President Trump's lone representative on the Sunday shows today was his senior policy advisor Stephen Miller.
Miller, a true believing populist nationalist, was a prime mover of the controversial travel ban. He didn't retreat one inch or acknowledge a single Administration mistake during his appearances today.
A big reason the first three weeks of the Trump presidency have been such a rollercoaster: the intense, daily competition between two very different world views in the West Wing — those who want radical confrontation at home and abroad, versus those who want to conform better to Washington and international norms.
Hence, the wild swings from confrontation over a "One China" policy to total accommodation, or a full-court fight over extreme vetting to growing momentum to simply fix it.
As Jonathan Swan pointed out last week, in the wake of a devastating election season, Dems are rallying together with a slew of grassroots supporters to fight Trump and the reigning GOP. Although there are differences between the goals and methods of the conservative Tea Party and the liberal resistance, in some ways, it feels like we've seen this all before.
The only person grabbing headlines as often as Trump these days is Steve Bannon, who quietly advised Trump during the campaign and now serves as the White House Chief Strategist.
While some of the many accusations and theories about him may be true, there's more to the story. Unlike SNL's comedic depiction of him as a soulless skeleton, Bannon's long-formed, nuanced and highly controversial beliefs make him a far more complex character. Here's some surprising facts about Steve Bannon...
Gary Cohn, the former Goldman Sachs executive who runs economic policy inside the White House, is getting star treatment this weekend. Both the Wall Street Journal and New York Times popped highly choreographed pieces on Cohn's rise.
If this sentence is true, it should worry people who work for President Trump — and people who're thinking about it. And bringing in good people is a challenge right now: Talented, experienced Republicans who have turned down big jobs tell me it's partly because it just seems too risky right now.
Trump has been increasingly focused on who was with him or against him during his campaign, according to several people who have spoken with him in recent days.
The WSJ has a useful rundown of how a group of Mexican businessmen, politicians and activists are working to make it harder for Trump to deport Mexican nationals.
An ad campaign urging people to fight their deportations in court. The goal is to gum up the court system so badly it can't push through deportation and extradition orders.
$50 million from the government to help illegal immigrants facing deportation.
"President Enrique Peña Nieto has instructed the country's 50 consulates in the U.S. to defend migrants."
Politicians threatening to stop cooperating with the U.S. on anti-drug and counter-terror operations.
A group of lawmakers are working on legislation to ban Mexico paying for Trump's wall.
"I am reading that the great border WALL will cost more than the government originally thought, but I have not gotten involved in the........design or negotiations yet. When I do, just like with the F-35 FighterJet or the Air Force One Program, price will come WAY DOWN!"
The background: the estimated price tag of Trump's wall keeps getting higher and higher, as Axios noted last month. It's gone from $4 billion in 2015 (Trump) all the way up to Homeland Security saying nearly $22 billion in a report released by Reuters on Friday. That's not even the ceiling, as MIT estimates it will cost between $27-40 billion.
Why it matters: Trump is hoping that the public will trust him enough not to revolt against a potentially shocking price tag, enabling Congress to build the wall without a political mess. And he thinks the examples of the F-35 fighter and Air Force One will get him across that finish line.
Trump's hanging out and playing some golf with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe at Mar-a-Lago this weekend. And he probably needs it. It hasn't been a great week for Team Trump.
