US Politics

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Preezy wrote:Won't all the Democrat bills that pass in the House just go and die in the Senate?

Five days of fury: Inside Trump’s Paris temper, election woes and staff upheaval

As he jetted to Paris last Friday, President Trump received a congratulatory phone call aboard Air Force One. British Prime Minister Theresa May was calling to celebrate the Republican Party’s wins in the midterm elections — never mind that Democrats seized control of the House — but her appeal to the American president’s vanity was met with an ornery outburst.

Trump berated May for Britain not doing enough, in his assessment, to contain Iran. He questioned her over Brexit and complained about the trade deals he sees as unfair with European countries. May has endured Trump’s churlish temper before, but still her aides were shaken by his especially foul mood, according to U.S. and European officials briefed on the conversation.

For Trump, that testy call set the tone for five days of fury — evident in Trump’s splenetic tweets and described in interviews with 14 senior administration officials, outside Trump confidants and foreign diplomats, many of whom spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

“He was frustrated with the trip. And he’s itching to make some changes,” said one senior White House official. “This is a week where things could get really dicey.”

During his 43-hour stay in Paris, Trump brooded over the Florida recounts and sulked over key races being called for Democrats in the midterm elections that he had claimed as a “big victory.” He erupted at his staff over media coverage of his decision to skip a ceremony honoring the military sacrifice of World War I.

The president also was angry and resentful over French President Emmanuel Macron’s public rebuke of rising nationalism, which Trump considered a personal attack. And that was after his difficult meeting with Macron, where officials said little progress was made as Trump again brought up his frustrations over trade and Iran.

“He’s just a bull carrying his own china shop with him when­ever he travels the world,” presidential historian Douglas Brinkley said.

For weeks this fall, an ebullient President Trump traveled relentlessly to hold raise-the-rafters campaign rallies — sometimes three a day — in states where his presence was likely to help Republicans on the ballot.

But his mood apparently has changed as he has taken measure of the electoral backlash that voters delivered Nov. 6. With the certainty that the incoming Democratic House majority will go after his tax returns and investigate his actions, and the likelihood of additional indictments by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, Trump has retreated into a cocoon of bitterness and resentment, according to multiple administration sources.

Behind the scenes, they say, the president has lashed out at several aides, from junior press assistants to senior officials. “He’s furious,” said one administration official. “Most staffers are trying to avoid him.”

The official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, painted a picture of a brooding president “trying to decide who to blame” for Republicans’ election losses, even as he publicly and implausibly continues to claim victory.

White House Chief of Staff John F. Kelly and Kirstjen Nielsen, secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, who are close allies, “seem to be on their way out,” the official said, noting recent leaks on the subject. The official cautioned, however, that personnel decisions are never final until Trump himself tweets out the news — often just after the former reality TV star who’s famous for saying “You’re fired!” has directed Kelly to so inform the individual.

And, according to a source outside the White House who has spoken recently with the president, last week’s Wall Street Journal report confirming Trump’s central role during the 2016 campaign in quietly arranging payoffs for two women alleging affairs with him seemed to put him in an even worse mood.

Publicly, Trump has been increasingly absent in recent days — except on Twitter. He has canceled travel plans and dispatched Cabinet officials and aides to events in his place — including sending Vice President Mike Pence to Asia for the annual summits there in November that past presidents nearly always attended.

President Trump’s 43-hour stay in Paris was fraught. As the Washington Post reports, he “brooded” over midterm recounts in Florida, “sulked” over Democratic victories elsewhere, “erupted” at his staff following the media’s coverage of his decision to skip a ceremony honoring World War I veterans, was “resentful” about Emmanuel Macron’s censure of nationalism, and all the while was “plotting a shake-up” of his own administration.

Julián Castro convened a group of supporters in San Antonio Monday in preparation for a 2020 presidential campaign, sources familiar with the gathering told POLITICO.

Castro and his twin brother, Rep. Joaquin Castro, brought together about 20 of their loyal donors and bundlers in San Antonio to begin to sketch out a national bid, according to one person present and another with direct knowledge of the meeting.

The session lasted several hours and invited the potential donors to ask questions about a potential presidential campaign. The 44-year-old brothers even left the room for a bit to give their allies a chance to talk freely, according to Scott Atlas, a prominent Houston attorney and the finance chair for Democrat Bill White’s 2010 challenge to then-Governor Rick Perry.

“The consensus was that Julián brings a lot to the table. He’s part of a new generation and most of the candidates who are talked about are not,” said Atlas, who declined to name the other participants at the meeting but said it was mostly people from Texas with longstanding ties to the Castro brothers.

The former mayor of San Antonio and secretary for Housing and Urban Development in the final years of the Obama administration has been strongly hinting at a presidential run over the past year. He has made several trips to early primary states, written a memoir, and created and formed the Opportunity First PAC to help build the Democratic bench. During his book tour this fall, Castro told Rolling Stone that he is “likely” to run.

Potentially the only Latino candidate in a sprawling Democratic presidential field, Castro recently assembled a group of Latino leaders in Washington to talk a 2020 campaign, according to a person with knowledge of the meeting. Castro and his brother both have long been considered rising stars on the left, with Julián rising to national prominence when he gave the keynote address at the 2012 Democratic National Convention. Hillary Clinton’s campaign then vetted him for vice president in 2016.

Castro would likely enter the race trailing other better-known candidates such as Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, and Kamala Harris.

But, as Castro concluded in his recent book: “Embrace your own unlikely journey.”

Alvin Flummux wrote:He's Latinx (better get used to hearing that term in place of Latino/Latina)

Preezy wrote:

Alvin Flummux wrote:He's Latinx (better get used to hearing that term in place of Latino/Latina)

Whatisathis? How is that pronounced?

OrangeRKN wrote:His last name is Castro

Good luck

Drumstick wrote:A progressive candidate is entirely the wrong route for the Democrats to go down in terms of their Presidential nomination. How have these clowns failed to realise that?