Trump has picked the dumbest political fight ever

You can't be a successful president when you're waging war on a Congress controlled by your own party

Torn apart.
(Image credit: Illustrated | Image courtesy iStock)

Presidents have been squabbling with Congress for as long as we have had presidents and Congress. But Donald Trump, smasher of convention, may be giving us something we haven't seen in our lifetimes: a president in all-out war against a Congress his own party controls.

Why is he doing it? He still doesn't seem to have managed to wrap his head around the idea that Congress is a collection of 535 egos, fears, and agendas, ones that may or may not line up perfectly with his own at any given moment. Tensions between President Trump and Congress have been rising, particularly Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whom Trump blames for not passing a repeal of the Affordable Care Act. Their relationship "has disintegrated to the point that they have not spoken to each other in weeks," The New York Times reported, "and Mr. McConnell has privately expressed uncertainty that Mr. Trump will be able to salvage his administration after a series of summer crises." Even after McConnell put out a statement insisting that they're working well together, Trump still took to Twitter to berate the majority leader, producing encouraging headlines like "Trump-McConnell feud simmers as GOP watches in horror."

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Paul Waldman

Paul Waldman is a senior writer with The American Prospect magazine and a blogger for The Washington Post. His writing has appeared in dozens of newspapers, magazines, and web sites, and he is the author or co-author of four books on media and politics.