Eight months in politics is a lifetime.
On day one you moved aggressively to advance your legislative agenda by rolling back burdensome Obama era regulations, appointed Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court and hired skilled operators to run your departments and agencies.
In parallel with those activities, you fostered a sense of optimism in the business community that kept companies like Carrier and Ford from moving portions of their operations south of the border saving thousands of American jobs. This led to Apple’s historic announcement that it will move large scale manufacturing operations into the U.S. Further, the stock market continues its historic rise, culminating this week with the Dow hitting a record 22,000.
Mr. President, given the aforementioned successes, I am sure you find yourself perplexed by the inability of Congress to advance the American people’s agenda, starting with repealing and replacing Obamacare. This is a position that you may have not expected to be in while standing on the stage last November, taking a victory lap after decisively and legitimately defeating Hillary Clinton.
Last year, American’s fed up with the status quo and downward direction of our country voted for Donald J. Trump to shake up Washington and set the focus on the people instead of the swamp. The voters: Democrats, Republicans and Independents collectively supported you; because it became obvious the people lacked a strong voice in Washington. Your election became the people’s blunt instrument that would aggressively advocate for the American people over the narrow agendas of a few.
What you may have already surmised is that in Washington, you don’t get more with honey. The only way to advance change in this town is to have more leverage than the other guy. Unfortunately, in politics this takes the form of poll numbers, which in your case are hovering around an anemic 40 percent. Your core supporters will always support you. But there are a great many who could move into your camp if you pivot back to a key pillar of your campaign platform – rebuilding our country and putting people back to work.
Attacking healthcare out of the gate was a tall order. It’s too complicated to explain to the American people and so many members of Congress have differing views – creating the current state of legislative paralysis. As a beltway outsider, it logically made sense to believe your election was a mandate to change the status quo and shake things up. But, it would be foolish to think the majority of Republican’s or any Democrats would willingly go along with this strategy.
Let’s not forget, the Democrats are still in denial about their loss and many in the Republican establishment including the Never Trumpers feel their party has been hijacked by a populist. The Anti-Trump movement is organized and knows how to plant stories in the media to delegitimize your presidency, which has been aided by early administration growing pains and a few self-inflected wounds.
One of the best attributes about politics, similar to the New York real estate business, is that you can reinvent yourself. With the hiring of General John Kelly as White House Chief of Staff, you have an opportunity to hit the reset button and get your agenda back on track. General Kelly is an American patriot with four stars on his shoulder, a true leader in every sense and a man who commands the respect of many in Washington. He will bring order and stability to areas of the government that are operating outside of the command and control structure of the White House. You would be well served to take his counsel.
Moving forward, you must accept that you have few friends in Washington. Always remember, it was the American people that put you in office, not the Beltway elitists.
The legislative branch has many hard working men and women who want to see this country flourish. However, as per our U.S. Constitution, they are a separate branch of government that rightly values their independence. 435 of these people are constantly running for re-election and spook easily. The other 100 have six year terms, so they are in no rush to wholeheartedly adopt your agenda.
Mr. President, you say on the back of each Trump International Hotel key card that “hard work and vision, that’s what got us both here”. You grew a real estate business into an internationally renowned hospitality powerhouse and I bet that came with many challenges along the way.
Follow your gut and focus on the people and the economy - ignore the rest. Tax reform and infrastructure should be the next big agenda item. Your potential 2020 opponents are already setting the stage and hoping you will fail on those fronts, don’t let them.
Push forward and continue to go on the road and make your case to the American people. They will continue to support you and more will come aboard if you can show them tangible progress. The net result will be that your popularity will rise and Congress will follow you, because just like in sports everyone wants to be around a winner.
Anthony Figliola is an economic development expert and co-author of “Patronage, Waste and Favoritism – A Dark History of Constitutional Conventions.”