President Trump angrily swore at acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney in front of congressional leaders while he was trying to negotiate the reopening of a large swath of the federal government, according to a report.
Trump’s outburst came during a White House Situation Room meeting this month in which the president reiterated his demand for roughly $5.6 billion for his proposed southern border wall, a figure well over the original $1.3 billion offered by Democrats on Capitol Hill.
When Mulvaney attempted to “find a middle ground,” he was quickly rebuked by Trump, a source told Axios in an article published on Sunday.
“Trump cut him off … ‘You just fucked it all up, Mick,'” the source said, paraphrasing the president’s reaction. “It was kind of weird.”
Another source told Axios Mulvaney failed to read “the room or the president,” missing how Trump was resetting the dialogue over the partial shutdown.
A White House official who was in the room at the time of the exchange played down the severity of Trump’s reprimand.
“This is an exaggerated account of the exchange that doesn’t reflect the good relationship Mulvaney has built over the last two years with the president,” the aide told the outlet. “The president and Mulvaney joked about it afterwards.”
Mulvaney and Trump have previously experienced tension over the president’s efforts to build a physical barrier along the U.S.-Mexico border. Mulvaney, as White House budget director, initially asked for only $1.6 billion from Congress to fund the project in his 2019 request made on behalf of the Trump administration. Democrats have questioned Trump’s refusal to accept their offers given how they fall close to that number.
