- Scott Bessent, a billionaire investor, was confirmed by the Senate in a bipartisan 68-29 vote.
- Bessent spent years working for George Soros before founding a hedge fund.
- He backs many of President Trump’s proposals, including deregulation and tariffs.
The Senate confirmed on Monday Scott Bessent, a Wall Street veteran and campaign ally of President Donald Trump, as treasury secretary, one of the highest-profile cabinet posts.
Bessent won confirmation to the key position in a 68-29 vote.
On Saturday, the Senate advanced Bessent’s nomination in a 67-23 vote — with 15 Democrats joining Republicans in backing him — which forecasted the relatively easy confirmation vote.
“Mr. Bessent rose from challenging economic circumstances to a career in the world of finance,” GOP Senate Majority Leader John Thune of South Dakota said on Monday hours before the final vote. “He brings a wealth of private-sector experience in the economy and markets to his new role, as well as a concern for the needs of working Americans.”
Bessent will guide Trump’s second-term economic agenda of reducing regulations, cutting taxes, and instituting tariffs.
During Bessent’s confirmation hearing with the Senate Finance Committee earlier in January, he said Americans face “significant challenges” in an economy that he said hasn’t generated sufficient opportunities for working people.
“We have an affordability crisis, a housing shortage — and for the first time in my lifetime, parents feel as though the American dream is slipping away from their children,” he said.
“We must work to get our fiscal house in order,” he added.
Trump rallied behind Bessent after the 2024 presidential election.
“Scott is widely respected as one of the World’s foremost International Investors and Geopolitical and Economic Strategists,” the president said upon nominating Bessent last November, adding, “we will ensure that no Americans will be left behind in the next and Greatest Economic Boom, and Scott will lead that effort for me, and the Great People of the United States of America.”
Bessent, 62, founded and runs the macro hedge fund Key Square Group and emerged as a key economic advisor to Trump during the 2024 campaign.
Bessent was a top choice for Trump early in the cabinet selection process. He widened his search, however, adding former Federal Reserve Board of Governors member Kevin Warsh and billionaire investor Marc Rowan to the mix after growing frustrated by the “knife fight” jockeying between Bessent and Cantor Fitzgerald chief executive Howard Lutnick over the position, The New York Times reported last year.
Tesla chief executive Elon Musk chimed in during that time, throwing his support behind Lutnick for Treasury secretary.
“My view fwiw is that Bessent is a business-as-usual choice, whereas @howardlutnick will actually enact change,” Musk wrote.
But Trump instead nominated Lutnick for commerce secretary.
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‘One of the most brilliant men on Wall Street’
Bessent’s journey to the top tier of the GOP financial world hasn’t been entirely linear, though — it includes years working for the liberal philanthropist George Soros and hosting a fundraiser for Al Gore, a former Democratic vice president.
The billionaire investor spent his childhood in South Carolina. His father went bankrupt investing in real estate, which Bessent later said led him to get his first summer job when he was 9 years old, The Wall Street Journal reported.
Bessent attended Yale University and broke onto the investing scene after working for Soros’ first partner, James Rogers. He joined Soros Fund Management in 1991.
By 2011, Bessent was Soros’ chief investment officer, and he was instrumental in the fund’s hugely successful bets against the British pound and Japanese yen. In 2015, Bessent broke off to start Key Square. He hasn’t talked to Soros in years, The Wall Street Journal said.
In 2011, Bessent married his husband, John Freeman, a former New York City prosecutor. They primarily live in Charleston, South Carolina, with their two children. They spend their spare time preserving historic mansions and used to own an 1880s-era house in Southampton, New York.
Despite his nomination that would put him at the center of Trumpworld, Bessent has a somewhat checkered political history. He disagreed with much of the work Soros did through his nonprofit and has primarily donated to Republican candidates, though he’s helped Democrats on occasion. In 2000, Bessent held a fundraiser at his home for Gore’s presidential bid.
By 2016, Bessent was inching toward Trump, telling people that they weren’t taking Trump seriously enough as a candidate. After Trump won the general election, Bessent donated $1 million to his inaugural committee. Though Bessent has known Trump’s family for decades, the 2024 race brought him closer to the president — Trump has called Bessent “one of the most brilliant men on Wall Street” and “a nice-looking guy.”
Rather than slam Bessent for his previous connections to Soros, a favorite right-wing punching bag, Trump appears impressed by how successful he was at Soros’ firm.
Bessent donated $3 million to Trump-aligned PACs and Republican committees this election cycle. His support extended beyond his pocketbook, as he frequently conferred with campaign officials on economic plans. Known for his interest in niche economic data, Bessent helped draft speeches and write policy proposals for Trump’s economic agenda. By the end of the race, Bessent was fully woven into Trump’s orbit; he attended the last two rallies and watched from Mar-a-Lago as election results rolled in.
As the new treasury secretary, Bessent faces a mixed economic landscape. While unemployment is low and the economy is growing at a healthy clip, Americans remain frustrated by high prices and what they see as runaway inflation.
Dubbed a “Trump whisperer” by Forbes, Bessent has signaled support for some of Trump’s key proposals.
Among Bessent’s top priorities is shrinking the country’s significant debt, primarily through increasing growth and, in turn, boosting tax revenues. He has also supported Trump’s tariffs proposal, telling CNBC that they should be “layered in gradually” to spread out any inflationary impact.
At one point, Bessent floated the idea of a shadow Federal Reserve chair — under his theory, Trump would nominate a replacement to lead the central bank before Jerome Powell’s term ends in 2026.
However, after facing blowback, Bessent walked back the idea.
Bessent has advised Trump on a “3-3-3 policy,” which the Journal described as “cutting the budget deficit to 3% of gross domestic product by 2028, spurring GDP growth of 3% through deregulation, and producing an additional 3 million barrels of oil or its equivalent a day.”
On November 10, the Journal published an opinion piece by Bessent that praised Trump’s economic vision. The markets, he wrote, were evidently giddy about the president’s return to the White House. Beyond lavishing praise on Trump, he said that the US should slash bank regulations, overhaul the Inflation Reduction Act, and reinvigorate American energy investment.
“Mr. Trump has turned around the economy before, and he is ready to do so again,” Bessent said.
