Weekend tweets aside, congressional Republicans praised the first 100 days of President Trump, pointing to his accomplishments rolling back Obama-era regulations and seating a conservative pick on the Supreme Court.
“I’ve been really encouraged to see the kind of commitment that President Trump has had on following through on the promises he made to the American people,” House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., told reporters last week. “Getting our economy back on track, of getting rid of regulations that are killing jobs in America. A lot of really good things have happened in that first hundred days, and there are still more things that are good that are set to happen.”
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Trump’s first months in the Oval Office haven’t been viewed glowingly by all members.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has said repeatedly he wishes Trump would stay off Twitter rather than issuing impromptu tweets nearly every day of the week, including a weekend tweet last month that accused former President Barack Obama of tapping Trump’s campaign office.
“As I’ve said repeatedly, I’m not a big fan of the president’s tweeting habits,” McConnell said last week. “But if you focus on what he’s actually doing, I think he’s doing exactly the right thing for the country.”
Some GOP lawmakers visibly cringed when asked about Trump’s tweets, but they gave the president high marks for signing multiple bills passed by Congress that undo Obama-era regulations critics deemed burdensome or harmful to the economy, including a regulation that would broaden the government’s oversight of streams and other small bodies of water and some financial rules.
They praised him for his foreign policy stance, which has so far included military strikes in Syria and Afghanistan and tougher talk with foreign adversaries, in particular North Korea.
“I like the congressional review action, I like the strike in Syria, I like the bunker buster bomb in Afghanistan, and I like the more assertive foreign policy,” McConnell said.
The president, McConnell said, “is doing just fine with what he is promoting.”
Trump took office facing unusually high skepticism from his own party’s lawmakers, who for the most part failed to rally behind him enthusiastically until he unexpectedly beat Hillary Clinton.
Those GOP skeptics are still for the most part waiting to see more of what Trump plans to do.
Trump has fallen through on some promises, including his pledge to quickly sign a bill to repeal and replace Obamacare or find a way to get Mexico to pay for a southern border wall.
“I’d give him a B-minus, C-Plus,” Rep. John Shimkus, R-Ill., told the Washington Examiner.
Shimkus, like other GOP lawmakers, said he was pleased with Trump’s Supreme Court pick, Neil Gorsuch, who was seated on the high court last month. Shimkus endorsed Trump’s signing of 30 executive orders since taking office, which included one initiating a review of the nation’s H-1B visa program, and his Cabinet picks.
“I’m optimistic,” Shimkus said.
Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C., said Trump’s first 100 days should have served as a time for Trump, a real estate magnate who came to the White House with no government experience, to learn how to actually govern.
Trump’s first 100 days, Sanford said, “are represented by ups and downs and hopefully represent learning and how to navigate the legislative waters in our nation’s Capitol.”
Sanford praised the Gorsuch nomination and the regulation rollbacks, “but some of the dead ends, blind alleys have been less productive.”
Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., an early Trump supporter, said Republican lawmakers underestimated Trump from the beginning.
“I think he has probably exceeded their expectations, frankly,” Massie told the Washington Examiner.
Massie said Trump gets little credit from the GOP for withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific Partnership days after taking office.
“You don’t hear that mentioned much because probably a lot of Republicans weren’t with him on that, and none of the Democrats want to give him credit for it.”
Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, said he doesn’t blame Trump for the failed effort to quickly repeal Obamacare, calling it “a big hill to climb.” But he wants Trump to speed up appointments of undersecretaries and sub-Cabinet staff in his administration.
“There are really not too many of the Trump-ites at the various agencies,” Barton said. “People expect things to happen, but there aren’t too many colonels and majors to implement these changes.”
Al Weaver contributed to this report
