President Trump spent the weekend at the winter White House, Mar-a-Lago, the secluded Florida castle where he is king. The sun sparkles off the glistening lawn and warms the russet clay Spanish tiles, and the steaks are cooked just how he likes them (well done). His daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner celebrated as calming influences on the tempestuous president joined him. But they were helpless to contain his fury.
Trump was mad steaming, raging mad.
Trumps young presidency has existed in a perpetual state of chaos. The issue of Russia has distracted from what was meant to be his most triumphant moment: his address last Tuesday to a joint session of Congress. And now his latest unfounded accusation that Barack Obama tapped Trumps phones during last falls campaign had been denied by the former president and doubted by both allies and fellow Republicans.
When Trump ran into Christopher Ruddy on the golf course and later at dinner Saturday, he vented to his friend. This will be investigated, Ruddy recalled Trump telling him. It will all come out. I will be proven right.
He was pissed, said Ruddy, the chief executive of Newsmax, a conservative media company. I havent seen him this angry.
Trumps team is trying again to reboot this week, with the president expected to sign a new executive order Monday implementing an entry ban for some countries after the initial one was blocked in federal court. The administration also intends to introduce a legislative plan later in the week to repeal and replace Obamas health-care law, officials said.
The rest of Trumps legislative plan, from tax reform to infrastructure spending, is effectively on hold until Congress first tackles the Affordable Care Act.
White House legislative staffers concluded late last week that the administration was spinning in circles on the health-care plan, amid mounting criticism from conservatives that the administration was fumbling.
The president has been seething as he watches round-the-clock cable news coverage. Trump recently vented to an associate that Carter Page, a onetime Trump campaign adviser, keeps appearing on television even though he and Trump have no significant relationship.
Stories from Breitbart News, the incendiary conservative website, have been circulated at the White Houses highest levels in recent days, including one story where talk-radio host Mark Levin accused the Obama administration of mounting a silent coup, according to several officials.
Stephen K. Bannon, the White House chief strategist who once ran Breitbart, has spoken with Trump at length about his view that the deep state is a direct threat to his presidency.
Advisers pointed to Bannons frequent closed-door guidance on the topic and Trumps agreement as a fundamental way of understanding the presidents behavior and his willingness to confront the intelligence community and said that when Bannon spoke recently about the deconstruction of the administrative state, he was also alluding to his aim of rupturing the intelligence community and its influence on the U.S. national security and foreign policy consensus.
Bannons view is shared by some top Republicans.
Its not paranoia at all when its actually happening. Its leak after leak after leak from the bureaucrats in the [intelligence community] and former Obama administration officials and its very real, said Rep. Devin Nunes (R-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. The White House is absolutely concerned and is trying to figure out a systemic way to address whats happening.
The mood at the White House on Tuesday night was different altogether jubilant. Trump returned from the Capitol shortly before midnight to find his staff assembled in the residence cheering him. Finally, they all thought, they had seized control. The president had even laid off Twitter outbursts a small victory for a staff often unable to drive a disciplined message.
He nailed it, and he knew it, said Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the president.
The merriment came to a sudden end on Wednesday night, when The Washington Post first reported that Attorney General Jeff Sessions met with the Russian ambassador despite having said under oath at his Senate confirmation hearing that he had no contact with the Russians.
Inside the West Wing, Trumps top aides were furious with the defenses of Sessions offered by the Justice Departments public affairs division and felt blindsided that Sessionss aides had not consulted the White House earlier in the process, according to one senior White House official.
The next morning, Trump exploded, according to White House officials. He headed to Newport News, Va., on Thursday for a splashy commander-in-chief moment. The president would trumpet his plan to grow military spending aboard the Navys sophisticated new aircraft carrier. But as Trump, sporting a bomber jacket and Navy cap, rallied sailors and shipbuilders, his message was overshadowed by Sessions.
Trouble for Trump continued to spiral over the weekend. Early Saturday, he surprised his staff by firing off four tweets accusing Obama of a Nixon/Watergate plot to tap his Trump Tower phones in the run-up to last falls election. Trump cited no evidence, and Obamas spokesman denied any such wiretap was ordered.
That night at Mar-a-Lago, Trump had dinner with Sessions, Bannon, Homeland Security Secretary John F. Kelly and White House senior policy adviser Stephen Miller, among others. They tried to put Trump in a better mood by going over their implementation plans for the travel ban, according to a White House official.
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Trump was brighter Sunday morning as he read several newspapers, pleased that his allegations against Obama were the dominant story, the official said.
But he found reason to be mad again: Few Republicans were defending him on the Sunday political talk shows. Some Trump advisers and allies were especially disappointed in Sen. Marco Rubio (Fla.), who two days earlier had hitched a ride down to Florida with Trump on Air Force One.
Pressed by NBCs Chuck Todd to explain Trumps wiretapping claim, Rubio demurred.
Look, I didnt make the allegation, he said. Im not the person that went out there and said it.
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