Professor Stephen Farnsworth, author of the book “Presidential Communication and Character,” says that Trump makes such statements to keep his opponents off balance. “You ask for something unreasonable and it is more likely you can get something less unreasonable,” he has been quoted as saying.
“Canada is not going to become part of the United States, but Trump’s comments are more about leveraging what he says to get concessions from Canada by putting Canada off balance, particularly given the precarious current political environment in Canada,” said Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg.
“One of the challenges that Trump’s press secretaries always have is the conviction that Donald Trump has that he’s the best messenger anyway, and so he tends to manage the public relations aspect of his presidency to a much greater degree than other presidents have,” said Stephen Farnsworth, a politics professor at the University of Mary Washington in Virginia.
“During his first term, many people stayed at his hotel just outside the White House to do business with him or curry favor,” notes political scientist Stephen Farnsworth of the University of Mary Washington in Virginia. “He uses his business to political advantage by rewarding those who pay him for privileged access to him. In truth, Trump is a transactional president.”
Stephen Farnsworth, a political science professor at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, Virginia, said Trump tweaking friendly countries harkens back to an aggressive style he used during his days in business.
“You ask something unreasonable and it’s more likely you can get something less unreasonable,” said Farnsworth, who is also author of the book “Presidential Communication and Character.”
“This was a big defeat for the president-elect,” said Stephen Farnsworth, professor of political science at the University of Mary Washington. “He engaged in this question to get an extension of the debt ceiling and he wasn’t able to get it. He wasn’t able to get it in fact because a significant number of Republicans, members of Trump’s own party, said they weren’t going to go along with it.”
