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As he huddled with advisers on Friday night, President Donald Trump was still upset by his sliding poll numbers and the avalanche of criticism he faced for suggesting a day earlier that ingesting disinfectant could be effective against the coronavirus.
Within seconds, the president was yelling, not at aides in the room, but on the phone, to his campaign manager Brad Parscale, three people familiar with the matter told CNN. Turning away from himself, Trump chided Parscale for a recent series of damaging poll numbers, even at one point threatening to sue Parscale. It is unclear how serious the president’s threat of a lawsuit was.
The White House did not immediately respond to a request for comment from CNN, and the Trump campaign declined to comment.
Faced with an increasingly uphill battle for reelection and aides trying to steer him in new, sometimes conflicting, directions, Trump has become increasingly nervous in the past week about his reelection prospects. Attacking Parscale was only the most recent manifestation of that anxiety.
“He is upset because he knows he was wrong in those briefings,” said a Republican close to the White House about Trump’s onslaught.
Last Wednesday, two days before Trump lashed out at Parscale, his campaign manager and several other top political advisers briefed him on the internal campaign and data from the Republican National Committee showing that the president was heading for defeat in the states. key to the battlefield. Parscale, RNC President Ronna McDaniel, and other advisers urged him to cut back on his daily, combative press conferences, noting data showing that the briefings were hurting him with critical voters in those states.
Trump has complained to attendees that his restricted travel has affected his numbers, not the reports.
A person familiar with the call said the message did not seem to fit the President, who instead changed the topic of the briefing topic.
But the next day, Trump’s flamboyant comments about the disinfectant only amplified those advisers’ impulses. Even when it erupted in Parscale on Friday night, during the briefing that day, the President did not answer questions. And the next day he dismissed the briefing entirely.
While Trump has cut his press conferences this week and even opted for a less combative tone during a press conference on Monday, attendees are unsure whether the new approach will continue. And Trump has still found places to answer reporters’ questions and share his views on the day’s news, even during long sprays in the Oval Office.
Despite the outbreak, two sources said Trump and Parscale sorted things out later that Friday night.
But Parscale, who has been working from his home in South Florida for the past month, flew back to Washington on Tuesday to meet with his boss.
Two sources familiar with the matter said Parscale spent several hours at the White House, where he discussed the reelection strategy with Trump and secured his approval for new campaign announcements that will hit former Vice President Joe Biden, the alleged Democratic candidate, for his stance. about China.
