Donald Trump and his group of advisors are taking wishful thinking to an entirely new level.
During an interview on Friday with Trump 2020 campaign advisor Steve Cortes on Newsmax, Mark Meadows, Trump’s last chief of staff, made some remarks that made it sound like the former president as well as the people around him are living in some alternate reality. Meadows said Trump is “a president that is fully engaged, highly focused, and remaining on task.”
Except, he’s not the president. Joe Biden is. Which means he has no “cabinet” anymore.
As Mediaite noted, throughout the interview Meadows continued to refer to Trump as “the President” in present-tense manner — so did Cortes, incidentally — and suggested the meetings are a sign of upcoming action.
What action could that be? Only the Mar-A-Lago/Bedminster “Cabinet” knows. Perhaps they were talking about the criminal complaint filed by the watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) against Trump and Meadows that accuses them of trying to undermine the 2020 election.
It’s not unprecedented to refer to a former president as “Mr. President.” Don’t just take our word for it. The Emily Post Institute, an authority on etiquette, says the proper way to address an ex-President is to say “Former President Last Name.” However, the institute also points out that many people ignore this convention and often just go with “President Last Name.” In a setting like Newsmax which is blatantly pro-Trump with two strong supporters like Cortes and Meadows, it’s no surprise they would do that.
Meadows’ choice of words could very well just be an attempt to keep his famously-sensitive former boss happy, while also sending a subtle dogwhistle to those MAGA supporters who keep believing the My Pillow guy’s conspiracy theories of an August reinstatement for Trump.