He talked of turning the Oval Office into a high-powered board room, empowering military leaders over foreign affairs specialists in national security debates, and continuing to speak harshly about adversaries.
.. Mr. Trump said he would try to unite Republicans and disaffected Democrats and independents over the next six months before the November election, and then work in office to show Americans that his chief interest was fighting for their needs. He argued that the fact that he would not have to rely on wealthy donors to finance his campaign
.. Several friends and allies of Mr. Trump said that “negotiating” was the word he used the most to encapsulate his first 100 days in office. He wants to put strong-willed people — business executives and generals are mentioned most often — in charge of cabinet agencies and throughout his senior staff, and direct them to negotiate deals and plans with congressional leaders and state officials, as well as insurance companies and others in the private sector.
.. “Trump is predicting he’ll be able to do all these things, but his workload will be pretty enormous and his power would be so limited by precedent, by the bureaucracy, by the Constitution,” said Robert Dallek, a presidential historian. “Even in trade and immigration, where Trump says he will make revolutionary changes, Congress has a say on those things. A lot of people have a say. The president is not king.”
.. He would also call the heads of companies like Pfizer, the Carrier Corporation, Ford and Nabisco and warn them that their products face 35 percent tariffs because they are moving jobs out of the country. Democrats and some Republicans have warned that financial markets would react poorly and that Mr. Trump’s protectionist stances might plunge the country into recession, but he insisted that trade is “killing the country” and “the markets would be fine.”
.. “The Oval Office would be an amazing place to negotiate. It would command immediate respect from the other side, immediate understanding about the nation’s priorities.”
.. “Of course, if he wins he’ll have some level of strength and momentum akin to a mandate. That would help.”
.. One of his closest advisers, his daughter Ivanka, would probably stay with his company, but he said he would seek counsel from her and her husband, the businessman Jared Kushner, and noted that family members had served in administrations before.
.. “I think about a U.N. ambassador, about a secretary of defense and secretary of treasury, but I think more about winning first,” Mr. Trump said. “Otherwise I’m wasting time. I want people in those jobs who care about winning.
..
Does Trump understand the President does not own the United States?
America is a country, not a company. And it’s owners are the citizens.
All of the citizens, even minorities and the poor.
The President works for us. Along with Congress. And is bound by the Constitution.
He is an employee. Not king. Not dictator.
And he does not get to wave his hand and “make it so”.
Perhaps Trump should actually read the Constitution and remember it’s not a contract that he can renegotiate... If we must read about Trump everyday, isn’t about time his repellent personal biography from the 80s and 90s got some new ink?
Voters who weren’t adults when ‘The Donald’ was building his fame as tabloid-fodder, and talk radio fixture deserve a recap of the way he lived his far from private, private life, so they can decide if he has the character to be president.
How is Trump’s dumping of first wife Ivana Trump ‘for getting old,’ (as related in her book) while squiring a younger, pregnant mistress around town not seen as relevant to his ongoing misogyny?
Hillary’s political opponents (and even a few Times columnists) never tire of finding ways to tie Bill Clinton’s long-ago infidelities around Hillary’s neck like the proverbial albatross. But Trump parades his third wife on the stage, as if his sordid history with the first two never happened.