It was only a matter of hours before the White House would start leaking like a sieve about Donald Trump's reaction to chief of staff John Kelly telling lawmakers Wednesday that Trump's position on the wall was "uninformed." As we all knew, Trump took the news like the tempestuous man-child he has repeatedly proven to be. The New York Times writes:
According to one person familiar with the president’s thinking, Mr. Trump was livid when he learned that Mr. Kelly had described him as “evolving” in his immigration position. Throughout the evening on Wednesday, Mr. Trump fielded calls from allies who described Mr. Kelly’s comments to Congress as undermining the president, stoking Mr. Trump’s fury.
The president — who never likes it when someone characterizes his thinking — vented his anger to Mr. Kelly and to allies, according to the person familiar with the president’s thinking. It was similar to a moment during the campaign in April of 2016, when Paul Manafort — who had just been hired to the Trump campaign — was caught on tape at a meeting with Republican National Committee members saying of Mr. Trump, “the part he’s been playing is evolving.”
During Kelly's meeting with Democrats on the Hill—an attempt to avert the shithole shutdown barreling toward the GOP—he also made the fatal mistake of taking credit for leading Trump in the right direction on immigration.
After serving as homeland security secretary and commander of U.S. military forces in Latin America, Kelly told lawmakers that he has helped Trump “evolve on issues of the wall.”
“I had a lot to do with that,” he said of Trump’s change in position regarding border security, according to attendees.
Trump's White House aides clearly knew what was coming, with some denying that Kelly ever characterized Trump’s views as uninformed. Later on Wednesday, White House legislative director Marc Short told CNN: “I don’t recall General Kelly saying the president was uninformed," but rather that the policy had "evolved."
But the idea that the "evolve" framing would somehow reduce Trump's pique was laughable from the outset. Trump woke up tweeting about the suggestion Thursday morning.
“The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it. Parts will be, of necessity, see through and it was never intended to be built in areas where there is natural protection such as mountains, wastelands or tough rivers or water,” Trump wrote.
When asked about Kelly's comments by reporters later in the day, Trump said Kelly was "a very special guy" who is "doing a great job" and then denied that he ever said such a thing.
“No, he did not say that. He didn’t say it the way you would like him to say it.”
Sounds like Kelly might be trodding the path of others before him, namely Paul Manafort, Jeff Sessions, and Steve Bannon.