Humiliating Jeff Sessions

As it becomes increasingly clear that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson does not know how to conduct foreign policy and has failed to take control of the State Department, President Trump has engaged in a very public campaign to humiliate and to force out… Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

No one expected that Donald Trump had the experience to take the reins of the federal government. No one expected that he knew enough about policy to take the lead in policy debates. And yet, everyone expected that a business executive would know how to conduct himself as a chief executive… and not just playing one on television.

Many of Trump’s supporters were thrilled to have someone who understood business in the White House. And yet, if you want to drain the swamp you also need to understand the swamp. You need to understand its flora and fauna, how it functions and where its weak points are. You cannot do it with bluster and bravado.

Now, President Trump is offering us all a workshop in how not to exercise executive leadership. Were it not appalling, it would be breathtaking. If an executive is not loyal to his staff he has no business expecting them to be loyal to him. While showing disloyalty to his most loyal supporter, Trump has been trying to disparage Sessions’ loyalty to him. It's yet another instance of how not to lead.

Ask yourself which political leader was first to support the candidacy of Donald Trump. Which cabinet member has worked the hardest and had the most success implementing the Trump agenda? And which cabinet member has the most friends and supporters in the United States Senate?

The answer to all the questions is: Jeff Sessions.

And yet, at a moment when Trump needs votes from Senate Republicans he is spending his time called Sessions “beleaguered” and “weak.” He seems to think that he can bully the Attorney General into launching another investigation into Clintonian perfidy. No one would be unhappy to see the Clintons exposed for the grifters they are, but Trump’s public bullying of Sessions will accomplish precisely the opposite. It will make it impossible for Sessions to do anything against the Clintons. The only people being served by the Trumpian attack on Sessions are the Clintons. Trump thinks he is attacking them. He is protecting them. One understands that if Sessions resigns, the Senate will never approve any new candidate who is nearly as conservative or Trumpian. One understands it. Trump does not.

Many of Sessions’ former Senate colleagues have rushed to defend him. The Wall Street Journal summed up the problem nicely in an editorial:

Instead [Trump] continued to demean Jeff Sessions, and in the process he is harming himself, alienating allies, and crossing dangerous legal and political lines.

And also:

Mr. Trump’s suggestion that his Attorney General prosecute his defeated opponent is the kind of crude political retribution one expects in Erdogan’s Turkey or Duterte’s Philippines.

As you know, the Wall Street Journal editorial page does not make a habit of promoting leftist causes.

It continues:

As a candidate, Mr. Trump thought he could say anything and get away with it, and most often he did. A sitting President is not a one-man show. He needs allies in politics and allies to govern. Mr. Trump’s treatment of Jeff Sessions makes clear that he will desert both at peril to his Presidency.

No matter how powerful the office of the Presidency, it needs department leaders to execute policy. If by firing or forcing out Jeff Sessions Mr. Trump makes clear that his highest priority is executing personal political desires or whims, he will invite resignations from his first-rate Cabinet and only political hacks will stand in to replace them. And forget about Senate confirmation of his next AG.

The Journal concludes:

Even on the day that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was scraping together enough Republican votes to avoid a humiliating defeat for the President on health care, Mr. Trump was causing Senators to publicly align themselves with Mr. Sessions. Past some point of political erosion, Mr. Trump’s legislative agenda will become impossible to accomplish. Mr. Trump prides himself as a man above political convention, but there are some conventions he can’t ignore without destroying his Presidency.

Remember, President Trump is dealing with human beings. All executives do. If they think that they are dealing with characters in a play that they are directing, they will have serious trouble getting anything done. Trump should know that Sessions has far more friends in Washington than he does.

Last night on CNN, a sworn enemy of everything that Sessions stands for and is trying to accomplish, Sen. Bernie Sanders commented on Trump’s treatment of his former colleague:

You don’t treat another human being that way.

It’s no way to run a government, or even a railroad.