He cares about his grievances and his reelection, and that's it'
He cares about his grievances and his reelection, and that’s it’
Trump spent the first years of his presidency micromanaging policy moves. These days, his monomaniacal focus is on surviving an existential threat.
By GABBY ORR at Politico
11/22/2019 05:14 AM EST
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/11/22/trump-sets-aside-policy-to-save-his-job-072769
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In the months since House Democrats began probing whether he leveraged foreign aid to pressure Ukraine into investigating his political rivals, the president has ditched conventional political wisdom to pursue a uniquely Trumpian defense strategy: campaign more, govern less.
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When Trump has participated in policy discussions, his fixation with impeachment has often overshadowed the intended subject. During a Cabinet meeting on Tuesday, where he was supposed to discuss “updates on [his] Cabinet’s whole-of-government approach to supporting America’s veterans,” according to the White House, the president didn’t mention military veterans once during the public portion of his remarks, but mentioned impeachment four times and responded to a question about Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman, the witness House Democrats had called that day.
“It’s no real mystery why he’s handing things off to other people. He cares about his grievances and his reelection, and that’s it,” said Chris Whipple, an expert on presidential schedules and author of “The Gatekeepers” about past White House chiefs of staff.
In Whipple’s view, Mulvaney’s decision to let Trump be Trump, particularly in the midst of an impeachment inquiry, has only exacerbated the problem. What Trump wants — what Trump has always wanted — is to assume perpetual campaign mode while leaving the grunt work to his deputies.
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