Download Firefox Enhanced with Yahoo »Trump’s Paris trip is poised to give a clear win to France’s Macron
WASHINGTON — French President Emmanuel Macron has kept President Trump off balance over the course of their short relationship, using Trump’s own favorite tactic of unpredictability against him.
It was less than two months ago that — in the first meeting between the two men — Macron held on to Trump’s hand as the American president tried to pull away. Later that same day, Macron swerved away from Trump to shake hands with German Chancellor Angela Merkel and other world leaders while Trump stood and waited to greet the French leader.
Macron later publicly explained that he had intended to send a signal to Trump, and the world, with the photo op. Trump usually likes to play the aggressor when it comes to the handshake game.
“I don’t let anything slide. That’s how one makes oneself respected,” said Macron, who won his election while promising to strengthen the European Union, a body that nationalist Trump advisers like Steve Bannon despise. During the race, Trump had signaled support for Macron’s opponent in the French election, far-right nationalist Marine Le Pen.
In early June, Macron responded to Trump decision to ditch the Paris Agreement on climate change, tweaking the U.S. president’s signature slogan. “Make our planet great again,” Macron said. And last week the Frenchman forcefully rebutted “narrow-minded nationalism,” an apparent jab at Trump.
But in late June, Macron invited Trump to come to Paris for Bastille Day (July 14), and Trump accepted. And then at the G-20, despite his strong words for Trump, Macron sidled up to the American during the group photo.
Trump will arrive in France on Thursday morning for a two-day visit that will serve as the next chapter in the complex and curious relationship between the two world leaders.
Trump’s fascination with Macron may stem in part from his willingness to buck French political norms. He created a brand new political party, En Marche! (roughly translated as Let’s go! or On The Move!) to be his vehicle to the presidency. He has also talked about running a “Jupiterian” presidency — as in the king of the Roman gods.
The French leader’s intentional displays of strength, including Macron’s decision to parade down the Champs-Élysées during his inaugural parade in a military rather than civilian vehicle, have attracted Trump’s admiration, sources said.
Trump himself reportedly wanted to include military vehicles in his own inaugural parade, and the Bastille Day parade will feature plenty of martial pageantry, including the presence of American troops, to mark the 100-year anniversary of the United States entering World War I.
One French official suggested that Trump’s failure to convince U.S. military officials to allow him to include military vehicles in his own inauguration this past January partly explained Trump’s eagerness to come to France. “Apparently Trump loves that, and he did not understand why his presidential inauguration ceremony didn’t have one,” the unnamed official told Le Journal du Dimanche.
Trump is also badly in need of distraction from troubles back home, as controversy over Trump campaign links to Russian meddling in the U.S. election has reached new heights following new disclosures of his son Donald Trump Jr.’s eagerness to receive information about Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton from the Russian government during the campaign.
But the admiration for Macron inside the White House goes beyond symbolism. Bannon told Yahoo News that while Macron ran as a “globalist,” he has made a number of nationalist gestures, all in the name of positioning France as the preeminent nation in Europe.
“Populist nationalist is the right side of history,” Bannon said in a phone interview, and asserted that the only question is whether the leftist version of nationalism championed by Jeremy Corbyn in Britain and Sen. Bernie Sanders in the U.S. wins the day — or something closer to Trump and Bannon’s version.
Bannon said Macron, a centrist, is closer to Trump’s philosophy than he is to the progressive version because he does not want the state to run the economy.
But French experts said the parallels between Trump and Macron are not so clear. “This has nothing to do with the savage libertarianism that has been festering among Republicans for the last several years,” said Robert Zaretsky, professor of French history at the University of Houston. “They are not kindred spirits.”
Macron has tapped into a strain of French nationalism that has characterized his country’s politics since World War II, sometimes colored by mistrust of U.S. commitments. Whereas Le Pen channeled that sentiment through anti-immigration policies, Macron has gone a more internationalist route. Macron tried — and failed — to convince Trump to remain in the Paris Agreement, and has not given up winning over his American counterpart to the cause of battling climate change.
But French presidents don’t fit neatly into the dismissive “globalist” tag White House nationalists like to attach to critics of their approach to the world. France tested a nuclear weapon in 1960 and built its own arsenal in part to be able to deter Soviet aggression in the event the United States did not uphold its mutual-defense obligations under NATO. In 1966, then President Charles de Gaulle withdrew France from NATO’s military command, citing a need to keep a free hand in asserting his country’s national interests. In 2009, with the threat from Moscow much abated, then President Nicolas Sarkozy returned France to the alliance as a full member. France keeps close ties with its former colonies and encourages the spread — or at least the maintenance — of the use of the French language in order to maintain its influence.
Since 9/11, French-U.S. intelligence cooperation has remained strong. And Paris has not hesitated to use force against suspected extremists in Africa.
“France is far and away one of the largest and strongest military members of the [NATO] alliance and spends an awful lot of defense right now, and carries a heavy load in the counterterrorism fight, in particular in places so that really we don’t have to,” a senior Trump aide told reporters on Tuesday. “So when you consider that the Sahel, for example, is half the size of the United States, and the French are carrying on the counterterrorism effort there with 4,000 or 5,000 French soldiers, I mean, their contributions are great.”
France committed forces to the war in Afghanistan in 2001, but by late 2002 and early 2003 it was one of the most outspoken opponents of the invasion of Iraq, which soured relations with Washington. By 2005, however, then President Jacques Chirac eagerly worked with George W. Bush in a successful push to reduce Syrian influence in Lebanon. In 2013, when then President Barack Obama seemed to be gearing up for military action in Syria, a country once under French administration, Paris was Washington’s closest partner.
Macron’s seizing of the initiative in his relationship with Trump is indicative of the way he has approached his first weeks in power, filling a power vacuum in Europe and on the world stage. He did not race to the U.S. for a meeting with Trump, as British Prime Minister Theresa May did. Instead, he challenged Trump, as he did Russian President Vladimir Putin.
This has put him in a position to woo Trump. Macron has so far used both Trump and Putin as springboards, growing in international stature every time he speaks bluntly against them. In Putin’s case, Macron dismissed Kremlin-sponsored news outlets as propaganda — while standing next to the Russian leader.
In part because of this dynamic, Zaretsky said that unlike in Britain, where May’s invitation to Trump for a visit drew loud objections, “nobody [in France] is speaking out against the invitation.”
“It’s fascinating. I think everybody is actually keen on Trump stepping into a trap. The trap is really symbolic,” Zaretsky said. The image-heavy portions of Trump’s visit — dinner at the Eiffel Tower, a visit to Napoleon’s tomb — “will be Republican, not monarchical,” he said.
“It’s really a win-win situation [for Macron],” Zaretsky said. “If he succeeds in persuading Trump to rethink the Paris climate agreement [or] to agree to a more explicit policy on the West’s attitude toward the tragedy in Syria, or to a common policy on antiterrorism, he’s going to be the clear winner in all of this. … And if he doesn’t succeed, nevertheless he will have brought Trump to France at the most symbolically important moment of the year for France, namely the three revolutionary values that Trump flouts day in and day out: liberty, equality and fraternity.”
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Meet the Trump regretters, who wish they could change their vote
Tom Dawe of Kent, Ohio voted for Donald Trump last year for a familiar reason: He didn’t feel he could vote for Hillary Clinton. But now that he has seen Trump in action, Dawe, 61, feels he made a mistake.
Trump has endorsed a Senate healthcare plan that, if enacted, would cut back Medicaid benefits for Dawe’s wife, Catherine. And Dawe, the retired manager of print operations for a container company, feels that instead of strengthening America’s standing around the world, Trump’s leadership style has weakened it. “If I knew what I know now, I wouldn’t have voted for him, because I think he’s a quack,” Dawe says. “His talk about how everybody was going to prosper—I fell for it.”
Donald Trump’s approval rating has remained low but steady at around 40% during his embattled presidency. But new research by Yahoo Finance has identified a key subset of Trump voters who are turned off by his actions as president, including some who would change their votes if they could. In a Yahoo Finance online survey conducted in late June, 12.6% of Trump voters said they were dissatisfied with his performance as president, and 11.1% said they wouldn’t vote for him again. That’s a much larger portion than Trump’s margin of victory in key states that put him over the top last November, including Pennsylvania, Florida, Michigan and Wisconsin—which Trump won by less than 2% of the vote. The poll results suggest Trump has lost the voters who provided his margin of victory in 2016—and would be needed again were he to run for reelection in 2020.
The Yahoo Finance survey included 25,271 people who said they voted for Trump for president. About 83% of them said they were satisfied with Trump’s performance so far, and 73% said they felt they’d be helped by policies Trump has backed as president. So Trump’s so-called base remains more or less intact. But a meaningful minority of Trump voters said they’d be hurt by his healthcare policy, along with a rollback of environmental regulations, changes to trade agreements, tax cuts perceived to help the wealthy more than the middle class, and other Trump priorities. (See the full survey results.)
Trump voters have confounded pundits who consider them oblivious to Trump policies that would leave some of his own supporters worse off. But in follow-up interviews with Trump regretters, we found thoughtful voters very aware of the likely impact Trump’s policies would have on them. Some are disappointed that Trump didn’t moderate his combative views and behavior once elected. Others feel he has abandoned campaign promises while obsessing over negative news coverage. And some simply feel they made a mistake. Here are a few vignettes on topics that came up most frequently in interviews with Trump regretters.
Competence. Trump impressed many voters with his success as a businessman, which they hoped would translate into success as a political leader. For many, it hasn’t. “I expected competence,” says Fred Wedel, 74, a retired petroleum engineer who lives outside Sacramento. “The only thing I’ve seen is gross incompetence. It started his first week in office, when he put out the immigration edict. I’m not a lawyer, but I read it and I knew it’s unconstitutional. I realized, he may know how to run his Trump business but he has no clue how to run a government.”
[Related: Read about the “contrarians” who didn’t vote for Trump, but would now]
Wedel says Trump reminds him of the worst boss he ever had, a man named Roger who took credit when things went right and blamed others when things went wrong. “We got another Roger,” he says of Trump. “I’m sure Trump, in his business, surrounded himself with what we used to call the ‘nodders.’ People are afraid to tell him the truth. I am so disappointed in the arrogance he’s running the office with. What I’ve seen so far is incompetence and I’m sorry I voted for him.”
Favoring the wealthy. During the campaign, Trump undoubtedly connected with working-class voters and others who feel traditional politicians have lost touch with middle America. But that connection is fraying. “He’s an embarrassment. I don’t know how else to say it,” says Cynthia Shearer, 67, a retired counselor and parole agent in Norristown, Pa. She began losing confidence in Trump when he started appointing his Cabinet. “All these bankers,” she says. “He needed to hire people, like maybe economists, but not these rich billionaires who are just going to help themselves. I think he’s going to hurt the working and middle class. Look at the money he wants to spend on defense, while he wants to cut out the estate tax. Why should a rich billionaire not have to pay estate taxes when they’ve already gotten these big tax breaks?”
Dishonesty. Some Trump supporters don’t mind his lies and exaggerations, since they feel he’s simply jousting with corrupt media outlets. But others feel Trump has squandered his credibility. “I get tired of the lies,” says William Fenn, 57, a machinist in Washington, Maine. “You can’t believe any word he says. Who in the world is going to believe him? Do you think Angela Merkel is believing him? Xi over in China? How this makes America great is beyond me. I had hoped that he would become more presidential. I’m disappointed he has not become presidential. He thinks he’s still on ‘The Apprentice’—and if he were on his own show, Trump would fire him.”
The environment. Jim McDonald, 62, of Westport, Conn., is a former Wall Street trader who voted for Trump because he agreed with Trump’s calls for better trade deals, lower taxes, deregulating banks and bringing down drug prices. He’s seen little action on those issues, however, and is appalled Trump pulled out of the Paris climate agreement. “His environmental policies might harm me or my two offspring, who are in their 20s,” he says. “The guy’s a nutcase and nothing can get done because he’s too busy talking about Joe Scarborough or insulting the prime minister of Germany. He’s constantly on the back foot trying to recover. If it were possible to impeach the guy by popular vote, I would sign on the dotted line right now.”
Healthcare. The most contentious issue in Washington, without a doubt, is the Republican plan to repeal the Affordable Care Act and replace it with something that might slash funding for Medicaid or otherwise limit coverage for lower-income Americans. Trump regretters express frustration that the president doesn’t seem to have a plan of his own, as he promised during the campaign, and hasn’t backed anything likely to make the US healthcare system better, overall. “Healthcare is of particular importance to me as I age,” says Mike Comrie, 60, a technology management consultant who lives in Orlando. “I have not seen anything come out of the Trump administration that I think solves the problem with healthcare. You don’t just go and repeal Obamacare, because then what? You’re removing something but you don’t have anything to replace it with. That’s where I have a problem with this line of thinking. He tends to shoot first and ask questions later.”
Yahoo Finance contacted one Trump voter who estimates the GOP cutbacks to Medicaid would cost his family several thousand dollars per year—and doesn’t mind. “I’m pretty darn sure I’ll be harmed, but I don’t’ think that’s a bad thing. I think that’s a good thing,” says Doug Krotzer, 75, an entrepreneur from Jacksonville, Fla., whose daughter has special needs and qualifies for Medicaid. “I think all this socialized medicine has been a disaster for the country, and anything I can sacrifice to help get past that, I’m happy to do.”
While some Trump regretters say they’d change their vote if they could do it over, others say it would depend on who Trump were running against—and if Hillary Clinton were the opponent again, they might still choose Trump. “My support has tapered off, but not enough to become a Hillary supporter,” says Fenn. Jim McDonald wouldn’t vote for Clinton, either. “The two choices were the worst I’ve ever seen,” he says. “If I had it to do over again, I wouldn’t have voted or I would have written in… whoever.”
Can Trump turn his presidency around? Some disillusioned Trump voters say yes—if he could stop the manic tweeting, focus on pragmatic solutions to problems and maybe court compromise with Democrats on an issue or two. Others think Trump will never change, and they gird for another three-plus years of disappointment. “It takes a humble person to change,” says Shearer. “He’s an arrogant person and will never change.” Her disappointment is so profound, she says, that “to tell you the truth, sometimes I wish I ended up voting for her.”
Confidential tip line: rickjnewman@yahoo.com. Encrypted communication available.
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Rick Newman is the author of four books, including Rebounders: How Winners Pivot from Setback to Success. Follow him on Twitter: @rickjnewman
People
Inside Julianne Hough's Perfect Wedding to Brooks Laich
It was a night of “perfection” for Julianne Hough.
The Dancing with the Stars judge married NHL star Brooks Laich on July 8 in a romantic, outdoor wedding on Lake Coeur d’Alene, Idaho, where Hough spent summer holidays growing up. “When I introduced Brooks to the lake, he fell in love with this special spot, and we knew this was where we wanted to raise our family and grow old together,” Hough, 28, tells PEOPLE in this week’s exclusive cover story. “It just felt right to be married here.”
Designed by event planner Troy Williams of Simply Troy Lifestyle + Events, the wedding weekend was a celebration of love and nature — both of which were essential to the bride and groom. “It was really important to me that we had our ceremony outdoors,” says Laich, 34, who wore a Brooks Brothers tuxedo. “Julianne and I are very adventurous and free, and wanted the setting to be in nature.”
More than 2,000 blooms were used to create the floral arrangements, all designed by Kristen Griffith-VanderYacht of Wild Bloom, including 100 flower boxes and at least 200 garden roses in the reception centerpieces. After the wedding, Hough and Laich donated all the flowers toThe Full Bloom, a non-profit organization that repurposes gently used flowers into bouquets for patients in area hospitals, hospice care and other facilities.
- For all the intimate details inside Hough and Laich’s gorgeous Idaho nuptials — including exclusive wedding photos — pick up this week’s issue of PEOPLE, on newsstands Friday
During the ceremony, Hough, who wore a custom strapless sweetheart Marchesa gown, and Laich said traditional vows and exchanged Lorraine Schwartz-designed rings. “Brooks and I kept eye contact the entire ceremony,” she says. “We never stopped looking at each other.” Her favorite moment was “kissing each other for the first time as husband and wife as the confetti cannons exploded around us,” Hough adds. “I couldn’t stop crying all weekend and most people [thought] I would have cried during the entire ceremony, but instead I was just so excited and ready to celebrate!”
Afterwards at their reception, Hough was surprised by her bridesmaids and girlfriends with a choreographed dance number to Sia’s song, “The Greatest,” a favorite from Hough’s recent tour with her brother, Derek. The bride surprised her groom as well — with timed fireworks over the lake during their first dance to OneRepublic’s “All This Time” (to which she also walked down the aisle).
- Watch People Weddings: Julianne Hough and Brooks Laich, available now, on the new People/Entertainment Weekly Network (PEN). Go to PEOPLE.com/PEN, or download the PEN app on your favorite mobile or connected TV device.
Guests were given turn-down gifts each night, put together from the bride and groom by Gifts for the Good Life, which included a Happy Spritz facial mist, Sugarfina Bubbly Bears with a J&B monogrammed label, and a make-your-own margarita set with Casamigos Tequila or make-your-own lemonade kit, among other goodies.
Hough and Laich announced their engagement in August 2015 after dating for a year and a half. Their wedding weekend was “perfection,” she says. “I don’t think I ever really necessarily dreamed about my wedding as a kid. But I know I will always cherish and remember it for the rest of my life.”
Julianne Hough married NHL star Brooks Laich in a romantic outdoor Idaho wedding.Subscribe now for exclusive photos inside the gorgeous celebration — only in PEOPLE!
Shutdown Corner
Peyton Manning: 'Un-American' to turn down Donald Trump's golf invitation
Retired NFL legend Peyton Manning’s reason for not turning down President Donald Trump’s golf invitation was simple.
“I heard Arnold Palmer say one time, ‘If the President of the United States ever asks you to play golf, you do it,'” Manning told Jimmy Kimmel on his late-night show, via Jon Heath of Broncos Wire. “It’s a no-brainer. It was a fantastic experience.”
Pretty straightforward. Manning has aligned himself with Trump before, reportedly speaking at a GOP retreat shortly after Trump’s inauguration. In this politically charged climate, however, Manning said he had people telling him to not golf with Trump. He did so anyway, in early June.
Manning said accepting the invitation to golf with Trump had nothing to do with his political affiliation.
“I’ve had a chance to play with President Bush before — if President Obama or President Clinton asked me, I’d be there in a heartbeat,” Manning told Kimmel, according to Broncos Wire. “It was just the experience of playing with the office that was pretty cool to me. And I think it would have been almost un-American to have said no.”
Washington Redskins quarterback Kirk Cousins offered a similar explanation for why he golfed with Trump earlier this year (there’s no shortage of opportunities to golf with Trumpduring his presidency). While some quarterbacks have gone out of their way to avoid discussing Trump since he was elected, golfing with him doesn’t necessarily indicate a endorsement.
Maybe all Trump needs to do to rekindle his friendship with Tom Brady is invite him golfing.
More Peyton Manning coverage on Yahoo Sports:
– – – – – – –
Frank Schwab is the editor of Shutdown Corner on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at shutdown.corner@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
Follow @YahooSchwab
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The Reason This Little Girl Wore Her Dad’s Boots Is Heartbreaking
A heartfelt July Fourth Facebook post about one little girl’s slain military father and “the freedom that we often take for granted” has moved thousands of readers to tears since it was originally shared by a South Carolina woman on Independence Day.
“I find myself sitting in the parking lot at Kroger trying to compose myself,” began the post by Katie Shuler of Myrtle Beach. “You see, while inside getting groceries, I came upon a little girl prancing down the isle making a crazy noise. I turned around to see this young lady wearing massive boots compared to her tiny body. At first I just giggled and continued shopping. I ended up in the check out lane behind her and her mother.”
She continued: “As good southerners do, we struck up conversation. I told the little girl that I liked her boots. She had a massive grin on her face and began to speak. She let me know that those boots belonged to her Daddy. Today would have been his birthday, but he was killed last year in ‘Afghan Stan.’ To feel better about today, she was allowed to wear his boots.”
The girl’s mom started to cry, Shuler went on, and “so did I, as did the cashier. Apparently, the gentleman behind me heard the story and gave the little girl a cupcake out of the dozen he was buying. He told the little girl to always eat a cupcake for her dad’s birthday. He told her that her dad was a hero and that she should be proud to be his daughter.
“Please remember why we are able to celebrate America. Let’s stop to think about those who protect the freedom that we often take for granted!”
Yahoo Style was unable to reach Shuler for further comment. But her post was shared more than 90,000 times, with many commenters noting that they were “sobbing” and “crying” as they read it. A couple of days later, the post made its way to the page Love What Matters, where it has picked up more than 19,700 shares and over 1,000 comments, including this one, from a mother who can relate:
“My husband is deployed for the third time right now, and this is my biggest fear with each deployment since we have two daughters and will have a son in about 4 months. Her daddy was and still is a hero. Military children are so strong in so many ways.”
Suggested another, “I hope she wears those boots when she walks down the aisle at her wedding.”
Yet another reader added: “As soon as I started to read this post, I knew what it was going to be about; it made me cry so hard. As a teacher on a military base, I’ve had students come to our classroom dressed in dad’s clothes & boots. GOD Bless you for being so wonderfully kind to this precious little girl and showing her compassion. RIP HERO.”
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