The Trump Administration may claim that it’s eliminating inefficiency and unqualified government employees. However, one man who has received a major job in the administration appears to have little qualifications aside from being friends with the president’s son.
According to Vanity Fair, the new acting deputy commissioner for human foods at the Food and Drug Administration is a man named Kyle Diamantas. An attorney whose primary background is not in food safety — although he has represented clients in the food industry — Diamantas’ most important qualification appears to be that he is “a friend and hunting buddy of Donald Trump Jr.“
Scoop: Kyle Diamante, 37, new @US_FDA Acting Dep. Commissioner of Human Foods, is a Fla. lawyer w/ a slim resume + no prior gov’t experience. Turns out, he’s @DonaldJTrumpJr‘s hunting buddy, @VanityFair is reporting exclusively: https://t.co/fppL9WJEot /1 pic.twitter.com/NKx2Oiq1iI
— Katherine Eban (@KatherineEban) February 24, 2025
The position does not require confirmation. Trump has nominated Marty Makary to serve as FDA commissioner. A surgeon, Makary was an opponent of vaccine mandates during the height of the COVID pandemic.
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The former head of the food division at the FDA, Jim Jones, announced his resignation last week, declaring that it would be “fruitless” to continue in the role in light of the massive recent job cuts.
Per the story, which cited a law firm bio, the lawyer has spent much of his legal career advising “food, cosmetic, dietary supplement, drug, and other life sciences and consumer goods clients on a wide range of regulatory, compliance, and enforcement matters.”
A photo has surfaced of the two men hunting together in 2021, showing them holding up what the magazine describes as “dead Osceola wild turkeys and grinning.”
https://t.co/xRusGYF9KC Don Jr. With his good friend Kyle Diamantas! Kyle’s first Osceola! #nomadoutdoor #nwtf #nra #mossyoak #benelli_usa #tetra @DonaldJTrumpJr pic.twitter.com/euJoGQDNfx
— mike tussey (@osceolaoutdoors) March 24, 2021
When Vanity Fair reached out to Arthur Schwartz, a spokesman for the president’s son, he stated, “Are you really asking whether a member of the transition team played a role in the transition? You people are a bunch of [r-slur].”
The magazine also pointed out that the new HHS Secretary, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., has vowed to purge “what he claims are compromised regulators, more beholden to industry interests than to their stated missions,” while Diamantas did legal work representing the food industry.
Photo courtesy of the Political Tribune media library.
