President Donald Trump is on a charm offensive this week, after inking a bi-partisan deal to raise the debt ceiling with Democrats Rep. Nancy Pelosi and Sen. Chuck Schumer, and he’s going to make both parties see eye-to-eye if he has to sit at his White House dinner table for the entire month of September.
According to Axios, Trump has recently been fretting over his public image, telling close staff, forlornly, that, “People really f@&@ing hate me,” and asking for advice on how he can turn around his public relations operation — a tough ask, given that a recent study claims 91% of Trump’s media coverage is negative.
Trump’s own solution seems to be what he claims to be best at: striking major deals between Republicans and Democrats that solve some of the country’s larger problems. He started with the debt ceiling — though conservatives decried his expansion of the national debt — and over the course of the next several weeks, Trump says he’ll be inviting lawmakers from both parties to his dinner table for “peace talks.”
The dinners will include moderate Democrats, and a handful of liberals from states that went for Trump in 2016, including. Sens. Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), and Joe Manchin III (D-WV), and a few Republican Senators from the all powerful Senate Finance Committee, like Sens. Orrin G. Hatch (R-UT), Patrick J. Toomey (R-PA) and John Thune (R-SD).
The first “working dinner” is set for Tuesday night in the White House dining room. Trump has yet to announce what’s on either the menu or the agenda, but it’s probably tax reform; the President is about to embark on a multi-city listening tour, where he’ll promote key parts of his tax reform plan.
Details on the plan have yet to be released, but the Treasury Department says “100 people” are working on the plan, and that it will likely include at least a 15% business tax rate.
Sources close to the White House says that if this dinner goes well, it will likely be the first of many. Tired of seeming like the scapegoat for all America’s ills, Trump wants things to move forward, and he’s willing to hear from both sides how he can make that happen. Further subjects might include a long-term solution for the debt ceiling, and a bipartisan immigration reform deal (something Trump says he hopes happens before the DACA executive order officially expires in six months).
The President also seems willing to ink the deals without the support of major Republicans, who he has criticized for ineffectiveness in recent weeks. In place of Rep. Paul Ryan and Sen. Mitch McConnell, Trump is delving into Republican ranks, pulling up-and-coming legislators and Senate veterans like Hatch to help craft legislation, rather than party leadership.
Trump is also bucking his own six-month governing strategy, reaching out to moderate Democrats (and even non-moderate ones) to make inroads where he feels deals can be struck. It may not be what he ran on, but it may be what actually works; so far, Democrats, at least, seem to be pleased.
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