Is Trump’s New Tack On Trade A Bannon Victory Over Kushner?
Image by Getty
As President Trump returned on Thursday to old accusations that foreign powers are cheating America on trade, it looked as if Steve Bannon – on the ropes for a number of weeks – might have a new lease on life within the administration.
“He’s manically focused on these trade issues,” Bannon told The New York Times. Skepticism of free trade was a hallmark of Trump’s White House bid, and was seen as part of the nationalist departure from Republican orthodoxy that Bannon helped engineer.
The president’s executive order called for an investigation into whether China or South Korea were engaged in unfair trade practices in their exporting of steel.
Before the executive order announcement, the West Wing’s moderates – including Trump son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner – seemed to be outmaneuvering the nationalists on economic policy and overall influence.
The president referred to Bannon as a “guy who works for me,” bragged that he was his own strategist and did nothing to tamp down rumors that Bannon soon might find himself booted out of the West Wing.
But as his polls sink and his administration seems unmoored, Trump might be returning to the red-meat message on the economy and trade partners that proved so popular in the heartland.
Contact Daniel J. Solomon at [email protected] or on Twitter @DanielJSolomon
Why I became the Forward’s editor-in-chief
You are surely a friend of the Forward if you’re reading this. And so it’s with excitement and awe — of all that the Forward is, was, and will be — that I introduce myself to you as the Forward’s newest editor-in-chief.
And what a time to step into the leadership of this storied Jewish institution! For 129 years, the Forward has shaped and told the American Jewish story. I’m stepping in at an intense time for Jews the world over. We urgently need the Forward’s courageous, unflinching journalism — not only as a source of reliable information, but to provide inspiration, healing and hope.
, editor-in-chiefSupport our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
