Trump Fury Rattles Aides as Midterm Woes Take Worse Turn: “He’s Angry”

A frustrated Donald Trump is mulling more personnel changes, Politico reports, potentially targeting his Commerce and Labor secretaries. As one official confides: “He’s very angry and he’s going to be moving people.” The Politico piece depicts unnerved aides parsing his fury like tea leaves and disconcertedly leaking to reporters about who’s on “thin ice.” Crucially, Trump is mulling changes that would make him look better on the economy—where a new poll is absolutely brutal—and in hopes of getting them through before a midterm loss makes them harder. Indeed, Time reports that his advisers cautiously delivered bad news to him about internal polling showing that his midterm problems have gotten worse due to the war. We talked to New Republic staff writer Kate Aronoff, who writes well about the crises Trump is losing control over. We discuss all these machinations, why real-world complexities are so elusive to Trump, and the real meaning of his ongoing collision with the limits of his magical thinking. Listen to this episode here.