The president has long charted his own path when it comes to issues of both foreign and domestic policy. He has seen policies through that he sees fit with often little regard for the opinion of outside advisers beyond a select few; it’s hardly as though he even has the opportunity to build up a reliance on outside advisers when his administration seems fronted by a revolving door. He lost a record high level of senior staff members in just the first year on the job, and a high rate of departures has extended into the second year. Among his most recent losses are top economic adviser Gary Cohn and White House communications director Hope Hicks.
As yet another part of the seemingly endless saga of the president charting his own path no matter the cost, last Thursday, it was revealed that he had accepted an invitation to meet with the leader of North Korea, Kim Jong-un.
The president seems to have blindsided top officials with his acceptance of the invitation from the North Koreans, since extremely recently individuals as high-ranking as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson shot down the idea of imminent “negotiations” with the North Koreans. (Tillerson has followed that up by saying Trump and Kim Jong-un are just having a “talk.”)
Now, in the face of the tumult associated with the president accepting the invitation from the North Koreans, he has taken to Twitter to reveal that he is — surprise surprise — dissatisfied with the way that the press is handling the news.
On Saturday, he posted a statement reading:
‘In the first hours after hearing that North Korea’s leader wanted to meet with me to talk denuclearization and that missile launches will end, the press was startled & amazed.They couldn’t believe it. But by the following morning the news became FAKE.They said so what, who cares!’
The backdrop for the president yet again taking on the press is not the controversy over his blindsiding of top officials. Rather, the president seems to be upset with individuals pointing out that even though the North Koreans have claimed that they’re open to concessions, that doesn’t mean that the problem of the dictatorship’s nuclear arsenal has been solved.
This tweet makes it yet again an open question, however, of whether the president is able to accept even the most very basic constructive criticism.
On Friday, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders was faced with questions about the issues the president is angered have been pointed out, and she insisted in the face of those questions that meeting between Trump and the North Korean leader would not proceed unless the North Koreans took concrete steps to undermine their nuclear program.
The president accepting an invitation for a meeting comes after months of him carrying on with aggressive rhetoric against the country, commenting at one point that he would see to it that the country was completely annihilated if provoked.
The president was repeatedly warned to stop with the rhetoric, but he did not.
In conjunction with his rhetoric, the North Koreans have claimed an ability to strike the continental United States.
Check out Twitter’s response to the president’s ranting about the press’ response to his pending meeting with the leader of North Korea below.
Featured Image via MANDEL NGAN/AFP/Getty Images
