Donald Trump has surrounded himself with ideological shape-shifters — former Democrats and former anti-Trumpers willing to profess a fawning loyalty to him.
One wouldn’t be wrong to think that this results in a treacherous environment. But Trump prefers this sort of snake pit because he understands snakes.
On Tuesday, The Times reported that Trump plans to name Tulsi Gabbard and Robert Kennedy Jr., who both recently endorsed him, as honorary co-chairs of his presidential transition team. Gabbard and Kennedy sought the Democratic nomination for president — Gabbard in 2020 and Kennedy in this election cycle before starting an independent bid.
But these two are only the latest onetime opponents that Trump has pulled into his orbit. Many of Trump’s Republican primary challengers from 2016 and 2024 became sycophants, some of them gushing over him at last month’s Republican National Convention. Some of his most vocal critics in Congress have become his confidants, like Senator Lindsey Graham, who once called Trump a “race-baiting, xenophobic, religious bigot.”
Even his own running mate, JD Vance, once wrote that the former president “is cultural heroin” and behind closed doors called him “America’s Hitler.”
Trump embraces people who will swallow their words and bury their beliefs. He seems to like people to demonstrate that their convictions are hollow. To him, it seems obvious that those are people he can try to manipulate. They are the people he prefers, rather than those who tell him no.
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