President Donald Trump has won praise from governors in both parties for outreach to states, after a high number of face-to-face meetings with the state leaders.
Kentucky Gov. Matt Bevin, a Republican, said Trump’s outreach to governors is a major underreported story, while California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, said his own talks with the president were “incredible.”
Trump has had more than twice as many meetings with governors as President Ronald Reagan had at this point in his first term, according to Douglas Hoelscher, White House director of intergovernmental affairs.
“Since taking office, President Trump has had in-person interactions with governors 364 times,” Hoelscher told The Daily Signal. “That’s 65 percent more than Reagan at this point in his presidency, who was the last champion of federalism and a former governor himself.”
The total of 364 was before governors came to Washington over the weekend for the National Governors Association’s winter meeting, Hoelscher said. Democratic and Republican governors also had separate gatherings in the nation’s capital.
“That’s just in person,” Hoelscher said. “He is on the phone regularly with governors.”
The comparison between Trump and Reagan on in-person meetings with governors is based on data from the Reagan Presidential Library, he said.
Hoelscher said he did not know the comparative number for Trump’s immediate predecessor, Barack Obama. However, as a former aide to Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad, he said he is certain Obama didn’t come close.
“The president is committed to state-federal partnerships,” Hoelscher said.
Bevin, Kentucky’s governor, talked about his phone calls with Trump on The Daily Signal podcast.
“I personally get calls from the president. I’m sure I’m not alone,” Bevin said. “I know other governors do. He will proactively reach out to ask our input on things, to get our help on things, to ask for our 2 cents worth.”
Bevin continued:
This is somebody that when you reach out to him, he’ll either take the call or will return it in very short order. And not always delegating it off to someone else. He’s very hands-on.
So too is the vice president. So too are each of the Cabinet secretaries. I’ve never seen anything like it. And it’s very helpful to those of us that are responsible for running our respective states.
Rhode Island Gov. Gina Raimondo, chairwoman of the Democratic Governors Association, told Politico that she interacts regularly with the Trump administration.
“Any time he wants to do something … to help Rhode Islanders, I’m right there because that’s my top job, so that means funding for transportation projects,” Raimondo said. “We’ve worked very collaboratively with the administration on that. Funding for job training programs, we’ve worked collaboratively on that, and I’ll continue to do that.”
However, she told Politico that at times it becomes “frankly exhausting” because she also must “protect the people from Rhode Island from the president’s bad policies.”
California’s Newsom, who has jousted with Trump over immigration policy and more recently about keeping funding for the state’s scrapped bullet train project, said he has a working relationship with the president.
“I want to continue to have a relationship with the president on things that matter, and what matters is emergency preparedness, [wildfire] mitigation and suppression,” Newsom told reporters. “And that’s an area that should be above politics, apolitical, and I just think that’s critical and I want to stay in that space.”
At least some of the affection from governors of both parties seems to stem from Trump’s support of infrastructure projects that governors back for their states.
“Our private conversations on that have been incredible,” Newsom said of Trump regarding infrastructure. “Truly, substantively, I’ve been impressed by his, not rhetorical commitment, but his firm commitment to get serious about an infrastructure bill. That is music to our ears.”
Trump held a meeting Monday morning with 36 governors in the State Dining Room of the White House that was attended by several Cabinet members.
On an infrastructure spending package, Trump told the governors: “I want to sign, I am ready.”
“We’re here to forge bonds of cooperation … as we strive to deliver a safe, prosperous future,” Trump said to the governors. “There are few—I say there are none—but there are few administrations that have accomplished what we have accomplished.”
Trump asserted that his administration has been cutting regulations so that instead of taking 10 years for a state to build a highway, it should take just two years.
“That has to be music to your ears,” Trump said, to applause from governors.
New Hampshire Gov. Chris Sununu, a Republican, said he believes an infrastructure proposal is a real possibility.
“It’s realistic because I think every governor is aligned on this, Republican and Democrat, and we can put pressure on that congressional delegation, Republican and Democrat, to get it done,” Sununu told The Hill.
Beyond infrastructure, Hoelscher said, Trump regularly talks to governors about such issues as school safety, workforce development, and the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement on trade that replaces the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Not every governor is swooning.
Some Republican governors expressed procedural and precedential concerns about Trump’s declaring a national emergency to build a border wall.
New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo led a press conference Friday in Washington with fellow Democratic governors from Oregon, Connecticut, New Jersey, Illinois, and Connecticut to announce the Governors Coalition for Tax Fairness, to oppose portions of the tax reforms signed into law by Trump.
Most Democratic governors have expressed opposition to a border wall. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee recently accused Trump of living in “neverland.”
Still, Trump often talked to Newsom and his predecessor, Democrat Jerry Brown, about disaster relief for the Golden State.
Trump also met recently with Cuomo about economic issues, even though the two are critics of one another.
“He knows Republican governors a little better, but he will have conversations with any leader of a state,” Hoelscher said.
