He even has some regrets about withdrawing from the TPP. The Wall Street Journal reported in April that the president had told lawmakers that he had “deputized Robert Lighthizer, the U.S. trade representative, and Larry Kudlow, the director of the National Economic Council, to study the possibility of re-entering the TPP if the terms were favorable.”

Trump is just as apt to fold on other matters. On a June 2017 call with Saudi Arabia’s King Salman, according to The Washington Post, Trump was supposed to scold the Saudis for their offensive against Qatar. After Salman delivered a flattering series of compliments, the president dropped his objections.

In December, when the U.S. announced it would recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the UN General Assembly voted overwhelmingly to condemn the move. Trump said the U.S. would withhold aid from those who voted for the resolution. “Let them vote against us,” he said. “We’ll save a lot. We don’t care. But this isn’t like it used to be where they could vote against you and then you pay them hundreds of millions of dollars.” Yet when the White House released its budget for 2019, “not a single country lost funding on the basis of voting against the U.S. at the UN,” John Hudson reported. More recently, he made a similar threat to countries that don’t back a joint North American bid for the 2026 World Cup, raising the question of why any country should take the threat seriously.

In January, Trump met with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer with a government shutdown looming. In exchange for Democrats backing funding for increased border security and possibly a wall, Trump agreed to back a deal to replace DACA, the executive order creating a legal status for unauthorized immigrants brought to the United States as children. Hard-liners in the White House thought the deal was such a giveaway, in fact, that Chief of Staff John Kelly reportedly called Schumer and torpedoed it.

In February, Trump held a meeting with members of Congress to discuss gun control following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida. He ridiculed lawmakers for being too timid in confronting the NRA and asked them to take up proposals opposed by the group. Days later, he met with the NRA, and when he unveiled his slate of ideas to combat gun violence, it included none of the proposals the NRA opposed.

In April, Trump demanded an immediate withdrawal of American troops from Syria. Military advisers worked to talk Trump out of it, bargaining the president down to speeding up the timeline. Less than two weeks later, he launched new airstrikes against the Syrian regime, following chemical attacks. On Monday, the commander of Central Command told the Tampa Bay Times it hadn’t taken much pushback for Trump to concede on withdrawal.

This is not to say that Trump has no core convictions. On a select set of policies, especially those he discussed most frequently on the campaign, the president has been extremely tenacious, as I wrote in May. He has worked to find a way to implement a travel ban and build a border well—not always effectively, but unceasingly. He single-handedly kept Obamacare repeal alive long past when other Republicans were ready to give in. He drove through tax cuts over the predictions of most analysts. It is only at the negotiating table, supposedly his natural habitat, where his nerve seems to fail him.