SCOTT HORSLEY, BYLINE: Many conservatives voted for Donald Trump because of his promise to put a conservative on the Supreme Court. As we approach the 100-day mark Saturday, NPR's Scott Horsley looks at whether the president has delivered on those promises. The plan included steps to boost security, protect American workers and reduce corruption in Washington. Flynn's departure cleared the way for a well-received overhaul of the National Security Council.During his presidential campaign, Donald Trump offered what he called a 100-day action plan, a roadmap of what he wanted to get done in his first three months. One of the lowest moments of Trump's young administration was the forced resignation of national security adviser Michael Flynn, who misled the White House about his Russia ties. The morning after his Oval Office row with his staff, he tweeted a series of inflammatory accusations about his predecessor wiretapping Trump's New York skyscraper. Sessions' decision overshadowed Trump's well-received first address to Congress days earlier it was a speech the White House hoped would give the president a burst of momentum.īut ultimately it was Trump himself who created the biggest distraction. He was particularly incensed by the steady drip of revelations about his campaign's possible ties to Russia.Īfter Attorney General Jeff Sessions stepped aside from Russia investigations because of his own undisclosed contacts with a Russian ambassador, Trump unleashed on his top advisers in an Oval Office meeting. He's frequently blamed his team for being unable to quash negative stories. Trump's frustration with a lack of progress has sometimes erupted in anger - and sometimes in the direction of his political advisers. Trump did meet his goal of starting work on the plan in his first 100 days, but another tough challenge awaits on Capitol Hill as he still contends with health care. Those are core Republican principles that would require lawmakers to eliminate or reduce precious tax breaks enjoyed by millions of people. The proposal lacks the details about making taxes simpler and more efficient in ways that don't add to the federal government's mounting debt. The president's declaration last week that his team would release a tax proposal before the 100 day mark startled some in the White House, who scrambled to put together the one-page outline that was released Wednesday. Sometimes so quickly that his own advisers can't keep up. Restless in Washington, Trump is working at "breakneck speed," chief of staff Reince Priebus told reporters. The White House is taking a similar approach on the president's tax plan. To bridge the divides, Trump's advisers have worked to moderate between the factions as his team tries to revive the health bill. In the AP interview, Trump said there was "a pretty vast area" between the approach by the most conservative members of his party and those who are more moderate. But no amount of bowling can overcome the division in the Republican Party. The White House has hosted 230 members of Congress, and there have been 10 bowling sessions in the Executive Mansion's basement. Now they've begun to compensate with outreach. None of Trump's top advisers had deep experience in legislating. "Probably we were a little bit surprised when we engaged some of the conservative groups on health care that they felt they'd been left out of the conversation from the Hill." "Outreach to partner organizations starting sooner is helpful and I think that you will see that," said Marc Short, the White House legislative director. The takeaway: working behind the scenes with outside groups, which lined up solidly behind Gorsuch, and lawmakers can pay dividends. The contrast between the scuttled first attempt on health care and the relative smooth sailing of Gorsuch was a learning experience. In the weeks after his inauguration, the realities set it. But Trump's roughest lesson has come from Congress, which has balked at his attempt to repeal the Obama-era health law his party campaigned against for years.ĭuring the campaign, Trump said the Affordable Care Act would be gone on his first day in the White House. Since then, they've pushed back on his rewritten travel ban and his attempt to cut federal money for cities that harbor people who are in the United States illegally. Just days into Trump's presidency, the courts rejected his first travel ban. "In business, you make a decision and it happens. "This is tougher than what he thought," said Trump friend and business partner Phil Ruffin, who has visited the president twice since he took office Jan. And the human responsibility," Trump said in an Associated Press interview, assessing the difficulty of the presidency. "I really just see the bigness of it all, but also the responsibility.
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