Trump’s baffling final days in office
Instead of burnishing his legacy, the US President has spent the past week attacking ally and adversary alike
It was among the most consequential weeks of President Donald Trump’s tenure: Across the country, health-care workers began receiving a lifesaving coronavirus vaccine. On Capitol Hill, lawmakers secured a deal on economic relief aimed at averting a deeper recession. And on Saturday, federal regulators authorised a second vaccine.
Yet Trump was largely absent from those events. It was Vice-President Mike Pence who held a call with governors December 14 to hail a “medical miracle” and who received the Pfizer vaccine at week’s end on live television. Legislative leaders were the ones working late into the nights on a stimulus deal.
All the while, Trump was conducting a Twitter-borne assault on Republicans for not helping him overturn the election results, even warning Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, to “get tougher, or you won’t have a Republican Party any more”.
By the weekend, Trump was considering naming a conspiracy theorist as special counsel to investigate voting fraud, for which there is no evidence, asking his advisers about instituting martial law and downplaying a massive hack his own secretary of state attributed to Russia.
Seldom has the leader of an American political party done so much to strike fear into the hearts of his allies but done so little to tackle challenges facing the country during his final days in office. Far from presenting the vaccine breakthroughs from Pfizer and Moderna as testaments to private-sector ingenuity and innovation — once a conservative creed — he was fixated on menacing Republicans who dared to acknowledge Joe Biden as President-elect.
That duality in Trump’s behaviour — acting as a bystander while other leaders answered a crisis and simultaneously raging at Republicans who have inched away from him — also amounts to a preview of Trump’s post-presidency.
He has shown no interest in shaping the debates that lie ahead for Republicans, in tending to the party’s electoral health or in becoming a champion of America’s recovery.
Rather, he seems intent on using his political platform to wage personal vendettas and stoke a shared sense of grievance with the voters he has long cultivated as a fan base.
Senator Mitt Romney said Trump’s
fury blinded him to his last best chance to buff his legacy: Visiting vaccine distribution sites and clinics to highlight the possibility of hope after nine months of national misery.
“The President could have made that the hallmark of his last days in office,” Romney said. “Instead, he’s
seen as promoting conspiracy theories and evidence-free accusations of fraud, which lead to a colour of a sore loser.”
Some Republicans see an upside ahead — especially those who have largely avoided Trump’s wrath.
They believe his departure might
allow Republicans to return to some of the themes that proved effective in down-ballot races last month, while also depriving Democrats of their most dependable boogeyman. In that rosy vision, lawmakers might step gingerly in public to avoid Trump’s anger but otherwise go about their
business, assuming Trump’s focus will never linger on one matter for long, while they elevate the perceived excesses of the left.
Yet if that is the view from the lofty perch of the Senate, there is little evidence at the ground level of Republican politics that Trump and his divisive persona are receding as forces in the party. Indeed, Republicans have recently struggled to articulate what their party stands for other than fealty to Trump.
Trump never espoused a set of plans for his second term, and for the past four years no one else has achieved the stature to detail an affirmative vision for the party. The coronavirus relief negotiations have also exposed serious ideological rifts among Republicans about the role of government in aiding suffering Americans.
The final major legislative acts of Trump’s presidency may well arise not from the White House but from bipartisan coalitions on Capitol Hill that have filled a leadership vacuum in Washington. One such coalition, a loose group of centrists in the House and Senate, forged a framework for striking a deal on a relief package for individuals and businesses.
While Trump’s Treasury secretary, Steven Mnuchin, has participated intermittently in the talks, the final agreement was settled by congressional leadership.
Scott Jennings, a Republican strategist close to McConnell, said Trump was squandering a chance to define the end of his presidency.
“Whether he likes it or not, a bunch of positive stuff could happen as he leaves office,” Jennings said.
“I would want maximum credit. He could sign all these things into law and be part of the process.”
Jennings said Trump’s invisibility during the vaccine rollout was especially baffling. “If it had been me, I would have had Air Force One sitting on the tarmac in Louisville waiting for that plane,” Jennings said, referring to the arrival of the Pfizer medication.
But Trump has always been most formidable when on the attack, against Republicans and Democrats alike. As one of his most prominent critics noted, if Trump continues to play the role of troll-in-chief, he will cast a long shadow over the Republican Party.
“If he wants to have a very active role and be on TV every day and be the voice attacking the Biden Administration, why, he’s going to set the vision of the Republican Party for the next four years and maybe beyond,” Romney said.