Trump, and the world, readies for a ‘leap into the dark’

The president-elect has promised to upend, if not gut, the system he is about to take over.

“It really is a leap into the dark. And I think that’s true for the country and that’s true for Trump,” said veteran GOP Rep. Tom Cole of Donald Trump.

As President-elect Donald Trump races to take over the White House in just four days — with fast-action promises to dismantle Obamacare, appoint a conservative new Supreme Court justice and overhaul the tax code in short order — Democrats and Republicans alike are bracing for a new reality of a Trump-run Washington.

The holiday weekend was a blunt reminder that no one knows what exactly comes next with Trump.

He attacked a civil rights icon as “all talk, talk, talk - no action” on Twitter. His staff floated the idea of moving news conferences — and possibly reporters’ work space — out of the White House itself. He suggested lifting sanctions on Russia in exchange for a nuclear reduction deal. And he said in an interview with the Washington Post that the health care package he’s crafting would have “insurance for everybody” — a radical departure from GOP orthodoxy.

“It really is a leap into the dark. And I think that’s true for the country and that’s true for Trump,” said veteran GOP Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), who has previously held several top Republican posts, including chief of staff to the Republican National Committee. “And that’s what the country wanted to do.”

On Friday, the pageantry and choreography of Inauguration Day will be much the same as it always has been: a church service for the Trumps at St. Johns near the White House, tea and coffee between the incoming and outgoing first families, a swearing-in on the National Mall, an inaugural address and black-tie balls.

But by week’s end it will be Donald J. Trump sitting behind the same “Resolute desk” that John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan used, receiving the intelligence briefings and nuclear codes that had been the purview of Barack Obama, and occupying the Oval Office of every modern American president.

“Whether he’s ready or not is even more indiscernible than usual,” Cole said. “He’s never held public office. He’s never been a governor. He’s never been a senator and we don’t have a lot of votes that give you a pattern of what he thinks….In terms of Congress, I can assure you that we’re not ready.”

With his surprise health care promise and attacks on African-American Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.) after Lewis questioned the legitimacy of Trump’s election the day before, Trump showed he’s still more than happy to discard the usual rulebook.

His supporters are delighting about whomever and whatever he takes on next.

“President Trump is going to be the same guy that campaigned and Washington’s going to have to wake up to that,” said Barry Bennett, a former senior Trump campaign adviser.

He will be able to shake world financial markets, shame outsourcing American companies and cajole Congress — all with a single tweet.

Democrats, meanwhile, have gone from change they could believe in eight years ago to change they still can’t quite believe is happening now.

“I'd like to start by answering the question that's on everybody's mind,” said Saturday Night Live actor Alec Baldwin, playing Trump at a press conference skit over the weekend. “Yes, this is real life. This is really happening.”

On Capitol Hill, Trump’s Cabinet picks face another week of confirmation hearings but so far no nominees appear at risk of rejection by the Senate, despite questions of incoming Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s ties to Russia, domestic violence accusations against incoming Labor Secretary Andy Puzder and the inexperience in housing issues of Ben Carson, the incoming housing secretary. Trump has filled out every cabinet position except agriculture secretary, though thousands of federal agency jobs remain to be named.

It’s not clear how many of Trump’s selections will be confirmed on his first day, but lawmakers are already quickly advancing retired Gen. James Mattis as Trump’s defense secretary, who requires a special congressional waiver, along with several others.

Trump has promised an intense and aggressive early agenda, including unwinding many of the executive actions the Obama administration used in the last six years as an end-run around a Republican-controlled Congress.
“We'll be doing some pretty good signings on Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday and Thursday and Friday,” Trump said in his only post-election news conference last Wednesday. “And then also the next week. And you're all invited.”

He has said he also wants to announce his Supreme Court choice in his second week, as well as to repeal and replace Obama’s health care law “probably the same day, could be the same hour.”

But Trump, who has operated as the mostly autonomous leader of his own multi-national empire for decades, will now confront the reality of an often-grinding Congress, where committee work, filibusters and demands for regular order can slow even the most ambitious of agendas to a crawl — even with total Republican control.

At one point, for instance, there had been hope inside the transition of Trump signing legislation to repeal Obamacare in his first week. The arcane budget reconciliation process, along with unanswered questions of what would replace the health law, have now pushed that to February, at the earliest. Trump’s advisers have already begun strategizing with GOP lawmakers and aides on how to proceed with both the health law and tax reform.

Incoming White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, who is also new to government, has said he has been in touch daily with outgoing chief of staff Denis McDonough to prepare for the handover of power. And last Friday, Priebus and 30 other top incoming Trump administration officials met with top Obama-era officials to talk about the transition.

Inside the West Wing, Joe Hagin, one of Trump’s three deputy chiefs of staff and a veteran of the George W. Bush White House, is seen as crucial to standing up the operation quickly.

“Thank God they got Joe Hagin because Joe will make that first day bearable,” said Bennett, who has started a lobbying firm with former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski down the block from the White House to capitalize on the new Washington world order. “Unlike previous administrations, there are precious few people with government experience. Precious few. Precious, precious few.”

Which, of course, was the whole idea.

“The American people spoke decisively,” Vice President-elect Mike Pence said Sunday on CBS. “They wanted change. And I promise them come noon this coming Friday, change really begins.”