begin quote from:
WASHINGTON
― In the hours after he sacked the very man investigating his ties to
Russia, sparked a media firestorm, and engendered political blowback
fierce …
POLITICS
Trump Once Again Invites Questions And Doubts About His Stability
“None of this is anywhere close to normal.”
X
WASHINGTON
― In the hours after he sacked the very man investigating his ties to
Russia, sparked a media firestorm, and engendered political blowback
fierce enough to imperil his legislative agenda, President Donald Trump
spent his time firing off 140-character insults at U.S. senators.
For
Trump’s critics, the sequence of events ― from the firing to the
tweeting ― was both dizzying and further cause to question the mental
state of the man in the Oval Office. The decision to dismiss FBI
Director James Comey sparked concerns about the president’s flexing of
executive power. The subsequent decision to dub Senate Minority Leader
Chuck Schumer “Cryin’” Chuck and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) a
joke who “cried like a baby” after exaggerating his wartime service read
like the ravings of a man becoming unhinged.
“None
of this is anywhere close to normal,” Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) told
HuffPost. “The danger is that every day this exhausting dysfunction
continues, it feels less exceptional. This country has never been
through this and it is getting more bizarre and more troubling every
single day. At some point Republicans have to pull the plug and say,
‘Enough is enough, this is a real threat to democratic norms.’”
None of this is anywhere close to normal. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.)
Since
Trump first announced his run for president, Americans have debated
whether his words and actions reflect a man operating on unbridled
impulsiveness or someone strategically obfuscating and distracting. The
Comey firing has reignited that debate. That it came as Trump was set to
meet with Russia’s foreign minister and U.S. ambassador; that Attorney General Jeff Sessions, ostensibly recused from the Russia investigation, signed off on
the firing; that Comey wasn’t warned in advance of the announcement,
illustrates just how audacious Trump’s approach has been. Whether it was
by design is less clear.
“At
first glance it looks crazy,” said Laurence Tribe, the Carl M. Loeb
University Professor and professor of constitutional law at
Harvard. What he worries about, he said, is if it’s “crazy like a fox.”
“He
is yet again changing the headline from what was disadvantageous for
him; namely what a pistol [former AG] Sally Yates was” in testifying
about Trump’s former top national security adviser’s ties to Russia,
Tribe said. “That was the headline, and suddenly the headline is all
about, should we have an independent counsel [to do the Russia
investigation] and commission and what kind of counsel. It is a cloud of
stuff.”
But
beyond the the firing itself, and Trump’s irascible tweeting at his
critics, the episode called into question the administration’s basic
competence.
When
news of Comey’s firing first broke, White House staffers appeared
utterly caught off-guard. White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer
avoided reporters, only agreeing to talk to them outdoors in the dark, with cameras turned off.
He referred most questions to the Justice Department, where officials
declined to comment on the unfolding fiasco. The White House press
office’s messaging strategy on Tuesday night amounted to emailing
reporters a list of four news stories that
were critical of Comey. Three were written before Trump took office. By
Wednesday afternoon, reports coming from the administration had the
White House paralyzed in “total and complete chaos,” with suggestions that Spicer hurt his standing in the job.
“Don’t
underestimate the role incompetence and volatility/instability play in
all this,” Peter Wehner, former deputy assistant to the president under
George W. Bush and director of the White House Office of Strategic
Initiatives, put it in an email to HuffPost.
Trump
made no public appearance Tuesday night to explain his decision. Spicer
said in a statement that Trump was acting based on the recommendations
of Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and Attorney General Jeff
Sessions. Rosenstein’s three-page letter contained a damning list of
Comey’s wrongdoing in relation to the Hillary Clinton investigation, but
did not explicitly call for him to be fired. Sessions wrote a shorter
letter, recommending a “fresh start” at the FBI, based on reasons laid
out by Rosenstein.
The
White House press shop struggled to keep straight even the most basic
elements of its narrative around Comey’s firing. Spicer told reporters that Trump first learned of DOJ’s concerns about Comey from the Rosenstein letter on Tuesday. Deputy White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Trump received an “oral recommendation” from a top DOJ official Monday and asked to see it in writing. On Wednesday evening, a White House official clarified that Trump met with Rosenstein and Sessions Monday and discussed reasons why Comey should removed.
But as Trump was berating senators on Twitter, the White House’s explanation was already falling apart.
On
Wednesday morning, Kellyanne Conway, a top adviser to Trump, appeared
on television, carrying a printout of the three-page letter from
Rosenstein criticizing Comey’s handling of the Clinton probe. But soon
thereafter she reversed herself: “This has nothing to do with the
campaign from six months ago.”
Later
in the day, Trump criticized Comey for “not doing a good job” despite
having praised him publicly during the later part of the election and
early in his administration. By the afternoon, Sanders was putting the
onus on DOJ officials, who, she said, had come to the White House with
concerns about Comey.
“The rank and file of the FBI had lost confidence in their director,” Sanders said.
For
the Laurence Tribes of the world, the lingering concern is that this is
madness with a purpose, that Trump and his team may be concocting
illogical post-facto rationales for the firing of Comey, but so long as
it distracts from or impedes a thorough Russia investigation, they are
fine with the outcome.
Others
aren’t quite as sure there is a strategy underpinning what Trump is
doing. Trump may be trying to avoid that investigation, they reason, but
his impulsiveness will catch up with him eventually and spell doom for
his administration.
“They
are riding a tiger right now,” said Brian Fallon, the Clinton
campaign’s press secretary. “James Comey is not going to stay quiet very
long. He has not been wronged by Trump. He has been humiliated by
Trump. He is going to find a way to embarrass them. ... When the moment
is right he will find the opportunity to get his side of the story out
there.”
This story has been updated to include comments the White House made Wednesday night.
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