| | | | Donald Trump's revolving-door presidency |  | | Remember back in 2016 when then-candidate Donald Trump pledged that "I'm going to surround myself only with the best and most serious people?"
Who knew there would be so many!
The removal of Kirstjen Nielsen as head of the Department of Homeland Security on Sunday night accounts for the 14th(!) member of Trump's Cabinet to resign, be fired or move on to another job. How does that compare to Trump's immediate predecessors? Barack Obama lost nine Cabinet secretaries in his first term; George W. Bush saw four Cabinet officials move on in his first four years. Trump has been president for 808 days. So.....
And it's not just at the Cabinet level! According to Kathryn Dunn Tenpas at Brookings, a DC-based think tank, 66% of all senior-level staffers who came into jobs when Trump became President are now gone. That's nearly equal to the 71% attrition for Obama's entire first term -- and eclipses Bush's 63% rate.
Trump, for his part, insists that his administration remains the hottest club in DC.
"Everybody wants to work in this White House," he said soon after the 2018 midterm election. "We are a hot country. This is a hot White House. We are a White House that people want to work with."
The facts belie that claim. Not only has Trump suffered from record-setting numbers of departures in his Cabinet and senior staff, he has also struggled to fill those jobs with permanent replacements. Nielsen's planned replacement -- Kevin McAleenan -- takes over the job only in an interim role. Ditto the Defense secretary. And the Interior secretary. And the White House chief of staff.
Is it possible that Trump is choosing not to fill some of the more junior roles within these departments under the belief that the government is bloated with unnecessary people? Sure! But it's hard to make that same argument when we are talking about the HEADS of massive government entities.
Why the turnover? And the struggles to replace the people who go? Trump. He is someone who struggles to delegate decisions and, even when he does, often overrules his people -- publicly. That's, uh, not a great work environment.
The Point: Trump views himself as the one indispensable cog of his administration. And he treats the people who work for him as interchangeable parts, usually of little value.
-- Chris | | "The Democrats will never be satisfied, no matter what they get, how much they get, or how many pages they get."
-- President Donald Trump, via Twitter today. He left things on a relatively positive note, adding: "It will never end, but that's the way life goes!" | | | April 15 isn't the most important deadline date for President Donald Trump's taxes.
House Ways and Means Chair Richard Neal set Wednesday (April 10) as the deadline for Trump to release six years of tax returns.
More on what comes next, per Lauren Fox: "What happens next is not immediately clear, though the legal posturing on both sides suggests that a court battle could be on the horizon. Before that, however, expect the team behind the President and the team behind Neal to produce a lot of paperwork supporting why they're right and the other is wrong." | | | Kishi Bashi covered Chris' favorite Simon & Garfunkel song: "Only Living Boy in New York." And it's great. | |  | | Today's topic: Why rapid Cabinet turnover is a big deal. | |
LAUREN'S CAMPAIGN TRAIL LATEST | | Eric Swalwell: Has a big announcement to make on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" tonight. I wonder what it could be...
Amy Klobuchar: Raised $5.2 million in the first fundraising quarter of 2019, her campaign announced today.
Cory Booker: Raised a relatively modest $5 million in the first quarter of 2019.
Pete Buttigieg: Got some notice for his criticism of fellow Hoosier, Vice President Mike Pence, (who has a fraught track record with the LGBT community) yesterday, saying "your quarrel, sir, is with my creator."
Mike Gravel: The Gravel 2020 committee is out with a video "Rock 2.0 - Mike Gravel 2020," telling viewers "Welcome to the Gravelanche." It notes that Gravel is not running for president this time to win, but "to qualify for the debates to push the field to the left on foreign policy and political reform." | | | A University of Iowa student going to see Beto O'Rourke speak on campus got more than he bargained for this weekend. While making small talk in the bathroom about O'Rourke, he didn't realize it he was talking TO O'Rourke. "Are you here to see Beto?" asked Matthew Rowland, as he recounted to the Iowa City Press-Citizen.
O'Rourke looked up at him with a grin and said, "That's me."
The two shook hands -- and Rowland tweeted about it: "While using the restroom in the IMU I asked the stranger next to me if he was here to see Beto's rally — only to find out I was washing hands and talking to the next future president himself. Thank you for the shoutout on stage @BetoORourke #GoHawks." | | | | | | |
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