President Trump and his advisers struggled Tuesday to turn the nation’s focus toward his agenda of promoting job growth and national security, amid relentless media attention on the administration’s alleged contacts with Russia.
As he has since his inauguration, Mr. Trump held events to highlight the plight of working people, including coal miners and police officers.
At EPA headquarters, the president surrounded himself with two dozen coal miners from West Virginia as he signed an executive order aimed at encouraging more domestic fossil fuel production, including coal mining.
“You know what it says, right?” he told the miners as he signed the document. “You’re going back to work.”
At the White House, Mr. Trump met with leaders of the Fraternal Order of Police from across the nation and pledged to them, “I will always have your back 100 percent.”
“Sadly, our police are often prevented from doing their jobs,” Mr. Trump said. “In too many of our communities, violent crime is on the rise. These are painful realities that many in Washington don’t want to talk about. We have seen it all over.”
While Mr. Trump routinely disparages polls, none of them have him above water. The latest Rasmussen survey has Mr. Trump’s job approval rating at 45 percent, a drop of 10 percentage points since Feb. 17. His performance in the Gallup daily tracking poll has plummeted to 36 percent, including a drop of five points among Republicans and nine points among independents over the past two months.
Mr. Trump tried again on social media to control the narrative of his presidency, directing his 27 million followers on Twitter to watch a “Fox & Friends” report on former Hillary Clinton campaign manager John Podesta and Russia, and hailing an announcement by Ford Motor Co. to invest in three Michigan plants.
“JOBS! JOBS! JOBS!” the president tweeted.
But Mr. Trump’s advisers are clearly frustrated that media coverage of alleged Russia ties to the Trump campaign and ongoing FBI and congressional investigations are obscuring the White House’s message on the economy and national security.
“If the president puts Russian salad dressing on his salad tonight, somehow that’s a Russian connection,” an exasperated White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters at the daily press briefing. “At some point you’re going to have to take ’no’ for an answer, with respect to whether or not there was collusion.”
Mr. Spicer blasted a Washington Post report asserting that the White House tried to prevent former acting Attorney General Sally Yates from testifying about Russia to House investigators. He said the White House counsel’s office never considered invoking executive privilege, and said the administration has nothing to hide about alleged contacts with Moscow.
“There’s no connection between the president and the staff here doing anything with Russia,” he said.
Congressional investigators are looking into alleged links between Russians and Trump campaign operatives in the wake of reports that Russian hackers meddled in the election last year to work against Democrat Hillary Clinton.
“At some point, report the facts,” Mr. Spicer told a reporter who asked how the White House intended to “revamp its image.”
“The facts are that every single person who has been briefed on this subject [Russia] has come away with the same conclusion — Republican, Democrat,” Mr. Spicer said.
When the reporter, April Ryan of American Urban Radio, appeared to show skepticism about an answer Mr. Spicer was giving moments later, he snapped at her, “Please stop shaking your head again.”
“This president continues to reach out to individuals who’ve supported him, who didn’t support him — Republicans, Democrats — to try to bring the country together and move forward on an agenda that’s going to help every American,” Mr. Spicer said.
He said the president and his aides remain focused on his campaign pledges.
“We’re going to keep doing everything we’re doing to make sure that what the President told the American people he was going to do to fulfill those pledges and promises that he made, to bring back jobs, to grow the economy, to keep our nation safe — that’s what he’s been focused on since day one,” he said. “We’re going to keep focusing on that every single day.”
For some supporters on the right, that’s still what they want to hear from the White House.
“We will continue to support President Trump as he keeps his word on economic matters, immigration policy, and other issues critical to our future,” said Tea Party Patriots co-founder Jenny Beth Martin, who praised the president’s action on rolling back environmental regulations.
• Dave Boyer can be reached at dboyer@washingtontimes.com.
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