AP Photo/Andrew Harnik Fourth Estate Trump’s Walkout Hits a Wall Real, pretend or imaginary—it doesn’t matter. The president needs to replace the theatrical tantrum with a political tactic that works.

Jack Shafer is Politico’s senior media writer.

How real are Donald Trump’s temper tantrums? Not very, says professional Trump observer Nancy Pelosi.

On Thursday, the House speaker called Trump’s latest tantrum—staged during a Wednesday White House session on infrastructure spending with the president and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer—a “stunt” and one of his “bag of tricks” he uses to “change the subject.” Schumer called the outburst “concocted.” Trump tweeted back a complete denial, asserting that he had been “extremely calm” during the meeting, and that the bogus charges were a product of Pelosi and Schumer’s scheming “with their partner, the Fake News Media.”


Trump’s fit or nonfit, depending on whose side you take, was allegedly triggered by Pelosi’s Wednesday morning comments about him engaging in a “cover-up.” I’d dig deeper on the origins of the Trump-Pelosi-Schumer dust-up except that it’s already starting to remind me too much of one of those interfamily disputes you enter and immediately wish you could find the exit. But let’s agree for the moment that it doesn’t matter whether Trump’s umbrage was real, ersatz, or nonexistent, only that he has acted similarly in the past. The genuine issue is why Trump thinks blowing his top will get him what he wants in Washington when the record indicates otherwise.

Lyndon Johnson cursed and Richard Nixon threatened and both could make life hell for the people who worked for them. But neither president governed by blowing his gasket in public. Trump on the other hand has made it one of the signature moves of his presidency, constantly putting his adversaries (and his friends!) off balance with his circus act. Trump’s outbursts have become so frequent the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration should build a warning station on the White House periphery to warn politicians and the public of upcoming Trump storms.

Remember when he slammed his hands on the table and stormed out of a White House meeting with Pelosi in January when she refused to fund a border wall in return for reopening the government? “I don’t have temper tantrums,” Trump said at the time. Then he gave evidence that he really had been pissed, saying, “I didn’t smash the table—I should have, but I didn’t smash the table.” Or his December encounter with Schumer, in which Schumer accused him of a “temper tantrum”?

A strong case can be made that the Trump presidency was born in a tantrum, as he raged in January 2017 that the size of his inauguration crowd had eclipsed all others. He yelled at his TV, The Associated Press reported in June 2017, to protest the coverage of the investigation of his administration. The next month, while trying to repeal the Affordable Care Act, Trump warned the world, “I will be very angry“ if Republican senators don’t vote his way. And how else to describe Trump’s famous showdown with CNN reporter Jim Acosta but a tantrum? Trump is still barking at his TV, reported the Atlantic last month, while eating chicken and cheeseburgers with the vice president .

Trump biographer Timothy L. O’Brien says the hissy fits are “standard operating procedure for him.” The bad temper is real, but he can feign outrage when needed, “usually when he feels he’s been embarrassed publicly. And then he wants to invite the world to share his pain.”

Maybe Trump had success bullying real estate moguls and other businessmen and thinks the tactic will work in Washington, even after two years of experience show that it doesn’t. Maybe he flies off the handle and plays the tough guy because he likes it, thinking the White House stage as a version of The Apprentice. Trump has been strategically consistent in using anger to connect with his supporters during his presidency. He’s angry about immigrants. He’s angry about Chinese imports “stealing” America jobs. He’s angry on behalf of working people. He’s angry in general about Democrats, and every time he pops off on these topics at rallies he collects cheers and applause.

Emotional terror of the Trump variety works on underlings or his fellow Republican officeholders who fear they’ll lose their positions if they defy the angry king. It also works on the preternaturally polite, who will happily fold if by folding they can cool tempers. But the more Trump puts on the fright wig, the less scary he becomes. The sight of Trump baring his teeth like a wild macaque doesn’t seem to faze Pelosi and Schumer. Decades in Congress have inured them to this kind of political gnarling.

Tantrums don’t work very well in government as opposed to business, because there are so many more moving parts—separation of powers, political parties, scores of agencies, 50 states and 245 million eligible voters—than in Manhattan real estate. Even when Trump’s party controlled both legislative houses, his tactics couldn’t achieve his complete agenda. What makes him think he can bulldoze the Democrats now that they’re in firm hold of the House, where they’re weakening him with the power of investigation?

Like his Niagara of lies, Trump’s hysterics are just another way of forcing people to live in his factually stunted, theatrical universe. As Pelosi and Schumer have shown, the spell is easily broken.

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