Trump’s attacks on Sessions awakened Republicans in the U.S. Senate. Graham said Sessions “believes in the rule of law.” Other Republicans defended their former colleague and said it would not be easy to get a replacement confirmed by the Senate. Deputy Rod Rosenstein might resign. It could cascade into a Watergate-like situation reminiscent of the 1973 Saturday Night Massacre, when Nixon fired the special prosecutor and the attorney general and his deputy both resigned. Priebus worried that could make the Comey problem look like child’s play.
Trump subjected Sessions to a withering attack in the Oval Office, calling him an “idiot.” Despite his promise to Bannon, Sessions sent a resignation letter to Trump. Priebus talked the president out of accepting it.
Recusing himself made the attorney general a “traitor,” Trump said to Porter. The president made fun of his Southern accent. “This guy is mentally retarded. He’s this dumb Southerner.” Trump even did a little impression of a Southern accent, mimicking how Sessions got all mixed up in his confirmation hearings, denying that he had talked to the Russian ambassador.
“How in the world was I ever persuaded to pick him for my attorney general?” Trump asked Porter. “He couldn’t even be a one-person country lawyer down in Alabama. What business does he have being attorney general?”
Trump would not stop. He told Porter, “If he was going to recuse himself from this, why did he let himself be picked attorney general? That was the ultimate betrayal. How could he have done that?”
Porter had an answer, which he presented as gently as he could. “There are well-established rules and guidelines for when you have to recuse yourself. And he met those. This wasn’t a political decision on his part. This wasn’t something he wanted to do. He consulted the relevant experts at the Department of Justice and was told you meet the criteria, so you have to.”
“Well,” Trump said angrily, “he never should have taken the job. He’s the attorney general. He can make these decisions on his own. He doesn’t have to listen to his staff. If he was that smart of a lawyer and he knew he was going to have to recuse himself, he should’ve told me and I never would’ve picked him. But he’s slow. He probably didn’t even know.”
CHAPTER
27
Priebus called a full senior staff meeting at 8 a.m. on July 20 on immigration. Stephen Miller made a presentation. To some, it amounted to a shopping list of issues—the border wall, border enforcement, catch and release, immigration judges, the diversity lottery, sanctuary cities, Kate’s Law—which would increase penalties for people who attempted to illegally reenter the U.S. after having been deported—and chain migration.
We need to select the winning issues, Miller said, the ones that are bad issues for the Democrats. We need to then convince the Senate to take on tough wedge issue votes such as defunding sanctuary cities.
Kushner strongly disagreed with Miller’s strategy. We need to focus on bipartisan, constructive things, and even find things we could give the Democrats—“a few of our priorities, a couple of theirs.” He wanted “a path forward so we can actually get something done.”
Priebus disagreed with Kushner. “I know the Hill. I know what’s going to be good in terms of these messaging votes.” A real estate developer from New York City like Jared didn’t know much about politics.
Jared protested. “I know how to get things done and be constructive and take people with disagreements and get them in the same place.”
Kushner said that most of the legislative discussions in the White House involved Priebus acolytes from the combative Republican National Committee, or from former senator Sessions’s office or from Pence’s stable of conservatives. None of them had experience negotiating bipartisan agreements or getting deals done. Extremists and people trying to score political points were running the legislative agenda.
* * *
Mattis and Gary Cohn had several quiet conversations about The Big Problem: The president did not understand the importance of allies overseas, the value of diplomacy or the relationship between the military, the economy and intelligence partnerships with foreign governments.
They met for lunch at the Pentagon to develop an action plan.
One cause of the problem was the president’s fervent belief that annual trade deficits of about $500 billion harmed the American economy. He was on a crusade to impose tariffs and quotas despite Cohn’s best efforts to educate him about the benefits of free trade.
How could they convince and, in their frank view, educate the president? Cohn and Mattis realized they were nowhere close to persuading him. The Groundhog Day–like meetings on trade continued and the acrimony only grew.
“Let’s get him over here to the Tank,” Mattis proposed. The Tank is the Pentagon’s secure meeting room for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. It might focus him.
“Great idea,” Cohn said. “Let’s get him out of the White House.” No press; no TVs; no Madeleine Westerhout, Trump’s personal secretary, who worked within shouting distance of the Oval Office. There wouldn’t even be any looking out the window, because there were no windows in the Tank.
Getting Trump out of his natural environment could do the trick. The idea was straight from the corporate playbook—a retreat or off-site meeting. They would get Trump to the Tank with his key national security and economic team to discuss worldwide strategic relations.
Mattis and Cohn agreed. Together they would fight Trump on this. Trade wars or disruptions in the global markets could savage and undermine the precarious stability in the world. The threat could spill over to the military and intelligence community.
Mattis couldn’t understand why the U.S. would want to pick a fight with allies, whether it was NATO, or friends in the Middle East, or Japan—or particularly with South Korea.
* * *
Just before 10 a.m. on July 20, a stifling, cloudless summer Thursday six months into his presidency, Donald Trump crossed the Potomac River to the Pentagon.
The Tank had its appeal. Trump loved the room. Sometimes known as the Gold Room for its carpet and curtains, it is ornate and solemn, essentially a private, high-security retreat reflecting decades of history.
Mattis and Cohn organized the presentations as part history lesson and part geostrategic showdown. It was also a belated effort to address the looming question: How does this administration establish its policy priorities and stick to them?
McMaster did not attend because he had a family obligation.
Maps depicting American commitments around the world—military deployments, troops, nuclear weapons, diplomatic posts, ports, intelligence assets, treaties and even trade deals—filled two large wall screens, telling the story of the United States in the world. Even countries where the U.S. had ports and flyover rights were shown, as were key radar and other surveillance installations.
“The great gift of the greatest generation to us,” Mattis opened, “is the rules-based, international democratic order.” This global architecture brought security, stability and prosperity.
Bannon sat off to the side, a backbencher with a line of sight to the president. He knew this globalist worldview too well. He viewed it as a kind of fetish. His own obsession was still America First.
This is going to be fun, Bannon thought, as Mattis made the case that the organizing principles of the past were still workable and necessary.
There it was—the beating heart of the problem, Bannon thought.
Secretary of State Rex Tillerson followed.
“This is what has kept the peace for 70 years,” the former Texas oilman said.
It was more of the old world order to Bannon: expensive, limitless engagements, promises made and kept.