Who's Afraid of Donald Trump?
Trump puts the bully into bully pulpit – but experts say his approach has problems.
By Susan Milligan | Senior Writer
July 7, 2017, at 6:00 a.m.
He talks tough, and tweets tougher. He makes demands on Congress and state governments, needles foreign nations and launches broad attacks on the press. But is anyone afraid of President Donald Trump?
The president wooed crowds and wowed political observers during his campaign, when the insults and veiled threats he lobbed against primary foes, journalists and protesters at his rallies turned out to be successful. Far from disqualifying him for the presidency, as Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton asserted, Trump's bombastic approach mirrored the anger of much of the American electorate, who sent him to the White House. But as a governing tool, Trump's tough-guy strategy is meeting with resistance, and not just the kind Democrats and their allies are organizing this summer. That, experts say, weakens the president both at home, where he is trying to achieve the first major legislative victory of his term, and abroad, where Trump is seeking to get allies to pay more for defense and foes, to back off their military postures.
President Dwight D. Eisenhower, like Trump, lacked political experience, but "he knew how to compromise, negotiate with people. Trump has none of that capacity," says Mark Peterson, a UCLA political science and law professor who is an expert on the interaction among the president, Congress and interest groups.
"That's going to be a problem with Congress [and] the G-20," the group of world leaders Trump is meeting with in Germany this week. "Already our allies are feeling pretty uncomfortable about his positions and approaches," Peterson says.
Trump has badgered Congress to pass an unpopular health care bill. They've not done so, and a strategy in the Senate to advance a bill before the July 4 recess failed miserably, with Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell being forced to pull the bill because of opposition from within his own party.
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