While the special counsel’s investigation is unlikely to present an existential threat to the administration, losing the House to the Democrats in 2018 will likely result in a Nancy Pelosi Nancy PelosiSunday shows preview: Justice Ginsburg dies, sparking partisan battle over vacancy before election Trump is betting big on the suburbs, but his strategy is failing 'bigly' Trump orders flags at half-staff to honor 'trailblazer' Ginsburg MORE-led House impeachment proceeding and a return to the pre-Donald Trump establishment dominated status quo. Therefore, the midterm elections will be a de facto nationwide referendum on President Trump Donald John TrumpUS reimposes UN sanctions on Iran amid increasing tensions Jeff Flake: Republicans 'should hold the same position' on SCOTUS vacancy as 2016 Trump supporters chant 'Fill that seat' at North Carolina rally MORE.

Not only will every contentious issue be adjudicated on the basis of supporting or opposing Trump, but even non-contentious issues like President Obama’s doctor giving President Trump a clean bill of health become contentious because of the media’s desire to destroy the Trump presidency and Republican control of Congress.

Republicans who are generally supportive of the president, and highly supportive of his agenda, privately note that the White House political operation is severely compromised: Smart political people who understand how and why Trump won are scant on the ground, and those who do have no authority.

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As evidence of the recent bungling, look no further than the rudderless and underpowered performance since the tax act passed. Whether the issue is immigration, trade, the budget, national security, de-weaponizing federal agencies like the IRS, Justice Department and the deep state, and replacing special interest influence with an America first agenda, the White House political operation has lost touch with what drove then candidate Trump to victory in 2016.

Instead of the president using the constitutional obligation of Congress to address Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals as a trading chip to obtain long overdue and necessary national security reforms such as border security or an end to chain migration and lottery migration, Democrats and their allies in the press have turned the debate into a national 24/7 discussion of identity politics and whether or not President Trump is a racist.

Instead of the Justice Department pursuing a corruption case against the Clintons or rooting out the Obama-era federal employees who weaponized the IRS against conservative groups, covered for the Clintons, or colluded with the Clinton campaign to create the wildly successful diversion of the Russia-Trump collusion investigation, Attorney General Jeff Sessions Jefferson (Jeff) Beauregard SessionsTrump's policies on refugees are as simple as ABCs Ocasio-Cortez, Velázquez call for convention to decide Puerto Rico status White House officials voted by show of hands on 2018 family separations: report MORE decided to take on the non-issue of marijuana legalization.

This isn’t a plea to call Steve Bannon Stephen (Steve) Kevin BannonJuan Williams: Swamp creature at the White House Engineers say privately funded border wall is poorly constructed and set to fail: report Bannon and Maxwell cases display DOJ press strategy chutzpah MORE back. Bannon may have been a keeper of the flame, but his penchant for political knife-fighting, lobbing grenades and leaking on his rivals was ineffectual. The problem was Bannon, not the flame. His surviving rivals seem to have succeeded in morphing Bannon’s personal shortcomings into a referendum to move away from the very things that got Trump elected.

Shaping the White House priorities based on that interpretation will result in a midterm drubbing. To avoid a disastrous 2018, the president should immediately strengthen his political team with outsiders and direct them to go get Bannon’s whiteboard. They need to review that set of issues and promises, remind themselves why Trump won, and reassert the priority of these positions over John Kelly John Francis KellyMORE’s preference for order. Order is good and necessary, but this president was elected as a change agent, a disrupter, and chief of staff Kelly would be wise to plan for and welcome the battle.

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There can be both order and focus in the White House while creating disruption in Washington. There is will be significant turnover in White House personnel over the next couple of months and that presents an opportunity to refocus the administration. Outside the beltway, there are dedicated insurgent political professionals that are closer to the voters and devoted to bringing about the changes Trump promised on the campaign. The president would be wise to seek them out, and empower them to help him make good on his campaign.

To avoid impeachment by a Democrat-controlled House, the immediate political goal must be to reconnect with the issues that underpinned Trump’s election. These include the wall, border security, creating jobs and not just stock market gains, holding the Clintons accountable, checking the scale and scope of abuses of federal power over individuals lives, negotiating better trade deals, and focusing on the concerns of voters, not the beltway lobbyists and entrenched powers.

The initial days after the election were heady times, and President Trump was excited to get to work on his agenda. The first six months were chaotic, but on track with the issues. The second six months have been increasingly orderly on governance, if equally chaotic in public relations terms, and won the key legislative victory on taxes.

Looking ahead in 2018, the threat of losing the House and facing impeachment hearings is very real. The best course of action is to go get the Bannon whiteboard, recruit a band of hard-nosed outsiders committed to that agenda, and prioritize it over the impulses to do things the Washington way.