Executive Time: After Spending The Weekend Off Twitter, Trump Returns With A Vengeance

Executive Time: After Spending The Weekend Off Twitter, Trump Returns With A Vengeance

I think we all knew it wouldn’t last long.

This past weekend, President Donald Trump took a break from Twitter. Apparently comfortable with letting his lawyer Rudy Giuliani go on TV and cause more chaos while seemingly opening him up to additional legal problems, Trump decided to treat himself to some golf on Sunday and stay away from social media.

But by Monday morning, his phone was back in his hand, and his fingers were furiously back to work.

With his public schedule showing a whole lotta Executive Time and not much else, it looks like the president decided early on his Monday would be dedicated solely to tossing out a series of tweet grenades. And by 10:10 AM ET, the president had sent out nine tweets, most them meant to generate at least some sort of reaction and potentially generate headlines.

In his first post of the morning, the president weighed in on the West Virginia GOP Senate primary, begged Republican voters in the state to not vote for former coal baron Don Blankenship.

Blankenship has gained notoriety in recent days for a series of campaign ads and remarks in which he’s called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “Cocaine Mitch” while complaining about McConnell’s “China family” and jobs given to “China people.” Trump, of course, isn’t condemning Blankenship’s comments — just telling West Virginians that the fresh-out-of-prison multi-millionaire can’t win a general election because he’s too reminiscent of Roy Moore. (If Blankenship wins the primary, though, you can bet Trump will endorse him just like he did Moore.)

The president followed that tweet up with a post backing his CIA director nominee Gina Haspel, who had reportedly considered backing out of consideration due to concerns she may not be confirmed over questions about her role in torturing terrorism suspects.

As for Trump’s complaints that she has “come under fire because she was too tough on Terrorists,” Vox provided a helpful explainer on why she is a contentious pick:

“Haspel is controversial because she oversaw a secret CIA detention site in Thailand when in 2002 operatives conducted a brutal interrogation of terror suspect Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri that included waterboarding. Before she arrived at the site, another suspect, Abu Zubaydah, was tortured there as well. The CIA videotaped the torture. Haspel later served as chief of staff to Jose Rodriguez, the head of the agency’s counterterrorism center, when he ordered that the tapes be destroyed. Her name was on the cable that made the call. The Justice Department investigated the tape-destruction order but filed no charges.”

Of course, we got some “Witch Hunt” tweets about the Mueller investigation because the day wouldn’t be complete without those.

And, just for the hell of it, he promoted a book by reporter and purported Trump whisperer Salena Zito. Likely he heard the new tome was complimentary of him and his voters.

Trump wanted to say congrats to his newest ambassador, who dealt with a tough confirmation fight.

Also, what Trump tweetstorm would be complete without some good ol’ fashioned punching down? In this instance, the president commented on the recent announcement that FBI officials Lisa Page and Jim Baker would be stepping down. Page has been at the center of Trump loyalists’ “Secret Society” and “Deep State” conspiracies regarding the FBI and DOJ.

And with reports that former Secretary of State John Kerry was clandestinely working with foreign leaders and diplomats to save the Iran Deal, Trump lashed out at the one-time Democratic presidential nominee.

Going to go out on a limb here and say the president is not done tweeting today.

Justin Baragona

Justin Baragona is the founder/publisher of Contemptor and a contributor to The Daily Beast. He was previously the Cable News Correspondent for Mediaite and prior to starting Contemptor, he worked on the editorial staff of PoliticusUSA. During that time, he had his work quoted by USA Today and BBC News, among others. Justin began his published career as a political writer for 411Mania. He resides in St. Louis, MO with his wife and pets.

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