The majority of President Trump’s scheduled time during the past three months in the White House has been spent in unstructured “executive time,” according to a leak.
Since the 2018 midterm elections, Trump spent almost 300 hours in executive time — or time for which nothing was planned for the president — Axios reported Sunday. The outlet obtained Trump’s private schedules dating back to Nov. 7, the day after the midterm elections.
During the same time frame, the president spent 77 hours in meetings, which have given him and his staff the opportunity to plan policy, legislative strategy, and video recordings.
One senior White House official said the schedules don’t reflect all of Trump’s engagements as some of discussions are arranged at the last-minute, while others are deliberately only included on a more detailed calendar circulated among a tighter circle of staff out of fear of West Wing leaks.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders attributed the timetable to Trump’s “different leadership style,” adding “the results speak for themselves.”
“While he spends much of his average day in scheduled meetings, events, and calls, there is time to allow for a more creative environment that has helped make him the most productive President in modern history,” Sanders said.
Axios reported last January that Trump, despite frequently waking up earlier than 6 a.m., usually doesn’t arrive in the Oval Office until 11 a.m. Instead, he prefers to spend his mornings in the residence, where he catches up on the news of the day via TV and newspapers. He also makes phone calls to staff, administration officials, lawmakers, or informal advisers.
The president is spending the Super Bowl weekend at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Fla. Trump previously canceled a trip to Mar-a-Lago, which has functioned as a so-called winter White House, over the winter holidays so he could stay in Washington during the recent 35-day partial federal government shutdown.
