Poor Mick. So soon???
by digby
President Trump chastised his new chief of staff, Mick Mulvaney, over his handling of shutdown talks, creating an awkward scene in front of congressional leaders of both parties, according to two sources who were present.
Behind the scenes: The encounter came near the end of a meeting in the White House Situation Room on Jan. 4, these sources said. Trump had spent the meeting restating his demand for $5.7 billion for his wall. (Vice President Pence, at Trump’s behest, had previously asked the Democrats for just $2.5 billion.)
Mulvaney inserted himself into the conversation and tried to negotiate a compromise sum of money, according to the sources in the room. Mulvaney said “that if Dems weren’t OK with $5.7 [billion] and the president wasn’t OK with $1.3 [the Democratic offer] … he was trying to say we should find a middle ground,” one of the sources said, paraphrasing Mulvaney’s remarks.
“Trump cut him off … ‘You just fucked it all up, Mick,'” the source recalled Trump saying. “It was kind of weird.”
Another source who was in the room confirmed the account. That source said their impression was that Trump was irritated at Mulvaney’s negotiating style. “As a negotiator, Trump was resetting,” the source said. “Mick was not reading the room or the president.”
[…]
Why it matters: Trump’s willingness to humiliate his top staffer in front of Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi is another reminder — beyond Democratic unwillingness to fund a barrier — of why shutdown talks have made zero progress: Trump exhibits little regard for the credibility of his own deputies.
And they seem to love it. I’ve never seen any group of men so eager to demean themselves for another. But then Tump is absolutely terrified of Ann Coulter so I guess it’s just something all the macho right wingers are comfortable with.
The irony is that Trump actually believes he’s a good negotiator.
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