Trump crams for looming election fight
Team taps unusual mix to teach policy
WASHINGTON — Far from the packed arenas and showy lights of the campaign trail, the education of Donald Trump has quietly begun.
The unlikely Republican presidential candidate who rose to popularity as a political outsider is now preparing for a general election battle against one of the most experienced policy professionals ever to run for president, presuming Hillary Clinton becomes the Democratic nominee.
So as Trump’s team begins to ready him for the fall debates and drafts a series of speeches, the New York businessman with no elected experience is cramming to get up to speed, consulting experts, asking questions and refining his ideas in anticipation of certain assault by Democrats.
The crash courses in foreign and domestic policy are a rite of passage for virtually every presidential candidate. But they carry even greater importance for Trump, who has mocked the Washington establishment as over-complicating problems and won over many voters with simple ideas that often lack details: build a wall to stop illegal immigration, defeat Islamic State, bring back jobs, make America great again.
The campaign has tapped many of the usual sources to school the candidate. Trump visited with former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, whose counsel on national security is a mainstay for White House hopefuls. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Corker, R-Tenn., chatted with the candidate at Trump Tower. The conservative Heritage Foundation served up names for Trump’s list of potential Supreme Court nominees.
But in addition to the more established committee chairmen, Trump has also assembled an unusual roster of informal advisers — less a Kennedy-esque collection of the best and brightest of Washington’s policy elite than an eclectic group of back-bench members of Congress and early campaign allies.
Among them is Sam Clovis, an Iowa college professor and former conservative talk radio host, who is Trump’s senior policy adviser and emissary to the Washington establishment.
On Capitol Hill, Trump is relying on some relative newcomers. Rep. Kevin Cramer, R-N.D., a climate change skeptic, is advising Trump on energy. Rep. Lou Barletta, R-Pa., the former mayor of Hazleton, Pa., is putting together an immigration paper for the campaign. Those who have met with Trump in recent weeks describe him as an attentive, inquisitive pupil, far from the bombastic showman of the campaign trail. Republican Rep. Chris Collins, an early Trump backer from New York, was taken aback slightly when Trump, during one session, began taking handwritten notes on their conversation.
“The Donald Trump on stage, the entertainer — he is not the Donald Trump in a meeting with six people,” said Collins, who is cochairman of Trump’s “House Leadership Committee,” a rapidly growing caucus of Trump supporters and advisers.
“Is he high-ego? Yes, he is. Does he dominate? No way,” Collins said. “He would rather hear other people speak on their issues and their concerns because he knows what he thinks.”
Washington insiders believe Trump has much catching up to do, however, as he races to make up ground already well-traversed by a Clinton campaign whose policy staff is thought to outnumber his by about 10 to 1.
Early reviews of Trump as a policymaker have been mixed, and there are few signs that he has adjusted his fiery stump speeches to reflect a more refined platform. In fact, in recent months the campaign has repeatedly come under fire for policy shifts on such issues as taxes and the minimum wage.
His March foreign policy speech was received by some as stiff and contradictory, and his energy address was panned as made-toorder for the oil and gas industry.
The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment.
This summer, Trump is expected to roll out additional policy speeches — on taxes, the economy and veterans — that will become a test of his studies.
“This man can focus,” said Alabama Republican Sen. Jeff Sessions, whose top advisers now populate Trump’s campaign staff.
Sessions said Trump is popular precisely because he doesn’t wade into the weeds to sound like a traditional politician. Like another onetime Republican outsider, Ronald Reagan, Trump has used the power of his personality rather than book-smart expertise to capture voters.
“But he doesn’t have to spend, on most things, long hours to understand the nature of NATO or the Soviet Union or China’s economy,” the senator went on. “He understands that intuitively.”