Staff ‘frustrate’ Trump’s agenda
WASHINGTON: President Donald Trump faces organised opposition from within his own administration who want to ‘‘frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations’’, according to an oped published yesterday in The New York
Times by an anonymous author. The writer, identified only as a senior Trump administration official, said he or she and others in government had vowed to thwart the president’s ‘‘more misguided impulses until he is out of office’’.
‘‘The root of the problem is the president’s amorality,’’ the person wrote. ‘‘Anyone who works with him knows he is not moored to any discernible first principles that guide his decisionmaking.’’
The New York Times said in a note appended to the oped that it knew the author’s identity but ‘‘publishing this essay anonymously is the only way to deliver an important perspective to our readers’’. The writer indicated he or she was a political appointee, not a career civil servant — a class of federal employees that some Trump allies have long derided as a ‘‘deep state’’ set on undermining him.
Trump called the oped ‘‘a disgrace’’ and the writer ‘‘gutless’’ during an event yesterday with sheriffs at the White House.
The official was ‘‘probably here for all the wrong reasons’’, Trump continued, and then declared he would win reelection in 2020.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said in a statement the author of the oped should resign.
‘‘The individual behind this piece has chosen to deceive, rather than support, the duly elected President of the United States,’’ Sanders said. ‘‘He is not putting country first, but putting himself and his ego ahead of the will of the American people. This coward should do the right thing and resign.’’
The writer said ‘‘ours is not the popular ‘resistance’ of the left’’, citing ‘‘bright spots’’ of Trump’s tenure, including deregulation, tax reform and more military spending.
‘‘But these successes have come despite — not because of — the president’s leadership style, which is impetuous, adversarial, petty and ineffective.’’ — Bloomberg News