CNN has begun to release "teaser" quotes from tonight's big interview with Vice President Kamala Harris, in an effort to build interest (and ratings). Among other tidbits, it was announced that Harris committed to appointing at least one Republican to her cabinet. This actually isn't all that unusual; the practice of bringing in a few members of the opposing party so a president can brag about having a "team of rivals" (the phrase originally referred to Abraham Lincoln's cabinet). But it did start me wondering about which department(s) she might be thinking about.

First, the teaser:

Vice President Kamala Harris said Thursday in her interview with CNN that she would appoint a Republican to her Cabinet if elected president this November.

"I have spent my career inviting diversity of opinion," she said, according to the network. "I think it's important to have people at the table when some of the most important decisions are being made that have different views, different experiences."

This isn't all that unusual, as mentioned, and there are actually a lot of positions to choose from. So using Wikipedia's a full list of the 26 cabinet (and "cabinet-rank") officials, let's take a look at which ones might Harris be thinking about.

First, let's set aside the positions that definitely wouldn't be on any such list Harris might make. The first two are pretty obvious: Vice President and White House Chief of Staff. Harris has already made her veep selection and (no surprise) it is a Democrat. The White House chief of staff is perhaps the second-most-powerful job in Washington, since the job includes the duty of being the "gatekeeper" to the Oval Office. Anyone wishing to speak with the president must get the chief of staff to approve the meeting. So it would be highly unlikely that Harris would stick a Republican in this trusted position.

Next, let's also set aside some positions from what used to be the core cabinet -- the heads of all the executive branches (most of whom are given the title: "Secretary of..."). A lot of executive departments are almost inherently political, especially those charged with carrying out administration policies that are high on the president's personal agenda. I would include the following in this list: the Secretaries of State, Treasury, Commerce, Labor, Health and Human Services, Housing and Urban Development, Education, and the Attorney General (who runs the Department of Justice). I don't think Harris would consider a Republican for any of those, mostly for very obvious reasons. Even a moderate Republican couldn't be trusted to implement the Harris agenda in any of these key areas, to put this another way.

I would also cull the list of "cabinet-level" appointments for the same reason. These are all less powerful than actual cabinet secretaries, and include some that are pretty obscure. But at this point, after Trump has so bizarrely changed Republican dogma in general, there are a few jobs that Harris will likely not trust any Republican to handle. I would expect the following jobs to all definitely be filled by a Democrat in a Harris administration: Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, Director of the Office of Management and Budget, Trade Representative, Chair of the Council of Economic Advisors, Administrator of the Small Business Administration, and the Director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy.

This leaves 10 positions -- seven department heads and three cabinet-level positions. This is where things get more interesting, because they cover a large range of relative importance. Will Harris just make a sort of token GOP appointment, to a department that isn't that political or to a Republican who has been a very sane ("not-Trumpian," in other words) advocate for the issue? This has been done before, so presidents can say: "Look at my team of rivals!" without it actually meaning all that much. And there certainly are sane never-Trumper Republicans out there who could fill such jobs. Or will Harris be bold and appoint a Republican to a top-level job dealing with national security? That's a clear possibility as well, and would make a much stronger political statement. So let's take a look at all of these, one by one.

Secretary of the Interior normally would be a possibility, since while the powers of the federal government over land it owns or controls is indeed vast, it is usually not all that politically-charged. However, I would strongly advise an incoming President-Elect Harris to keep Deb Haaland right where she is. Her appointment was a powerful statement by President Joe Biden, since she is the first Native American to ever oversee the department that includes the Bureau of Indian Affairs. And from all accounts, she's been doing a great job -- but she still has more work to do.

Secretary of Agriculture is also a fairly safe job to turn over to a member of the opposition. Find some mild Republican from a farm state who is moderate on policy and well-loved by farmers, and you have successfully checked the "team of rivals" box -- and perhaps even boosted your chances of getting some rural votes down the road in your re-election effort.

Secretary of Transportation falls into the same category as Interior for me, since I could easily see Harris allowing Pete Buttigieg to remain as the Secretary of Transportation. However, I could also see Harris shuffling Buttigieg to another cabinet job (perhaps even one a little more prominent). If that happens then I suppose some moderate Republican could handle Transportation.

Secretary of Energy might normally be a consideration for a cross-party appointment, but Harris would have to find a Republican who supports the transition to green energy, and no such Republican springs immediately to mind. The GOP has doubled down on their insistence that climate change is somehow not real, and few Republicans remain in the party who dare to contradict this "let's all just pretend it isn't happening" idiocy, these days.

Ambassador to the United Nations is a high-profile job, but one without all that much power (since they must hew directly to any foreign policy the president decides upon). Here's an interesting idea -- how about Liz Cheney? She'd probably do a great job at the U.N., but she also might not accept the position, since she'd have to be the voice of a Democratic administration's foreign policy (Cheney is indeed laudable for her fierce opposition to Trump, but she is also very conservative). Another interesting idea might have been Nikki Haley, but on this one I am almost sure she'd decline the offer (since she actually still has a future in the Republican Party, unlike Cheney).

This leaves five jobs which are all probably pretty high on the list for Harris. They are all related, and they have a history of cross-party appointments. Democratic presidents looking to shore up their image on the national security front have previously made such appointments, and Harris would likely be no different. There is a pool of retired generals (and serving generals, for that matter) and national security experts who are nominally Republican -- many of whom have forcefully denounced Donald Trump -- who would be possibilities for any of these positions.

The two cabinet-level jobs left are the Director of National Intelligence and the Director of the Central Intelligence Agency. Harris could appoint a Republican with a long and impressive résumé to either job, and it would definitely make a strong "team of rivals" statement, politically-speaking. There are two other jobs which are even more important: Secretary of Defense and Secretary of Homeland Security. Again, there are plenty of serious-minded Republicans who might be possibilities for the secretary-level jobs, but this would be a lot more risky than just appointing a Republican to run the C.I.A. Either Defense or Homeland Security would be the strongest possible "people of different political views" statement Harris could make.

And then there's the obvious choice. If Harris wants to appoint a Republican to her cabinet who would have an important job -- but not a particularly political one -- as a sort of token "team of rivals" outreach, then she would name a Republican to be Secretary of Veterans Affairs. Obviously, she'd go for a retired member of the military for this pick (the job almost demands it). This would almost certainly come with a backstop, as well. Because even if Harris did pick a Republican to head the V.A., her vice president is going to be heavily involved in her administration's policies for veterans. Tim Walz made the issue of veterans central to his time in Congress, and it's pretty much expected that he's going to be the point man on the issue for Harris. So the actual secretary would be on a very short leash, with the vice president at the other end of it. Even normally this job would be of a limited political nature, and that would be even more true with Walz closely overseeing it.

So those are the choices for Harris as I see them. She could choose to appoint a (moderate, sane) Republican to lead some very minor department or agency, she could go a bit bigger, or she could appoint someone in the realm of national security to shore up her "strong on national defense" credentials. Or she could try to have a little flavor of all of these things at once, which would lead to a Republican heading up the V.A.

-- Chris Weigant

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant