Trump Seems To Think He Went Overboard On That Whole Chaotic Thing

Chris Whipple, author of The Gatekeepers: How the White House Chiefs of Staff Define Every Presidency, spoke with Chris Riback about how Donald Trump’s White House compares to others. Short version: "the most dysfunctional White House in history." Maybe Señor Trumpanzee listened to it and took it to heart because Gabe Sherman reported Friday in Vanity Fair that Trump wants a clean reset and get a whole new White House staff, one that is 100% MAGA. He's going to fire everyone who isn't onboard with his crackpot agenda, including Ivanka and Kushner-in-law. He's tired of being reined in. Sherman reported that he told a friend that he's "doing great, but I’m getting all these bad headlines" and that he's "frustrated by all these people telling him what to do." Trump is feeling liberated to act on his impulses. "Trump is in command. He’s been in the job more than a year now. He knows how the levers of power work. He doesn’t give a fuck," is what Sherman says a Trump-whisperer told him. His "decision to circumvent the policy process and impose tariffs on imported steel and aluminum reflects his emboldened desire to follow his impulses and defy his advisers. 'It was like a fuck-you to Kelly,' a Trump friend said. 'Trump is red-hot about Kelly trying to control him.'" It's all about to get much worse, much, much worse.

According to five Republicans close to the White House, Trump has diagnosed the problem as having the wrong team around him and is looking to replace his senior staff in the coming weeks. “Trump is going for a clean reset, but he needs to do it in a way that’s systemic so it doesn’t look like it’s chaos,” one Republican said.

Sources said that the first officials to go will be Chief of Staff John Kelly and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, both of whom Trump has clashed with for months. On Tuesday, Trump met with John Bolton in the Oval Office. When he plans to visit Mar-a-Lago next weekend, Trump is expected to interview more candidates for both positions, according to two sources. “He’s going for a clean slate,” one source said. Cohn had been lobbying to replace Kelly as chief, two sources said, and quit when he didn’t get the job. “Trump laughed at Gary when he brought it up,” one outside adviser to the White House said.

Next on the departure list are Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump. Trump remains fiercely loyal to his family, but various distractions have eroded their efficacy within the administration. Both have been sidelined without top-secret security clearances by Kelly, and sources expect them to be leaving at some point in the near future. One scenario being discussed is that Kushner would return to New York to oversee Trump’s 2020 re-election campaign with his ally Brad Parscale, who was hand-selected by the Trump family. One Trump friend referred to it as a “soft landing.” Ivanka will likely stay on longer, perhaps through the summer, before decamping home to New York to enroll the children in a Manhattan private school. Both are presumed to remain in close contact with Trump, who often places significant value on the opinions expressed outside his administration, anyway.

Sources cautioned that the couple plans to hang on as long as possible, so as not to make it appear that Kelly railroaded them out of the West Wing. They continue to be furious at the chief. “Why do you have to embarrass Jared like that?” Ivanka complained to a friend recently. Kushner is doing everything he can to appear engaged despite his lack of a security clearance. “He is looking at everything he can do that doesn’t require a clearance,” a former White House official said. Another source added, “The White House is trying to fluff him up again.

People who have spoken with Trump said his reset is being driven in part by the looming midterms, and he’s been fielding advice from Corey Lewandowski and Dave Bossie. They’ve counseled him to return to his 2016 campaign message. Another source said Trump has felt newfound validation after a CPAC straw poll last month showed him with a 93 percent approval rating. “He felt the crowd desiring more,” a Republican close to the White House said. “He knows there’s going to be a battle ahead.”

Yeah, call him Señor Toxic. Trump won this district in 2016 by 20 points (TWENTY)! Below is the most recent nonpartisan poll for the special election on Tuesday. Both candidates are equally awful and the top (only?) issue in the campaign is Trump and his policies and personality.