Tag: Trump presidency

What Donald Trump Liked About Being President

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He preferred the parts of the job that combined pomp, splendor and a world amenable to his decisions. In other words, he always seemed to genuinely enjoy pardoning turkeys.

In November 2018, after a vote that did not matter enough to him to push conspiracy theories about the outcome, President Trump stood in the Rose Garden and delivered the hard truth.

“This was a fair election,” he said to a bird named Carrots, sidelined at the annual White House turkey pardon after being snubbed in an online contest over which privileged poultry (Peas or Carrots) would star in the ritual. “Unfortunately, Carrots refused to concede and demanded a recount, and we’re still fighting with Carrots.”

The crowd laughed, and Mr. Trump smirked a little. Such hammy pageantry in stately settings, aides say, has long been a part of the job he especially enjoys. He gripped his lectern for the punchline, thumbs behind the presidential seal. Continue reading.

The central feature of Trump’s presidency: False claims and disinformation

Washington Post logoWill future presidents return to trying to tell the truth?

For weeks, as the coronavirus silently spread through the United States, President Trump belittled the threat and repeatedly praised China for “transparency” and the World Health Organization for its handling of the outbreak. But when the death toll mounted and the scope of the public health crisis became too difficult to ignore, Trump reversed course.

“I always felt it was a pandemic long before it was called a pandemic,” he declared — then angrily blamed China for failing to contain the new virus and accused the WHO of helping a coverup. He later withdrew the United States from the WHO.
Likewise, when a distraught widower asked Twitter to remove Trump’s tweets insinuating that the man’s wife had been killed by MSNBC morning host Joe Scarborough, Trump ignored the plea and repeated the slander. Continue reading.

‘Fear is subsuming his presidency’: NYT reporter explains how Trump lost control of the pandemic

AlterNet logoWith more White House staffers getting infected with COVID-19 every day, President Donald Trump is having a hard time convincing Americans that it is safe for them to go back to work.

Appearing on CNN Monday, New York Times reporter Maggie Haberman said that Trump has lost control of his pandemic messaging as even his own staffers are saying they’re scared to come to work.

“Fear is subsuming his presidency,” she said. “And it is fear within the public, fear among the public, fear within his White House. Those are not comments he generally wanted to hear. He wants people to suggest that this is, yes, this is bad, but we’re not afraid. He doesn’t like the optics of wearing a mask.” Continue reading.

However historic, impeachment is but a way station in the struggle over Trump’s presidency

Washington Post logoThe impeachment of a president is a rare moment in the history of the country, and so Wednesday’s vote in the House puts President Trump into the annals of the nation in the most ignominious of ways. The stain of the House action on his biography and legacy, whatever the final resolution in the Senate, is now part of his permanent record.

But in the annals of Trump’s presidency, Wednesday’s deliberations in the House reflected nothing particularly extraordinary. Split sharply along party lines, with only the barest of defections among the Democrats and none among Republicans, the people’s House became the nation in miniature, a people torn over the conduct of a president who has defied political odds and broken the rules of politics — and who is braced for more to come.

The word “history” can be an overused term about matters of the day, tossed around casually and often without good reason. That cannot be said about impeachment, which was included in the Constitution by the framers as an ultimate remedy for the legislative branch to check the power of the president. Trump became only the fourth president to face articles of impeachment and the third to see the House approve those articles. It is a club no president would seek to join. Continue reading

Day 1,000 of the Trump presidency: ‘I think now we have to pray…’

Washington Post logoWednesday was the 1,000th day of Donald Trump’s presidency. He spent it the usual way, by saying unusual things.

“It’s a lot of sand,” Trump said.

He was sitting in the Oval Office next to the president of Italy, and referring to the battleground between the Turkish military and Syrian Kurds.

View the complete October 16 article by Dan Zak on The Washington Post website here.

ABC confronts a furious Trump over false claims of ‘no obstruction’ as he says Constitution lets him ‘do whatever I want’

In a combative interview with ABC’s George Stephanopolous, President Donald Trump brought up special counsel Robert Mueller’s report on links between his campaign and Russia in a bizarre effort to explain why he’s angered by internal polling that shows him trailing Joe Biden in 2020 battleground states.

During the interview, Trump accused former White House counsel Don McGahn of lying under oath about the president’s efforts to fire Mueller, “because he wanted to make himself look like a good lawyer.” Trump then brought up Article II of the Constitution, which he claimed gave him the authority to fire the special counsel.

“Article II allows me to do whatever I want,” Trump insisted.

Pressed on his argument that Article II of the Constitution grants him broad powers to obstruct justice, Trump told Stephanopolous to “read” Article II.

View the complete June 16 article by Elizabeth Preza on the AlterNet website here.

Mueller’s report paints a damning portrait of Trump’s presidency

The Trump presidency long has been an exercise in normalizing extraordinary behavior, with President Trump repeatedly stretching the limits of what is considered appropriate conduct by the nation’s chief executive. The report from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III puts into high relief the degree to which Trump has violated the norms.

The principal focus of the special counsel’s investigation was on questions of criminality. But there is more than the issue of what rises to the level of criminal conspiracy or criminal obstruction when judging a president and his administration. These are questions that go to the heart of what is acceptable or normal or advisable in a democracy. On that basis, the Mueller report provides a damning portrait of the president and those around him for actions taken during the 2016 campaign and while in office.

The 448-page document is replete with evidence of repeated lying by public officials and others (some of whom have been charged for that conduct), of the president urging advisers not to tell the truth, of the president seeking to shut down the investigation, of a Trump campaign hoping to benefit politically from Russian hacking and leaks of information damaging to its opponent, of a White House in chaos and operating under abnormal rules.

View the complete April 18 article by Dan Balz on The Washington Post website here.

Trump two years in: The dealmaker who can’t seem to make a deal

President Trump blasted House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Jan. 20, after she refused to accept an immigration deal he spoke about the previous day. (Reuters)

Donald Trump was elected president partly by assuring the American people that “I alone can fix it.”

But precisely two years into his presidency, the government is not simply broken — it is in crisis, and Trump is grappling with the reality that he cannot fix it alone.

Trump’s management of the partial government shutdown — his first foray in divided government — has exposed as never before his shortcomings as a dealmaker. The president has been adamant about securing $5.7 billion in public money to construct his long-promised border wall, but he has not won over congressional Democrats, who call the wall immoral and have refused to negotiate over border security until the government reopens.

View the complete January 20 article by Philip Rucker and Josh Dawsey on The Washington Post website here.

President non grata: Trump often unwelcome and unwilling to perform basic rituals of the office

The following article by Ashley Parker was posted on the Washington Post website August 28, 2018:

During an Oval Office meeting with Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, President Trump ignored reporters’ questions about Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). (The Washington Post)

Shunned at two funerals and one (royal) wedding so far, President Trump may be well on his way to becoming president non grata.

The latest snub comes in the form of the upcoming funeral for Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), which, before his death, the senator made clear he did not want the sitting president to attend. That the feeling is mutual — Trump nixed issuing a statement that praised McCain as a “hero” — only underscores the myriad ways Trump has rejected the norms of his office and, increasingly, has been rejected in turn.

Less than two years into his first term, Trump has often come to occupy the role of pariah — both unwelcome and unwilling to perform the basic rituals and ceremonies of the presidency, from public displays of mourning to cultural ceremonies.

View the complete article here.

As Republicans “hide in the tall grass,” a darkening shadow engulfs Donald Trump’s presidency

The following article by Eric Lutz was posted on the Mic.com website August 22, 2018:

Donald Trump attends a meeting at his New Jersey golf club in August. Credit: Brendan Smialowski, Getty Images

It was one of the most consequential hours of Donald Trump’s presidency.

On Tuesday afternoon, the president’s former campaign manager Paul Manafort was found guilty on eight bank and tax fraud charges stemming from special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation — verdicts that could send him to prison for the rest of his life.

Simultaneously in New York, Trump’s former longtime personal lawyer and fixer Michael Cohen pleaded guilty to eight charges — and, perhaps most significantly, implicated his former boss in the process.

View the complete article here.