A Prefect's Guide to Veto Threats and Other Self-Inflicted Wounds

Word reaches my desk from the American capital: President Trump, speaking on the South Lawn on Friday, declared that if the Democrats take the House or Senate next month, he will veto everything, and the Democrats will come crawling to make a deal. The polls, the reporters say, suggest the Democrats may well take at least the House. I have seen this maneuver before. I once hung gilded shields bearing Caesar's image in the temple at Jerusalem, expecting the Jews to beg me to remove them. They did not beg. They lay on the ground for five days and would not move, and I had to back down. The lesson, which I apparently failed to learn: do not make a threat you cannot enforce, especially against a people with nothing to lose and a long memory.

Let me be clear about what the President has done. He has told the voters, in effect, if you elect my opponents, I will govern by paralysis. Now, as a man who once raided the temple treasury to build an aqueduct, I am not unfamiliar with bold, unpopular gestures. But there is a difference between a gesture that projects strength and one that announces you expect to lose. The veto is a shield. The President has turned it into a banner, and he is waving it before the battle. A man who says 'I will veto everything' is a man who has already conceded the agenda. What is truth? The truth is that vetoes do not make deals; they make headlines. And headlines, as I learned at the Passover crowd, are not the same as power.

Consider the broader scene. The same week, Republicans in Congress are in open revolt over the President's Russia policy—lifting sanctions on Russian diesel, waiving sanctions on oligarchs, pressuring Zelenskiy to step aside. Even his own party smells weakness. And what does a cornered administrator do? He threatens to veto everything. I recognize the instinct. When the Sanhedrin cornered me, I washed my hands and gave them a prisoner. It did not solve the problem; it merely postponed it until the next Passover.

So, as a professional, let me offer the President a few crisis-management tips from a man who has made every mistake in the book:

• Never threaten a veto before the votes are counted. It tells your friends you expect to lose and your enemies you fear them. Wait until the bill is on your desk. Then veto it, quietly, and let them explain to the voters why nothing got done.
• If you must make a threat, make one you can carry out. I threatened to slaughter the Jews who protested my aqueduct. I did not do it. Everyone knew I would not. Now no one fears my threats. Do not be Pontius Pilate.
• Blame the other side for the gridlock, but do it after the election. Before the election, every word you say is a campaign ad for your opponent.
• Keep your coalition together. The President's Russia policy has Republicans in Congress sharpening knives. A veto threat on top of that is like pouring oil on a temple fire.

I have no dog in this fight. I am a prefect of a small, troublesome province, and my only concern is that Rome's taxes arrive on time and that no crowd gathers in the streets. But I will say this: the American republic has a genius for orderly transfers of power. I envy it. I had to wash my hands of a mess I could not control. The President still has time to control his. He should spend less time threatening vetoes and more time counting his friends.

As for me, I wash my hands of the whole affair. I have an aqueduct to inspect.

The story: Washington Examiner — Trump threatens to veto 'everything' if Democrats win Congress