Sure, Donald Trump is a serial flip-flopper—for every position he takes, there's a polar opposite tweet just waiting to be unearthed in his Twitter treasure trove and today’s no exception. Even on health care—GOP priority No. 1—Trump was holding a Rose Garden party one month for the repeal deal he pressured House Republicans into passing, then calling the bill "mean" a month later.
But in the last 12 hours, Trump’s notorious fungibility has become a Tasmanian Devil swirl of warp-speed proportions ever since Democrats Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi released a statement Wednesday night saying they had reached an agreement with Trump to protect some 800,000 Dreamers from deportation. We are now finding out what it looks like when Trump defies the nativist anti-immigrant haters who make up the staunchest part of his hardcore base.
Check out the immediate fury from ol' Steve “Cantaloupe Calves” King last night:
White supremacist platform Breitbart News dubbed Trump “Amnesty Don” and Ann Coulter went full-on “Off with his head!”
“At this point, who DOESN'T want Trump impeached?” Coulter tweeted on Thursday morning.
Trump’s fragile ego isn’t made for this. He woke up Thursday morning swinging. First, he tweeted that “
no deal” had been reached. Less than 10 minutes later
he assured us that “The WALL [...] will continue to be built.”
But wait, hold on a second, lightin’ Don—what about the kids? Oh yeah, them.
Again, less than ten minutes later:
Oh, crap, it’s time to head to Florida. Let’s tweet it!
All that transpired in under an hour. But now it’s time to really buckle up, folks—here come the pool reports from journalists traveling with Trump to Florida to talk about hurricane relief efforts. Here’s just a few snippets.
Travel Pool Report 1: Trump boards Air Force 1
Responding to a shouted question on whether he favors "amnesty," Trump shouted back: "The word is DACA."
Travel Pool Report 2: Trump talks DACA
"We're working on a plan - subject to getting massive border controls. We're working on a plan for DACA. People want to see that happen. You have 800,000 young people, brought here, no fault of their own. So we're working on a plan, we'll see how it works out. We're going to get massive border security as part of that. And I think something can happen, we'll see what happens, but something will happen."
[inaudible question]
"The wall will come later, we're right now renovating large sections of wall, massive sections, making it brand new."
Travel Pool Report 2a: White House spokesperson clears things up
Lindsay Walters says there are bad tweets out there, and the president has in fact spoken with Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan this morning. She declined to detail the calls.
Walters: "The president spoke to McConnell and Ryan this morning."
Travel Pool Report 3: Trump talks DACA deal, clears up that The WALL is a top priority
"We're working on a deal .. we are looking at extreme border security .., we also have to get the wall."
He denied they were looking at "amnesty," but said "we are looking at taking care of people."
"But Number one we have to have a wall."
Travel Pool Report 4: The WALL, extreme security, and Paul Ryan
“Very important is the wall. We have to be sure the wall isn’t obstructed. Very important is the wall. We have to be sure the wall isn’t obstructed because without the wall I wouldn’t do anything. … It doesn’t have to be here but they can’t obstruct the wall if it’s in a budget or anything else.”
“We’re not looking at citizenship. We’re not looking at amnesty. We’re looking at allowing people to stay here. … I just spoke with Paul Ryan, everybody’s on board. … We’re talking about taking care of people, people who were brought here, people who’ve done a good job.”
“We’ll only do it if we get extreme security, not only surveillance but everything that goes with surveillance. If there’s not a wall, we’re doing nothing.”
In Travel Pool Report 5, Trump talked taxes and by Travel Pool Report 6, Trump had gotten to hurricane recovery.
Whew. We’re gonna need a breather from that whirlwind. All that is to say, Trump appears to want a DACA deal but he’s hit a WALL, so to speak.
For now, we’ll refrain from reading more deeply into that heap of quotes. Who can possibly say what comes next?