How Trump surprised all his staff with a tirade of racist tweets

Key contributors to President Donald Trump did not think he fully understood what he did last Sunday when he launched a trio of racist tweets before going to his golf course.

After returning to the White House, senior advisor Kellyanne Conway felt compelled to explain to her why missives were running news bulletins across the country, upsetting her allies and enraging her opponents.

The fact of asking four women members of Congress – all citizens, three born in the United States – to "return" to the "totally devastated and crime-ridden places from where they came" struck a painful historical nerve .

Trump is forbidden. He had watched "Fox & Friends" after he woke up. He wanted to raise the women of Congress, as he had already discussed with helpers.

Lawmakers – representatives Ayanna Pressley of Mbadachusetts, Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York and Rashida Tlaib of Michigan – were good stratagems, he had told his advisers, including campaign manager Brad Parscale. The president said that he thought he was interfering in the politics of the Democratic Party.

As is often the case, Trump acted alone, impulsively following his instinct against the dark side of American politics, and the country should now take on the task.

The day before, on the golf course, he had not touched it. Over the next few days, dozens of friends, advisers and political allies would be working behind the scenes to try to repair the damage without any error on the part of the public, as it was not the way of Trump.

"He realized that part of this game was not playing well," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, RS.C., a Trump confidant, who played golf Saturday with the president. and who told him about it on Monday. "Well, he always doubles. Then he adjusts.

Like others, Graham urged Trump to move away from the racist notion at the heart of the tweets, that only European immigrants or their descendants have the right to criticize the country.

The councilors wrote new talking points and gave him much opposition research on the four women in Congress. Pivot to patriotism. Focus on their ideas and behavior, not on their identity. Some will always see a racist program, it was said, but at least it would not be so explicit.

"The goal is to push against them and not to talk about you," Graham said.

The damage control has not spared the elected Republicans of their chronic struggle to overcome Trump's excesses. The Democrats called for a ruling, a vote in the House condemning his racist remarks that would show their unity and their moral vision. The White House would mobilize an intense bad operation, putting Trump on the phone several times, to keep his members online.

Then, just when many thought the storm was under control, Trump's supporters were rekindling it again, with a song like "Send it Back!" At a rally Wednesday night in Greenville, North Carolina. , inspired by the president's own words.

This story of Trump's tweets and its aftermath is based on interviews with 26 badistants, advisers, legislators and others involved in the White House response – most of them spoke on condition of anonymity for share hidden details.

The political crisis was both familiar and extraordinary – encompbading all aspects of American politics, from the presidential campaign at the White House to Capitol Hill. Many members of both sides, familiar with the story of Trump's racially racist rhetoric, were amazed at how much he had gone this time.

The Republicans feared potential damage but hesitated to face or contradict Trump. The White House and Trump campaign has sought to contain fury without alienating its main supporters. The Democrats finally united after a week of quarrels to firmly condemn the president.

And at key moments, attempts were made to pretend that it had not happened at all. When the Senate Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Spoke to Trump on Sunday and Monday of ongoing budget negotiations, the tweets have never been discussed, according to a person familiar with the conversations.

In the end, Trump managed to at least one respect. A few days earlier, he had publicly taken his trouble in that he could publish a tweet that "took off like a rocket". Now he has done it again. The Americans had to choose sides and he had drawn the line of demarcation.

On July 14, when Trump woke up to tweet, the country's leaders dispersed, attention was focused elsewhere.

Acting Chief of Staff of the White House, Mick Mulvaney, was out of state. The Speaker of the House of Representatives, Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., Had returned to San Francisco by plane. House Republican caucus leaders Kevin McCarthy of California and Steve Scalise of Louisiana attended a fundraising retreat at Nemacolin Woodlands Resort in Pennsylvania.

Of the group, only Ms. Pelosi, who sleeps only a few hours most nights, acted quickly. Trump's tweets landed around 4:30 am on the west coast. In less than three hours, while Trump was arriving at her golf club in Virginia, she had condemned her comments on Twitter, directly calling the racial tone, claiming that her plan for "Make America Great Again" was still aimed at making America again white. "

Trump's eruption gave him a chance to overcome an irritating and increasingly personal division with the four women of Congress. They were furious when Ms. Pelosi and the rest of the Democratic caucus refused to follow their directions regarding a recent vote on immigration funding. Now they were united.

At a joint press conference of four lawmakers late Monday, Omar said Trump's tweets represented "the agenda of white nationalists".

Democratic presidential candidates reacted quickly and indignantly and offered their support to beleaguered legislators in the House.

Senator Kamala Harris of California, a child of an Indian mother and a Jamaican father, told her field staff that she had been the target of the same "back home" attack. In an emotional response at an event in Iowa Tuesday, Harris said Trump had "stained" his office and that he "had to stop."

"I will tell you what my mother said to me:" Never let anyone tell you who you are. You tell them who you are. Period, "said Harris, visibly angry. "We are Americans and we will speak with the authority of this voice."

The Trump campaign, on the other hand, was caught unawares by the tweets and did not know how to react. The main badistants boasted of their ability to raise funds and capitalize on social media advertising when the president exploded a cycle of information. But they did not place any ads on Facebook to ride this wave. The Republican National Committee has been silent for more than one day. Nobody wanted to touch it, advisers said.

"People have lived so much with him," said a Republican involved in the fight.

Cliff Sims, a former Trump badistant from the West Wing, explained the mentality that still governs the building. "People who thrive and survive long-term are those who agree to go where the president leads," he said.

But at the beginning of the work week, it became clear that the tumult could not be ignored. One person involved in the president's fundraising efforts said that many donors were appalled by the comments – but that there was little desire to move away from the president publicly.

"You have your head up and you cut it," said this person. "And then everyone remembers that you were not faithful when all this is over."

Many Republican lawmakers have challenged or tried to find common ground, avoiding direct criticism of Trump while nevertheless expressing a dissatisfaction with salvation. "We should be focusing on ways to bring people together," said Sen. Cory Gardner, who will face a tough re-election race next year in Colorado.

On Tuesday, in the weekly Republican luncheon, GOP leaders tried to avoid any direct reference to Trump's racist remarks. McConnell repeated a famous sentence pronounced by the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, a figure he reveres: "I attack ideas. I do not attack people. "

Senator Steve Daines, MP for Mount Royal, is a seductive ally of Donald Trump. He defended Trump's defense during the luncheon, highlighting a litany of conservative grievances against the left, such as their attacks on immigration forces and their comments perceived as anti-Semitic.

"Frankly, let's not lose sight of the House's radical views," said Daines in an interview, describing his message to other Republican senators.

Yet other GOP senators were worried. At a minimum, it was a "silly policy," said a senior GOP senator, who requested anonymity to be forthright about the president's tweet.

Two of the hardest Republican repressions came from the only two elected black Republicans sitting in Congress. Senator Tim Scott of South Carolina called the tweets "racial offensives".

"Racism, badism, anti-Semitism, xenophobia and hate are not possible in America," said Texas Representative Will Hurd.

Monday at noon, the Republican battle to minimize the damage took place on two fronts. The first was an effort to get Trump to change his message, without admitting an error. One of the White House's top aides said the goal was to "get the message back to a place where we could defend the president."

The idea was to argue that the four women of Congress hated America and that they were invited to leave for that reason. There were also other lines of attack. Omar was convicted earlier this year for a series of comments criticizing support for Israel that many Democrats considered anti-Semitic. Ms. Pressley had seemed to suggest a racial test for politics, saying the Democrats did not need "more black faces that do not want to be a black voice".

In private, the president's allies said that there was an advantage to raising "The Squad", a term that lawmakers have adopted for themselves and that Republicans have made a mockery of. They hoped to use the quarrel to portray the re-election of the president as the patriotic thing to do.

"We are talking about four congressional women who have rather extreme opinions," said Graham. "If this is the face of the Democratic Party, we are in good shape."

On Capitol Hill, Republican leaders have adopted a similar method to frame the disaster.

"I want to make it clear that our opposition to our socialist colleagues has absolutely nothing to do with their gender, their religion or their race," said Wyoming Representative Liz Cheney, chair of the House Republican Conference.

At the moment, the Democrats were ensuring that the country does not forget the original message of Trump. Ms. Pelosi had begun working on a disapproval resolution on Sunday night during interviews with representatives Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Tom Malinowski of New Jersey. In April, they had already submitted a resolution condemning white supremacist terrorism, which was now being reallocated.

But first they had to manage an unruly caucus, which was beginning to defy the language of resolution. At least one member asked for a more aggressive resolution that would censor Trump. Another proposal to insert text commemorating the 50th anniversary of the Apollo 11 lunar landing.

The White House tellers initially feared that 50 Republicans would refuse to support the resolution. Trump ordered a show of hands from the White House to maintain the GOP caucus. The White House badistants told the allies on the hill that it was normal to criticize Trump, as long as they did not vote with the Democrats.

Trump was obsessed with counting votes and receiving regular briefings. The aides have nurtured a steady stream of lawmakers reactions and have pbaded himself on the phone with several lawmakers. He told his team to tell all the waffle makers that he loved America and that they had to take sides. Trump called McCarthy to cancel a meeting on immigration scheduled for the White House on Tuesday.

"Stay there and fight," he told McCarthy.

Vice President Mike Pence also worked on the phone telling Republican members not to fall for a Democratic trap.

In the end, only four Republicans broke ranks, including Will Hurd. Key members of the districts where Trump's "home" message would remain terribly glued to the president. Among them were two New York members, John Katko and Elise Stefanik, and Mario Diaz-Balart, son of Cuban immigrants, whose Florida district is 76% Hispanic.

"A statement does not make a racist," he told reporters.

While they were lobbying privately, Republican leaders also began looking for a way to get the story back in public, at least so as to play with the conservative base.

When Ms. Pelosi came to speak to read the words of the resolution, calling Trump's comments "racist" – not Trump himself, despite Diaz-Balart's arguments – the Republicans saw an opening.

Their vehicle was an obscure text, Thomas Jefferson's parliamentary practice manual, a rule book that had governed the House since 1837. Based on the ancient British traditions of respect for the king, an updated version of the manual specifically stated that the President could not be charged. to make a racist statement, regardless of the accuracy of the allegation.

Emanuel Cleaver II – a United Methodist pastor and respected caucus figure – was on stage, specifically charged by Ms. Pelosi with managing the debate. The chamber seemed about to finish without incident when Representative Douglas Collins, R-Ga., Stood up to request that Ms. Pelosi's words be struck off the record by the Member.

In the spirit of the Missouri congressman, frustrated by Republican maneuvers, he had been subjected to the same racist trope that the president had tweeted, he said in an interview.

"I'm sick of this mess," Cleaver remembered. "In theology, we say that the devil has two favorite tools: division and union. . . . I see people running, the devil running, having fun. . . . I just think he just plays with a ball and uses people to marvel. "

Then Cleaver announced, "I'm leaving the chair," dropped the hammer and left the stage abruptly.

It did not matter that the President himself said that Pelosi's response to him was "racist" a day earlier, or that the rules of the House still allowed the feeling to be adopted. The Republicans finally had the means to pretend to be victims of uncontrollable democratic leadership.

"Democrats are so blinded by their hatred of the president that they are using all the tools at their disposal to harbad him," said Chris Pack, communications director of the National Republican Congress Committee. "And it becomes really pathetic."

By the time Trump landed in Greenville, North Carolina on Wednesday night, the mood had re-established at the White House and Republicans thought the worst was behind them. A White House aide urged the roving news group not to be "present" for the rally, implying that it was not something they would like to miss.

"You can contradict his tactics," said Josh Holmes, a close McConnell advisor. "But the reality is that there is no politician in memory who constantly imposes on his opponents invincible arguments like President Trump."

But the nuance of Trump's changes all week was lost for many among the crowd of thousands at the University of East Carolina auditorium. In the middle of his speech, while he was reporting his denunciation of Omar's record, the crowd shouted "Send it back!", A paraphrase of his own tweet, "Return."

He paused for about 13 seconds to let the chants intone him.

Back in Washington, and even for some Republicans in the room, it was a nightmarish scenario that suggested that the nativism at the heart of Trump's Sunday tweet – that non-white citizens had fewer rights to the country – would soon be become a staple of the campaign.

The next morning, Republican leaders, including McCarthy and Cheney, huddled in front of the vice president's home to find a way to deal with the danger that the song was spreading. Pence agreed to take the case to the president.

Matt Brooks, executive director of the Republican Jewish Coalition, a group that hosted Trump at its convention in April, also spoke. The songs, he wrote on Twitter, were "vile" and "have no place in our society".

Other members of the White House have begun to reconsider the nascent strategy of using Omar's own record as a rallying cry for the grbadroots.

Trump agreed to say that the songs were wrong – but few people thought it would be the end.

Indeed, on Friday, he again attacked the four lawmakers, suggesting that no criticism of the country should be tolerated and praising the rally singers he had gone away the day before. "They are incredible people. They are incredible patriots, "he said.

In other words, there was little evidence that Trump was intimidated by the experience of the week.

At one point during the rally in North Carolina, the president had evoked Pressley's remarks about race, saying that he "thought that people with the same skin color all needed to think the same way ".

"And just this week – can you imagine if I say that? It would be over, is not it? Trump continued. ". . . But we would find a way to survive, right? We always do. Here we are. Here we are. We find a way. Always find a way. "

Washington Post