I said the same thing to my wife earlier today. Trump could have done that way. He should have done it that way.
imo .... he HAD to go through various seemingly useless steps first.
NO ONE can accuse him of favoritism and and all the et cetera's that go along with THAT one.
Look at his own Supreme Court appointees.
I'm pretty sure (now), that was foreseen.
During his campaign in 2016, President Trump told his enemies, ( as well as his friendlies ), He would not let them know his battle strategy.