Saunders: Trump’s veto threat latest act in White House drama

So after 1 p.m., Trump signed the bill. He also announced, “But I say to Congress, I will never sign another bill like this again.”

It was vintage Trump — a maneuver that allowed him to sign the bill he had endorsed while dumping responsibility for it onto others.

The GOP establishment — and that includes Trump — had political and substantive reasons to support the “omni.”

“We had no choice but to fund our military,” Trump said, after U.S. forces have been overstretched across the globe. The measure also provided $1.6 billion for Trump’s beloved border wall, and included a measure to strengthen federal background checks for gun purchases.

But the “omni” made the GOP look like big-spending hypocrites. When reporters pointed out that Republicans control the White House and Congress, Budget Director Mick Mulvaney chastised them. “This is what a bill looks like when you have 60 votes in the Senate and Democrats get a chance to take their pound of flesh,” Mulvaney said.

This also is what a bill looks like when party leaders negotiate behind closed doors, and then, with two days left to prevent a government shutdown, they tell lawmakers that they can contribute only by voting up or down on a measure they haven’t had time to read. Add: The Republican president signed off on the tome before it passed. Poof, $1.3 trillion became enshrined in spending history.

Eight years after Republicans chanted, “Read the bill, read the bill” in response to President Barack Obama’s Affordable Care Act, their leaders rushed out a trillion-dollar behemoth so fast that Trump could say only, “Nobody read it. It’s only hours old.”

That does not absolve the president. He promised to drain the swamp, and then he failed to pressure Republicans to curb runaway spending.

No wonder Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., called the omnibus measure “a darn good bill” about which he was “really happy.”

Less drama, less wisdom

Friday’s antics were smart theater that allowed the White House to end the week on a defiant note.

The drama over administration turnover and McMaster’s departure, however, presented less drama and less wisdom behind it.

The Brookings Institution, which tracks the turnover of Trump’s A-team staffers, estimates that 48 percent of his first hires have left the White House in the administration’s first 14 months. (The calculation does not include cabinet members.) By comparison, Obama lost 9 percent of his A-team in the first year and George W. Bush lost 6 percent.

And you have to wonder how much of a toll Trump’s mistreatment of his staff is taking on those who remain at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Beltway insiders have made a game of guessing which member of Trump’s team will go next. Chief of Staff John Kelly? Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin? Or frequent Trump whipping boy Attorney General Jeff Sessions?

The president likes to tweet that reports of possible firings are “fake news,” and then he pulls the plug.