But this emerging narrative, and in particular, its portrayal of the Kushner-Cohn camp as the reasonable, clean-cut wing that surely will eventually vanquish the mercurial, unkempt Bannon, obscures the overarching cause of the tension, which constitutes a much more alarming reality. Specifically, there is a gaping leadership void in the West Wing, and it’s caused by Trump’s complete lack of a clear vision or agenda.

After days of leaked reports informing us that the president was strongly considering a “shake-up” that reportedly involved sidelining Bannon, Trump instead has ordered Bannon and Kushner to reach a truce with each other in order to “try to implement the president’s agenda,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

AD

AD

Fittingly enough, a Trump White House leaker is already signaling that the cease-fire is likely only temporary. “The two men have agreed to put aside their differences,” the Journal reports, although “it is unclear whether the detente will hold.”

It’s notable enough on its own that Trump’s White House has continued to leak about the warring sides even after he supposedly ordered them to stop fighting. But the failure here runs much deeper. Trump’s command to his aides seems to suggest that he’s operating under the illusion that he has an actual agenda to implement.

Trump’s agenda, of course, was encapsulated by his campaign slogan, “Make America Great Again.” Crucially, however, the White House is being run by people who can’t seem to agree on what “making America great” entails.

AD

The Bannon wing of the White House, obviously, believes that this greatness can be obtained through actions such as building a wall on the Mexican border; restricting immigration; deporting undocumented immigrants; and banning refugees from majority-Muslim countries. Much of this has run into failure — his travel ban, most notably, is held up in court, and there is no real plan for the wall. But those actions still have utility: They have thrilled his base of activists who identify with the alt-right, the white nationalist movement that Bannon appealed to as head of Breitbart News.

AD

What’s suddenly happening now is that the Bannon “nationalist” agenda is contrasting more sharply and visibly with the “globalists” in the White House, who appear to be led by Kushner. And this contrast will itself be grist for Trump’s alt-right and nationalist base.

Remember: It was under Bannon’s guidance as chief executive of his campaign that Trump gave an October 2016 campaign speech, claiming that Hillary Clinton “meets in secret with international banks to plot the destruction of U.S. sovereignty in order to enrich these global financial powers, her special-interest friends and her donors.” His closing campaign ad evoked similar anti-Semitic imagery, showing philanthropist George Soros, Federal Reserve Chair Janet Yellen and Goldman Sachs Chief Executive Lloyd Blankfein, who are all Jewish, complete with narration about “those who control the levers of power in Washington,” “global special interests” and “a global power structure.”

AD

It was under Bannon’s tutelage that Trump believed these moves would win him the White House — and perhaps they did help him get there by appealing to at least some of Trump’s voters.

AD

But now the “globalists” are crucial members of Team Trump, and they are inside the White House, in the form of Kushner, Ivanka Trump, chief economic adviser Gary Cohn and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, both former Goldman Sachs executives. To Bannon’s base, the “globalists” are the enemy: They haven’t put America’s economy or America’s interests first — so it’s hard to see how Trump will ever get these two camps to unite behind a cogent agenda, much less get them to function as a White House staff.

The problem is that Trump himself is a man without ideas or an ideology. His political instincts are more frequently driven by the likes of Bannon, and it’s obvious that Trump will be reluctant to cast Bannon aside. Yet at the same time, Trump is plainly loyal to his family. There’s no clear way for Trump to reconcile this, however, precisely because Trump does not have any clear policy agenda of his own.