The Note: The devil is in the lack of details

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April 27, 2017

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The devil is in the lack of details

The big story

The "micro-details," we have been told, will have to wait. This is about the big picture for President Trump, and nobody knows that better than the members of Congress whose votes he needs. The something-for-everybody start to planned tax overhaul announced by the Trump administration sets up a series of tests for Trump, plus the conservative movement he is well along in redefining. If Republicans can't rally around tax cuts, what can they get behind? But not having even rough estimates of what it means for people, including quite wealthy people, like the president himself? Having no conception, beyond aspirational growth figures, of how it will be paid for? The clear-as-day statement by the Treasury secretary that the president has "no intention" of releasing his taxes? These are the small things that tend to block very big things. But the president is closing his 100 days out like you might expect, thinking big, perhaps unrealistically so, and commanding enough attention to stay in the middle of all the action.

The sleeper story

NAFTA, he doesn't hafta. President Trump sought to close the door on the rip-up NAFTA phase of his presidency with phone calls to the presidents of Mexico and Canada, and a statement: "It is my privilege to bring NAFTA up to date through renegotiation." The anti-trade campaign chants are still echoing but add this to the list of shifts that chart the policy transformation of the Trump White House. Trump still has no apparent fixed ideology, though the nationalist wing continues to lose out. And don't underestimate what this means for Trump's relationship with Congress. From China-North Korea to Russia-Syria to the Export–Import Bank of the United States and beyond, the fact that Trump isn't backing up his hardline rhetoric with similar actions goes over well in Republican caucus meetings.

The shiny story

It's Trump v. courts, Round...9? President Trump told the Washington Examiner that he would "absolutely" consider proposals to break up the U.S. 9th Circuit court system, which has frustrated his travel ban and sanctuary-city crackdown. Then came a classic Trump formulation: "There are many people that want to break up the 9th Circuit. It's outrageous." The proposals are out there, but to be clear: Trump is not going to pass a reorganization of the judiciary that breaks up the existing circuit-court system. He is most likely not going to even really try. What he's doing is throwing high, hard ones at judges, which is what he does with adversaries, whether they wear robes or not. Just as important in this latest scuffle is that the district court judge in San Francisco who is blocking the move against sanctuary cities is doing what other federal judges have done before: using the words of Trump, plus his top aides, as evidence.

TLDR

The White House unveiled its tax plan, but there were few details and no information on how it will affect Americans, though there is a declaration that President Trump has "no intention" of releasing his own tax returns.