GOVERNMENT/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WHITE HOUSE STAFF: “President Donald Trump said Saturday [1-12-19] he was alone in the White House with a plan at the ready to reopen the federal government, but close White House advisers and staff said they remained in the dark about how he would end the three-week partial shutdown. Trump was slated to spend the day speaking by phone to staff and lawmakers, one White House official said. In the meantime, it remained unclear how long he would let the longest shutdown in the nation’s history drag on or whether he planned to declare a national emergency in the coming weeks to secure the funding he has demanded for a wall at the southern border, according to four advisers and staff reached by POLITICO…The president did not have any public events listed on his schedule for Saturday and Sunday [1-13-19]. With weather forecasters predicting several inches of snow in Washington, golf — one of Trump’s favorite past times — seemed out of the question. Instead, he spent the morning tweeting about a New York Times report that the FBI had opened an investigation into whether Trump acted on behalf of Russia early in his presidency and insisting Democrats return to Washington to fund his long-promised border wall and reopen the government.”
–Nancy Cook, “Trump touts shutdown plan, but advisers say ‘no one knows what he will do’,” Politico, January 12, 2019 5:48 pm