“When a clown moves into a palace, he doesn't become a king. The palace becomes a circus.”
WSJ Exclusive
Trump Advisers Took Advantage of Navarro’s Absence to Push for Tariff Pause
Peter Navarro, an adviser to Trump in favor of wide-ranging tariffs, had been a fixture on the president’s side after ‘Liberation Day’
So that morning, when Navarro was scheduled to meet with economic adviser Kevin Hassett in a different part of the White House, Bessent and Lutnick made their move, according to multiple people familiar with the intervention. They rushed to the Oval Office to see Trump and propose a pause on some of the tariffs—without Navarro there to argue or push back. They knew they had a tight window. The meeting with Bessent and Lutnick wasn’t on Trump’s schedule.
Almost as funny as the Gary Cohn story….
Background
In 2017, amid growing frustration over trade deficits, President Trump considered withdrawing the U.S. from the U.S.–Korea Free Trade Agreement (KORUS), a move that many in his administration feared would damage the U.S.–South Korea alliance and destabilize the region, especially given tensions with North Korea. Gary Cohn, then Trump’s chief economic advisor, strongly opposed the idea. According to Bob Woodward’s book Fear, Cohn took the extraordinary step of physically removing a draft executive order to withdraw from KORUS off Trump’s desk before he could sign it, later saying, “I stole it off his desk… I wouldn’t let him see it. He’s never going to see that document. Got to protect the country.” Trump never noticed the document was missing, and the withdrawal never happened. Ultimately, Trump chose to renegotiate rather than exit the agreement, and Cohn resigned in 2018 amid broader disagreements over trade policy.
Is Susie Wiles Still in Control?
For what it's worth, our best educated guess is that this story—along with a couple of other tariff-related stories—are part of managed leaks by the White House, intended primarily for a domestic audience.
Susie Wiles is likely still in control of the information flow from the Trump administration. They're not as inept as some make them out to be.
As for the theory of a deception operation against the CCP, it seems unlikely—and unlikely to work. Based on our understanding, Chinese spy-craft relies on a “thousand grains of sand” approach.
Still, a funny story—fact or fictionalized.
