On Sunday, President Trump took on the New York Times again, this time calling out a reporter by name who had written a piece suggesting the president had over-promised and under-delivered in his first nine months in office.
‘The Failing @NYTimes, in a story by Peter Baker, should have mentioned the rapid terminations by me of TPP & The Paris Accord & the fast approvals of The Keystone XL & Dakota Access pipelines,’ the president tweeted. ‘Also, look at the recent EPA cancelations & our great new Supreme Court Justice!’
On Saturday, Baker had bylined a piece of analysis headlined ‘Promise the Moon? Easy for Trump. But Now Comes the Reckoning.’
President Trump started off his Sunday by calling out a New York Times reporter by name for penning a piece of analysis that suggested the president has under-delivered on his campaign promises
President Trump called out the New York Times’ Peter Baker by name, suggesting he didn’t list enough of the president’s accomplishment in a story about the president under-delivering on his campaign promises
Baker pointed to some of Trump’s rhetoric on the campaign trail, including calling the Iran nuclear deal ‘one of the worst and most one-sided transactions the United States has ever entered into,’ but then to Trump’s reality: that he’s taken half-steps on most of his agenda items, often leaving the real decisions up to Congress.
This happened twice last week, with Trump telling Congress and U.S. allies that he wouldn’t recertify the Iran deal unless it was made more tough.
He also signed an executive order on health care, which would cut subsidies to insurance companies.
The latter move was called ‘sabotage’ by Sen. Sheldon White House, D-R.I., who was quoted in Baker’s piece.
Trump made the move because his efforts to move the ball on an Obamacare repeal in Congress have fallen short, despite Republicans having a majority in both houses.
Baker’s big question in the New York Times piece was whether these gestures would be enough to appease Trump’s base.
A handful of the reporter’s sources suggested that would not be the case.
‘The gap between President Trump’s ambitious promises and actual policies is large and growing,’ William C. Inboden, a White House aide under President George W. Bush and now the executive director of the William P. Clements Jr. Center on History, Strategy and Statecraft at the University of Texas, told the Times.
Inboden continued by saying, ‘This is weakening the institution of the presidency itself, which becomes diminished when presidents over promise and under deliver, or when responsibilities normally handled by the president become habitually shirked to Congress or other nations.’
Another source, Jacob Heilbrunn, the editor of the National Interest, a foreign policy magazine, called it ‘classic Trump,’ when Baker mentioned how Trump often speaks as if he’s accomplished more than he has.
‘Bluff and bombast substituting for actual deeds,’ Heilbrunn told the Times. ‘He’s the political equivalent of the Washington Nationals – a choke artist at critical moments.’
Baker did quote a few Trump allies in the piece, including Newsmax CEO Christopher Ruddy, described as a friend of the president’s.
‘I am not surprised because Donald Trump is not an ideologue, he’s a realist and a pragmatist,’ Ruddy told the Times. ‘During the campaign, he staked out some very strong positions maybe as a negotiating start point, or in other cases they were based on the facts he had at the time.’
‘Trump is actually very open to feedback and criticism on his ideas,’ Ruddy continued. ‘Based on that he can easily adjust and change course.’
On the Iran deal, Trump’s national security team had urged the president not to pull out, so now he’s simply pushed it into a gray area instead.
And Baker pointed out Trump’s critics believe even the small moves have been ‘destructive’ and that the president was ‘effectively leaving initiatives like health care and the Iran deal wounded on the battlefield without allowing ambulances onto the scene.’
Chairman of the Eurasia Group Clifford Kupchan told the Times he didn’t think Trump’s tactics were wholly bad, but suggested they might not bring him lasting support.
‘Trump’s clearly got a theory of deal-making – demand the world, take the most you can, and then brag about it,’ Kupchan told the Times. ‘It’s actually a pretty good tack that’s often underestimated.’
‘But the bottom line, so far in his presidency, is that he’s been unable to deliver on overstated goals,’ Kupchan said.