HUD secretary

NEW YORK (AP) — Donald Trump chose retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson on Monday to be secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, raising fresh concerns about the lack of experience some of Trump's Cabinet picks have with agencies they're now being chosen to lead.

[...] retired Gen. James Mattis, a widely praised battlefield commander, spent decades in the Marines but now is tapped to run the nation's largest government agency, the Defense Department, with 740,000 civilian employees in addition to 1.3 million service personnel.

HUD also promotes home ownership with the Federal Housing Administration underwriting about 1 in 6 mortgages issued in the U.S. The agency is charged with enforcing federal fair housing laws, too.

Carson has been coy about joining the new administration, saying shortly after Trump's election victory that he wasn't certain he'd fit into a Cabinet-style role in a job like Health and Human Services secretary.

"People can learn the policies and the talking points, but the transition will be dictated by their own managerial style," said Chang, who remembered incoming Secretary of State Colin Powell walking the halls to meet with career officers and not just his executive staff.

Trump's selections also highlight a frequent divide between the two major political parties in their strategies in filling out a Cabinet:

In early 2009, Republicans criticized incoming President Barack Obama for not making enough selections with private sector experience.

Over the weekend, two people close to the transition told The Associated Press that Trump is moving away from two of the four: former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential nominee.