Meet the New Boss
15th November 2024
Donald Trump’s visit to Washington on Wednesday had all the hallmarks of his first term. There was the cable-news pageantry of Trump Force One’s arrival in and departure from D.C. There was a cordial and reassuring meeting in the Oval Office between Trump and President Biden. There was the reelection of Speaker Mike Johnson within the House GOP and an orderly transfer of leadership to a new generation of Senate Republicans. And there was mounting shock, disbelief, and alarm within the bipartisan political class at Trump’s selections for secretary of defense, director of national intelligence, attorney general, and secretary of health and human services.
Four years of the somnolent, garbled, and often out-of-sight Joe Biden, accompanied by the vacant and aloof Kamala Harris, had dulled the senses. By dawn Thursday, some of us were beginning to recall the unrelenting nature of Trump’s first administration: a near-constant gale of news, hot takes, controversies, scandals, policies, personalities, and surprises. Reporters, commentators, wonks, bureaucrats, and elected officials are left searching for ballast. The situation is unlikely to change in the coming months. Why? Because the Trump whirlwind has returned.