The disconnect between the headlines—and President Donald Trump’s online life—and his presidential engagements has become something of a defining feature of this White House. | Evan Vucci/AP Photo Trump shifts from seething about Mueller to welcoming Macron

President Donald Trump in recent days has oscillated from bragging about negotiations with North Korea to seething about special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation and insulting reporters by name on Twitter.

On Monday, he also posted about his proposed border wall – but not about Syria, Iran or any of the other issues expected to be on the table this week as he hosts French President Emmanuel Macron, the first foreign dignitary to be honored with a full state visit since Trump took office, as well as German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who arrives for her second White House visit on Friday.


The European leaders are visiting as Trump continues to deal with the fallout from the recent raid on his longtime personal attorney, Michael Cohen, who is under federal investigation. As Macron arrived in Washington on Monday, the White House was also grappling with new questions about EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, the latest cabinet official to face potential ethics violations.

At Monday’s daily briefing, press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders jumped from speaking about the state visit and denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula to defending Trump for tweeting that he doesn’t think Cohen will flip and stating that the White House continues to “review” the revelations about Pruitt, including that he rented an apartment from the wife of a lobbyist with business before the EPA.

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The disconnect between the headlines—and Trump’s online life—and his presidential engagements has become something of a defining feature in this White House.

“That’s just a constant fact of life for those guys,” said one former administration official. “Trump’s going to do his thing no matter what’s going on in the news, and it’s going to always be a mix of him responding to the substantive stuff and him responding to whatever the scandal of the day is.”

But this time, “the substantive stuff” will require more attention than past meetings with foreign leaders.

State visits are a massive undertaking for any White House, and Macron comes ready to work with Trump on major issues including tariffs, the war in Syria, the Iran nuclear deal and the Paris Climate Accord.

Punctuating their official meetings are a dinner at George Washington’s estate in Mt. Vernon and a State Dinner at the White House on Tuesday.

Such visits occupy White House staff and officials from the National Security Council, the Council of Economic Advisers and others in the Cabinet.

“It really does encompass every single part of the building and everybody contributes to it,” said Julianna Smoot, who served as social secretary under President Barack Obama.

The main goal is for two principals to spend as much time engaged with each other as possible.

“They’re pretty much connected at the hip for whatever is planned,” Smoot said. “It’ll be a lot of togetherness for them, which is good.”

For his part, Macron is aiming to stay out of Trump’s headline-dominating domestic scandals. Macron and his aides have gone out of their way to say the controversies are none of their business.

In a recent interview with Fox News, Macron said he has “never” considered that Trump might not serve out his full term. The aim is clear: France wants the United States as a powerful ally, and angering Trump only makes this more difficult.

In his speech to Congress on Wednesday, however, Macron is going to emphasize the importance of “democratic values,” according to a French official. In so doing, Macron—who said in his Fox interview that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s idea of democracy is “not mine”—is an indirect warning that those values may be in danger in the United States.

Macron’s visit comes just as Trump is trying to complete a reshuffling of his national security staff, with a vote expected later this week on secretary of state nominee Mike Pompeo after unexpected congressional pushback on the new role for Trump’s CIA director, who was tapped after Trump ousted Rex Tillerson last month.

Meantime, the Pruitt situation continues to nag at the White House. Pruitt is expected to face tough questions on Thursday when he appears on Capitol Hill for an appropriations hearing. Members will have everything from his relationship with the lobbyist to questionable raises for EPA employees and extreme security measures to grill the embattled administrator on.

So far, though, the White House is standing by the former Oklahoma attorney general.

“The president is happy with him,” White House legislative affairs director Marc Short told NBC’s “Meet the Press” on Sunday. “Right now, Scott Pruitt is doing a great job at EPA, and we’re excited to have him there.”

The mixture of controversy and high-stakes foreign policy would be a challenge for any administration, but especially for a president who lacks foreign policy experience and remains uncomfortable with many of the ways of Washington. But the White House is unlikely to betray any uneasiness.

“This president is very capable of doing more than one thing at a time and more than one thing in a day,” press secretary Sarah Sanders declared at one point in September.

Nicholas Vinocur contributed reporting.

