By Albert R. Hunt
Bloomberg View
If you’re associated with the administration of President Donald Trump, there’s not much to be thankful for this week. With the exception of Defense Secretary James Mattis, no insider has elevated his or her standing in 10 months and no superstar has emerged as in previous administrations.
Already, Trump’s chief of staff, national security adviser, press secretary, communications chief and Health and Human Services secretary are out, none leaving with dignity intact. His former campaign manager and a deputy have been indicted along with a campaign foreign-policy adviser. Michael Flynn, the shelved national security adviser, is in the crosshairs of the special counsel investigating Trump’s links with Russia, Robert Mueller.
Here are some people in the Trump orbit who have taken big reputational hits.
John Kelly: When the former Marine Corps general was tapped as White House chief of staff last summer, the idea was to bring discipline to a chaotic place. Success has been minimal; the best argument is that the chaos is not as bad as before.
Kelly has proved to be no more successful than anybody else in the inner circle in controlling Trump’s rants and raves. By defending his boss’s dishonesty and churlishness, Kelly has damaged himself. After Trump bickered publicly in October with the widow of a slain American soldier, the White House trotted out Kelly, whose son was killed in Afghanistan. Kelly then made false accusations against a Florida congresswoman who had criticized Trump’s behavior in a phone call with the widow. A few days later, Kelly took up Trump’s defense of Confederate monuments by asserting that the American Civil War was caused by “the lack of an ability to compromise” rather than by slavery.
Paul Ryan: The veteran Wisconsin lawmaker once enjoyed a reputation as a serious student of policy and an embodiment of political decency. Then he became House Speaker, Trump became president, and the two joined forces behind two ill-considered legislative initiatives that appear so far to be political and substantive fiascos.
One was the failed attempt to replace the Affordable Care Act with a piece of legislation that even many Obamacare opponents regarded with horror. The other is the unpopular effort now underway to pass a hastily assembled tax cut focused on corporations and wealthy individuals, which has passed the House and faces an uncertain legislative future. Now the right wing considers Ryan weak, many mainstream Republicans fear that he lacks political skills and some longtime admirers lament his failure to stand up to the White House.
The Cabinet: Secretary of State Rex Tillerson appears miscast, incompatible with Trump, and is likely to leave soon — so much for the idea that the skills that led him to the top of Exxon Mobil Corp. would make him an effective government reformer. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who is compatible with Trump, was a Wall Street middleweight who has demonstrated scant expertise or persuasive power since coming to Washington. Attorney General Jeff Sessions has struggled to defend shifting accounts of his discussions with campaign aides about potential contacts with Russia. Only Mattis has distinguished himself in one of the four top cabinet posts.
Ed Rollins: Rollins, one of the more skillful, engaging and candid political operatives, ran President Ronald Reagan’s 1984 re-election campaign and Jack Kemp’s national run three years later. Eager to get back into the action last year, he embraced Trump. Now he’s working to elect a Trumpist, Kelli Ward, to an Arizona Senate seat.
Rollins surely knows that Ward is no disciple of Reagan or Kemp, two Republicans known for their optimism about the power of conservative solutions to pressing social and economic problems. By contrast, Ward spews right-wing vitriol. When Sen. John McCain was diagnosed with cancer and there was an outpouring of support for this military hero, she called on him to resign so she could take the seat. She embraces kooky conspiracy theorists, bashes immigrants and suggests that the U.S. should leave the United Nations.
Albert R. Hunt is a Bloomberg View columnist. He was the executive editor of Bloomberg News, before which he was a reporter, bureau chief and executive Washington editor at the Wall Street Journal. Readers may email him at ahunt1@bloomberg.net.
