Mr. President, Priebus said, we know you are going to come down soon but we wanted to give you a heads-up on a decision memo on transgender people in the military.
The four options: One was to retain the Obama policy that allowed transgender people to serve openly, two was to issue a directive to Secretary Mattis giving him leeway, three was a presidential order to end the program but come up with a plan for those transgender people already in the military, and four was to ban all transgender people from military service. The likelihood of being sued increased as they got to number four, Priebus explained. “When you come down, we want to walk you through on paper,” Priebus said.
“I’ll be down at 10,” the president said. “Why don’t you guys come and see me then? We’ll figure it out.”
Priebus thought they had found an orderly process on at least one controversial matter.
At 8:55 a.m., his phone signaled him that a presidential tweet had been sent. “After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow . . .”
In two more tweets following at 9:04 and 9:08 a.m., Trump finished his announcement: “. . . Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you.”
“What’d you think of my tweet?” the president asked Priebus later.
“I think it would’ve been better if we had a decision memo, looped Mattis in,” Priebus answered.
Mattis was not happy with Trump’s decision to tweet the news and the effect it would have on serving and deployed transgender troops. On vacation in the Pacific Northwest, he was caught by surprise.
The confusion played out in the press, with a Pentagon spokesman calling the Trump tweet “new guidance.”
Trump spokesperson Sarah Huckabee Sanders said, “The president’s national security team” was consulted and that Trump had made the decision the day before and “informed” Mattis immediately after. Several White House officials told the press that Mattis was consulted before the announcement and knew Trump was considering it.
Bannon knew that the generals, though hard-line on defense, had become progressive on social issues. “The Marine Corps is a progressive institution,” Bannon said. “Dunford, Kelly and Mattis are the three biggest. They’re more progressive than Gary Cohn and Kushner.”
The commandant of the Coast Guard said publicly, “I will not break the faith” with transgender members of his service.
Dunford sent a letter to the service chiefs: “There will be no modifications to the current policy until the President’s direction has been received by the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary has issued implementation guidance.” In short, tweets were not orders. “In the meantime, we will continue to treat all of our personnel with respect . . . we will all remain focused on accomplishing our assigned missions.”
Mattis aide Sally Donnelly called Bannon. “Hey, we’ve got a problem with the boss,” she said. “We can’t stand by this transgender decision. This is just not right. They are American citizens.”
“These guys are coming over to get full surgery,” Bannon said. “We’re supposed to pay for that?”
Mattis was going to try to reverse the decision, she said.
“You’ve got to take one for the team,” Bannon told her. Mattis would have to get in line.
The White House later issued formal guidance to the Pentagon. Mattis announced he would study the issue. In the meantime, transgender troops continued to serve. Lawsuits were filed, and four federal courts entered preliminary injunctions against the ban. On January 1, 2018, the Pentagon began accepting transgender recruits as required by the courts.
CHAPTER
25
On June 2, Marc Kasowitz, Trump’s longtime attorney, walked into the Oval Office. Trump was signing papers that Porter had brought him, carefully presenting each for signature and offering a few comments.
Wow, Kasowitz said. Your man Porter here is quite a hire. Harvard, Harvard Law School, Rhodes Scholar.
Trump had been dealing with Porter since he’d taken office.
“You’ve got a better résumé than Neil Gorsuch!” the president said. Gorsuch’s nomination and confirmation to the Supreme Court was probably Trump’s most notable accomplishment as president. He mentioned Gorsuch whenever he recounted his administration’s achievements. “Who do you work for?” Trump asked after Kasowitz had left.
“I guess I work for . . .” Porter began.
“Who do you report to?”
“I guess I report to Reince, but I really work for you.”
“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Trump said. He knew about the formal organization charts, and hated them. “Forget about Reince. He’s like a little rat. He just scurries around. You don’t even have to pay any attention to him. Just come talk to me. You don’t have to go through him.”
That day changed the Trump-Porter relationship. His staff secretary was practically a Neil Gorsuch clone.
Porter was shocked that Trump was so vicious about his chief of staff.
* * *
Priebus, Porter and others continued to try to persuade Trump to curtail his use of Twitter.
“This is my megaphone,” Trump replied. “This is the way that I speak directly to the people without any filter. Cut through the noise. Cut through the fake news. That’s the only way I have to communicate. I have tens of millions of followers. This is bigger than cable news. I go out and give a speech and it’s covered by CNN and nobody’s watching, nobody cares. I tweet something and it’s my megaphone to the world.”
“Going bananas” was the term Priebus used to describe Trump early on the morning of Thursday, June 29. Trump had aimed a pair of pre-6:00 a.m. tweets at the MSNBC cable show Morning Joe, starring former Republican congressman Joe Scarborough and his partner, Mika Brzezinski.
The two had been friendly and even supportive of Trump early in the presidential campaign, and Trump had called in to the show regularly during the primaries, but they were now regular detractors. Trump’s tweet said, “How come low I.Q. Crazy Mika along with Psycho Joe came to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year’s Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a face-lift.”
About 10:15 a.m. Trump was in the Oval Office reading the newspaper when Priebus walked in.
“I know what you are going to say,” Trump said as Priebus crossed the threshold. “It’s not presidential. And guess what? I know it. But I had to do it anyway.”
Priebus knew not to ask why.
Hope Hicks, now the director of strategic communication, was horrified. She tried to take the lead on the tweets about Mika.
“It’s not politically helpful,” Hicks told the president. “You can’t just be a loose cannon on Twitter. You’re getting killed by a lot of this stuff. You’re shooting yourself in the foot. You’re making big mistakes.”
Following the Mika tweet, a measurable storm of protest came from key Republicans who were necessary votes on repealing and replacing Obamacare and other legislation. Senator Susan Collins of Maine said, “This just has to stop.” Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska: “Stop it!” Already on shaky ground with women, Trump’s personal attack encouraged comparisons to his past history.
As an extreme measure, Hicks, Porter, Gary Cohn and White House social media director Dan Scavino proposed they set up a committee. They would draft some tweets that they believed Trump would like. If the president had an idea for a tweet, he could write it down or get one of them in and they would vet it. Was it factually accurate? Was it spelled correctly? Did it make sense? Did it serve his needs?
“I guess you’re right,” Trump said several times. “We could do that.” But then he ignored most reviews or vetting and did what he wanted.