Anyone covering Trump’s new “press conferences” has seen the pattern. Trump will read a bunch of numbers that he’s not seen before, such as the total number of daily tests or the total number of ventilators made, to paint a rosy-picture and convince people he’s on top of this and things are getting better, and then Trump will take a few questions, only to scamper out as soon as he feels pressured.

Now, Politico has a report suggesting that Trump is trying to avoid the personal confrontations between himself and reporters, especially women reporters, because it turns off suburban women.

Our two-fisted brawler of a president, always ready to smash the interlocutors from the press with a virtual folding chair, has replaced moxie with pouts. In the old days, he would have had a ready answer for the much-expected question from Reid, Collins and Jiang. But now he’s like the former alpha leader of the troop. He makes a show of maintaining his dominance by beating his breast, but when challenged by somebody superior, he takes his beating then slinks off to a dark, safe place to lick his wounds.

It is also possible that the press, having gone through this for five years, is also getting a lot better at dealing with Trump. They have learned the limits in his press conferences and are far more likely to stick with just trying to get one or two questions answered, and not leaving that question until he addresses it.

What’s causing Trump to back down from the press after so many months of fighting them? There could be a method to his madness. As my colleagues Nancy Cook and Gabby Orr reported this summer, his aides have urged him to avoid the marathon sessions of his earlier coronavirus briefings, “straying off message and generating negative headlines.” He’s playing it safe by keeping it short. Another way to view his dust-ups with female reporters is as an act of conflict avoidance. With his support among suburban women dropping in the polls, the Trump camp thinks that dodging unnecessary clashes with women in the briefing room might help win additional votes in November. Essentially, don’t make a bad situation worse.

Yes, on the other hand, he also looks quite weak. He put himself in this situation and it stems from his inability to answer a simple question honestly. He would rather attack, which then gets him in trouble with some voters.

Trumpies might think that avoiding direct and extended conflicts with detail-minded reporters during the pandemic lends his administration an edge. They might even think shutting down the pressers on no notice make him look like a bad-ass with his base. But I doubt these tongue-tied tantrums have such an effect. And so does Karl. “The walk-off is a surprising display of weakness—he allows the reporter to have the last word, ending the press conference by asking a question the president appears unable to handle,” he says.

Yes, that is true, provided the person watching TV was listening to the reporter at the time. It is still highly passive-aggressive and may appear to some at home as “Trump showing them.”

Regardless, these are the exact type of issues one might expect to have when a serial liar wants free air time to do a campaign commercial. Networks won’t hand over airtime for a simple commercial, so he has to take some questions and at least make a show of it. But he cannot handle the pushback, so he’s left with a choice, fight to reassert his lie or go pouting off. Right now, apparently, the campaign believes they’re better served by pouting off.

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Peace, y’all
Jason
[email protected] and on Twitter @MiciakZoom