The tone of the entire Trump presidency was captured this week with the simple swipe of a black Sharpie.
An ill-timed, inaccurate but well-intentioned Twitter warning from President Donald Trump at the start of the week extended into a five-day presidential feud by Thursday, transforming a forgettable fact check of his words into an epic storm of attacks as the president repeatedly doubled down and dug in.
Trump’s latest move of promulgating false information, blaming the media for the coverage of it and then subsequently turning that controversy into a seemingly pointless multiday story reminded current and former White House aides, advisers and Trump allies of all the times in business and government he has leaned on the same playbook of never, ever backing down: whether it was the value of his real estate business or the crowd size at his inauguration or his statements about Chinese tariffs.
View the complete September 5 article by Nancy Cook on the Politico website here.