July 31, 2017

Donald Trump Is Steadily Firing Everyone Who Helped Him Win

Shawn Thew/CNP via ZUMA

Fight disinformation: Sign up for the free Mother Jones Daily newsletter and follow the news that matters.

Ezra Klein notes this morning that President Trump has turned on some of the people who were among his earliest and staunchest supporters:

Attorney General Sessions was one of Trump’s earliest, staunchest supporters. On the night Trump won the election, he singled out Sessions for special praise. He thanked Sessions for being “the first man, first senator, first major, major politician” to endorse him, going on to say Sessions was “highly respected in Washington because he’s as smart as you get.”

….During the campaign, Priebus was among Trump’s most consequential allies….No matter what Trump said, or what Trump did, Priebus kept the RNC in his corner, and, once Trump had won the nomination, turned it into the campaign machinery Trump had never bothered to build.

I don’t think this is just a coincidence. I’m averse to grand theories of Trump, but two things that are obvious about him are (a) he’s ultrasensitive about how narrow his victory was and (b) he doesn’t like to share credit with others. James Comey was a daily reminder that a lot of people think Trump won only because Comey’s last-minute letter sank Hillary Clinton, so Comey had to go. A lot of people credit Reince Priebus with keeping Trump viable during the primaries, so Priebus had to go. A lot of people think Jeff Sessions was instrumental in bringing evangelical support on board early in the campaign, so Sessions has to go. Trump hasn’t yet fired Steve Bannon, a guy who gets a lot of credit for turning around the Trump campaign during the summer, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he does eventually. This is probably one reason that Bannon keeps such a low profile. The last thing he wants is more magazine covers praising him as “Trump’s Svengali” or somesuch.

Back in his real estate days, Trump’s staff was essentially invisible—and nobody cared about them anyway. Trump never had to share credit with anyone. But Washington plays by different rules, and that drives Trump crazy. There’s not much he can do about it except to fire anyone who helped him win, so that’s what he’s doing.

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

WHO DOESN’T LOVE A POSITIVE STORY—OR TWO?

“Great journalism really does make a difference in this world: it can even save kids.”

That’s what a civil rights lawyer wrote to Julia Lurie, the day after her major investigation into a psychiatric hospital chain that uses foster children as “cash cows” published, letting her know he was using her findings that same day in a hearing to keep a child out of one of the facilities we investigated.

That’s awesome. As is the fact that Julia, who spent a full year reporting this challenging story, promptly heard from a Senate committee that will use her work in their own investigation of Universal Health Services. There’s no doubt her revelations will continue to have a big impact in the months and years to come.

Like another story about Mother Jones’ real-world impact.

This one, a multiyear investigation, published in 2021, exposed conditions in sugar work camps in the Dominican Republic owned by Central Romana—the conglomerate behind brands like C&H and Domino, whose product ends up in our Hershey bars and other sweets. A year ago, the Biden administration banned sugar imports from Central Romana. And just recently, we learned of a previously undisclosed investigation from the Department of Homeland Security, looking into working conditions at Central Romana. How big of a deal is this?

“This could be the first time a corporation would be held criminally liable for forced labor in their own supply chains,” according to a retired special agent we talked to.

Wow.

And it is only because Mother Jones is funded primarily by donations from readers that we can mount ambitious, yearlong—or more—investigations like these two stories that are making waves.

About that: It’s unfathomably hard in the news business right now, and we came up about $28,000 short during our recent fall fundraising campaign. We simply have to make that up soon to avoid falling further behind than can be made up for, or needing to somehow trim $1 million from our budget, like happened last year.

If you can, please support the reporting you get from Mother Jones—that exists to make a difference, not a profit—with a donation of any amount today. We need more donations than normal to come in from this specific blurb to help close our funding gap before it gets any bigger.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate