I am very skeptical @RepCummings told Trump he would be one of the greatest presidents ever. https://t.co/G58PAvBnqf pic.twitter.com/UOdpfZA0Ox
— Kevin Robillard (@PoliticoKevin) April 6, 2017
[Laughter]
The best explanation for this highly implausible Elijah Cummings quote is that Trump has mixed up his black people. https://t.co/5kzyOPgowd
— Jamelle Bouie (@jbouie) April 6, 2017
Here is the interview from which that quote came:
Trump on Syria & Russia to @maggienyt @glennthrush: “I think it’s a very sad day for Russia because they’re aligned" https://t.co/RhPL489o00
— Jennifer Epstein (@jeneps) April 5, 2017
The Haberman/Thrush interview is getting all kinds of attention, because it is just full of what might be called “nuggets” (aka “lies”). This no doubt pleases them, since H&T seem to have decided to play court jesters in Lord Smallgloves’ four-year promotional project, but what seems IMO to be under-discussed is the degree to which the people around Donald Trump just don’t trust him to be left unsupervised. The NYTimes “partial transcript” reads like a reboot of the Marx Brothers’ Night At the Opera stateroom scene…
At least six White House aides were sitting in: Gary D. Cohn, President Trump’s lead economic adviser and a former president of Goldman Sachs; Reed Cordish, an assistant to the president; Sean Spicer, the press secretary; Hope Hicks, a long-serving Trump aide; and eventually Vice President Mike Pence and the chief of staff, Reince Priebus…
Also — and not for the first time — if your grandpa couldn’t stay on topic any better than this, you’d be planning to hide his car keys and checkbook before something terrible happened:
GLENN THRUSH, White House correspondent: Why do you think Democrats feel the need to oppose Gorsuch? What do you think the politics is?
TRUMP: Well, I think that some of it had to do with the election. They thought they were going to win. You know, winning the Electoral College is, for a Republican, is close to impossible and I won it quite easily. And I think they are still recovering from that, but they are recovering now. I think the Susan Rice thing is a massive story. I think it’s a massive, massive story. All over the world, I mean other than The New York Times.
HABERMAN: We’ve written about it twice.
TRUMP: Huh?
HABERMAN: We’ve written about it twice.
TRUMP: Yeah, it’s a bigger story than you know. I think —
HABERMAN: You mean there’s more information that we’re not aware of?
TRUMP: I think that it’s going to be the biggest story…
******
HOPE HICKS, White House director of strategic communications: Can we get to infrastructure? [Laughter.] Because I know we are sensitive about time.HABERMAN: I understand. I just want to ask one last follow-up on that note, and then we’ll move on, not on O’Reilly.
TRUMP: You certainly covered O’Reilly big. Not Susan Rice, boy, O’Reilly [unintelligible]. He’s taking my place. He’s taking my place.
HABERMAN: Sir, if you could give us more information about Rice. If the administration would give us more information —
TRUMP: No, you have a lot of information. No, you have so much information…
THRUSH: [Transportation Secretary] Elaine Chao said that [Trump’s infrastructure bill] would likely come “later in the year.” Are you thinking about accelerating?
TRUMP: I am. I’m thinking about accelerating it. I’m thinking about putting it with another bill. Could be health care, could be something else. [Cross talk.] Could be tax reform.
HABERMAN: What’s your time frame, at this point, that you’re looking at as an accelerated?
TRUMP: Well, we’re working — you know when people said, when you guys, because you know we have a very solid administration. We have some very, very good people. This man was the president of Goldman Sachs. I mean, he was, like, the president of Goldman Sachs…
It’d be mildly funny, in an improv skit, with the right cast. But I actually found myself thinking, Well, I’m 61 years old, I’ve had a pretty good run, if they manage to break the world…
.@GlennThrush 2/ not a coincidence. Came days after @GlennThrush and I reported that some Pence allies question Priebus's chops
— Maggie Haberman (@maggieNYT) April 6, 2017
We.Are.So.Fucked.
THANKS, REPUBLICANS!
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