The guessing game over — or hunt for — who wrote the anonymous New York Times op-ed from inside the Trump administration is in full swing.

Publicly, the president and White House press secretary Sarah Sanders have called the author a “coward.” The president tweeted the single word “TREASON?” before questioning whether the Times made the whole thing up.

Yet the Washington Post’s sources called Trump’s reaction “volcanic,” and a Politico source said the White House was in “total meltdown.” Both report that the White House is trying to figure out who the author is but is having little success so far.

For those of you asking for the identity of the anonymous coward: pic.twitter.com/RpWYPHa6To — Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) September 6, 2018

In any case, much of Washington and political Twitter has embarked on the same endeavor — trying to otherwise reason out (or wildly guess) the official’s identity based on the op-ed’s content.

Some officials have even come out and issued statements denying that they wrote the op-ed, including Vice President Mike Pence, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats, and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen. But, of course, anyone capable of writing this op-ed is probably also capable of denying having written it. Here, then, are the latest developments in this saga.

Are there linguistic clues to the author’s identity?

First off, various Twitter denizens have attempted to suss out who the official is by closely analyzing the op-ed for supposedly unusual words or phrases, such as “lodestar” and “first principles,” and checking which other Trump officials have publicly used them.

Personally, I am deeply skeptical of these attempts at linguistic analysis, for several reasons:

New York Times op-eds are often heavily edited, and any supposedly telltale word or phrase could well have been inserted by the editor rather than the official. (Op-ed page editor Jim Dao said that no special effort was made to disguise the official’s writing style, but that “there’s editing in everything we do” involving adhering to Times style standards.)

Many of the phrases used in this specific op-ed are generic to the point of being clichéd, the Washington Post’s Carlos Lozada points out:

This NYT piece has every oped cliche possible. Makes me think the writer is an oped pro:



"looms large"

"bitterly divided"

"Don't get me wrong."

"unsung heroes"

"astute observers"

"cold comfort"

"early whispers"

"put it best"

"reaching across the aisle"https://t.co/WQoJcq0yAS — Carlos Lozada (@CarlosLozadaWP) September 5, 2018

Even “lodestar,” a somewhat unusual word some have pointed to as a potential clue, isn’t so uncommon. On this very website alone, at least seven writers used the term in their own voice before Wednesday, a Google search reveals. “First principles” has also been used by several Vox authors.

Finally, some Trump administration leakers deliberately try to throw suspicion elsewhere with their wording. “To cover my tracks, I usually pay attention to other staffers’ idioms and use that in my background quotes,” one anonymous official told Axios’s Jonathan Swan.

Some also saw a clue in a New York Times tweet on the op-ed, which refers to the official as “he.” But the Times has since said that was an error, and we wouldn’t necessarily expect the op-ed’s editors to share this closely guarded secret with the person running a Times Twitter account.

What’s a senior administration official?

Similarly unpromising is any attempt to narrow down who might qualify as a “senior administration official” — an infamously vague reporting term.

Back in 2005, Slate’s Daniel Engber wrote that “there are no hard and fast rules” among journalists on who counts as senior. Generally, he said, reporters told him they tried to limit the term to the 20 or so White House aides with the “assistant to the president,” as well as the top few people in each Cabinet department or agency. (The vice president could count. Perhaps ambassadors to major countries would too.)

But in the end, “senior” is really in the eye of the beholder — in this case, the New York Times Opinion section.

Now, I do think the Times is fully aware that the official’s identity could get out. If that does happen, the paper will want to be able to defend its controversial decision to grant him or her anonymity.

To me, that suggests the official isn’t someone totally obscure who would embarrass the paper if his or her identity became known, like a deputy assistant secretary in a backwater Cabinet agency. I would think the Times would only make this highly unusual decision for someone who is relatively high up, important, and knowledgable about the administration, but of course, I don’t know that for certain.

The op-ed also mentions the tidbit that “there were early whispers within the cabinet of invoking the 25th Amendment” to remove President Trump from office. But the description is vague, and doesn’t make clear how the official knows this (as in, whether he or she was personally involved in these discussions, or heard it secondhand).

The specific critiques the official makes — and doesn’t make — of Trump

More promising, in my view, is examining the official’s actual argument. Why, exactly, is Trump so bad? He or she makes four basic points:

Generally, Trump’s management and decision-making are “erratic,” “ill-informed,” and “occasionally reckless.” When it comes to foreign policy, Trump has too much of “a preference for autocrats and dictators” — specifically, that he’s too willing to cozy up to North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and not tough enough on Russian President Vladimir Putin. On economics, the official is not a fan of the president’s “anti-trade” impulses and lack of affinity for “free markets.” Finally, the official objects to Trump sowing divisions in American society, both by attacking the media and by allowing “our discourse to be stripped of civility.”

On the flip side, we could also gain some insights from common critiques the official doesn’t make.

The person believes “many” of Trump’s policies have “made America safer and more prosperous,” and specifically praises his “effective deregulation” and “historic tax reform,” and for keeping “a robust military.”

The official doesn’t deem immigration, one of Trump’s core issues, even worthy of a mention. That may suggest the person doesn’t have strong views on the issue.

All in all, the official seems to have relatively standard conservative or center-right views, as well as a temperamental inclination toward civility rather than confrontational, triggering-the-libs politics. The official is interested in both foreign and domestic policy. And he or she is also a big fan of the late Sen. John McCain, praising his “example” of “honor” in public life.

What’s the author’s motive?

In general, the op-ed seems to confirm what a plethora of anonymous sources have been saying since this administration began and have most recently told Bob Woodward for his new book — that officials often view Trump’s instructions as bizarre and try to slow-walk them or avoid carrying them out.

However, the argument is phrased in a particularly inflammatory way, as the official says he or she is “working diligently from within to frustrate parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations” — and condemns Trump as acting “in a manner that is detrimental to the health of our republic.”

So why write an op-ed like this, beyond the obvious reason of the official wanting to tell his or her story?

For one, there’s a clear goal of rehabilitating the reputations of certain Trump administration officials, deeming them “unsung heroes” working behind the scenes to rein Trump in. The official even mentions that some of his aides “have been cast as villains by the media,” despite privately going “to great lengths to keep bad decisions contained.”

Second, the official is laying down a marker that he or she was part of this internal resistance to Trump. I’d guess the official expects his or her identity to become public at some point, and thinks that one day his or her social or professional interests will be served by being unmasked as the author of the now-famous op-ed. That is, the person is getting positioned for a post-Trump world.

More controversially, some have speculated that the official wanted to cause precisely the paranoid reaction from Trump that has ensued. Given Trump’s long-running obsession with the idea of a “deep state” trying to undermine him, his vituperative response to the op-ed certainly seems predictable. Still, perhaps the official was just willing to risk such a reaction, rather than actively seeking to cause it.

So who is it?

I don’t know! Various guesses have been flying around about who fits the profile, but really, all they are are guesses. Washington will keep on guessing, and Trump’s team will keep on searching, but for now, the answer remains a total mystery.