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Cabinet-level nominations

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I think the entire section can be reduced significantly. An initial proposal. Power~enwiki (talk) 04:06, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Cabinet-level nominations

Before

After

Trump has nominated Senator Jeff Sessions as Attorney General, retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn as National Security Advisor, (later replaced by Lieutenant General H. R. McMaster), Kansas Representative Mike Pompeo as CIA Director, education reform activist Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education, South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley as Ambassador to the United Nations, former Secretary of Labor Elaine Chao as Secretary of Transportation, U.S. Representative Tom Price as Secretary of Health and Human Services, financier Steve Mnuchin as Secretary of the Treasury, billionaire investor Wilbur Ross as Secretary of Commerce, retired Marine Corps General James Mattis as Secretary of Defense, former campaign rival Ben Carson as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, retired Marine Corps General John F. Kelly as Secretary of Homeland Security, former WWE CEO Linda McMahon as Administrator of the Small Business Administration, Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, businessman Andrew Puzder as Secretary of Labor (later withdrawn, replaced by FIU Law Dean Alexander Acosta), ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State, former Texas Governor Rick Perry as Secretary of Energy, Montana Representative Ryan Zinke as Secretary of the Interior, South Carolina Representative Mick Mulvaney as Director of the Office of Management and Budget, international trade lawyer Robert Lighthizer as U.S. Trade Representative, Indiana Senator Dan Coats as Director of National Intelligence, Veterans Under Secretary David Shulkin as Secretary of Veterans Affairs, and former Georgia Governor Sonny Perdue as Secretary of Agriculture. Despite being nominated promptly during the transition period, most cabinet members were unable to take office on Inauguration Day because of delays in the formal confirmation process. By February 8, 2017, President Trump had fewer cabinet nominees confirmed than any prior president two weeks into their mandate, except George Washington. Part of the lateness was ascribed to delays in submitting background-check paperwork, part to obstructionism by Senate Democrats. The last Cabinet member, Robert Lighthizer, took office as U.S. Trade Representative on May 11, 2017, more than four months after his nomination.

Trump's cabinet nominations included Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions as Attorney General, financier Steve Mnuchin as Secretary of the Treasury, retired Marine Corps General James Mattis as Secretary of Defense, and ExxonMobil CEO Rex Tillerson as Secretary of State. Trump also brought on board politicians who had opposed him during the presidential campaign, notably neurosurgeon Ben Carson as Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley as Ambassador to the United Nations, While most of Trump's nominees were approved by the GOP majority in the Senate, the confirmation of education reform activist Betsy DeVos as Secretary of Education required Vice President Pence to cast a rare tie-breaking vote. Most cabinet members were unable to take office on Inauguration Day because of delays in the formal confirmation process. Part of the lateness was ascribed to delays in submitting background-check paperwork, part to obstructionism by Senate Democrats. The last Cabinet member, Robert Lighthizer, took office as U.S. Trade Representative on May 11, 2017, more than four months after his nomination.

Sources

• Support trimming, with the following suggestions:
  • Add Nikki Haley and Ben Carson to the list of significant appointments, because they were campaign rival:s
  • Remove the withdrawal of Puzder, which was his own decision

Can I edit the proposal accordingly? — JFG ^talk 04:41, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Go for the editing. I believe Puzder withdrew because he was not going to get 50 votes, but it was never officially stated in that way [1]. Neutral on Haley/Carson. Power~enwiki (talk) 04:43, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done — JFG ^talk 04:57, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support. Good job. -SusanLesch (talk) 23:27, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

This seems generally accepted, I've made the change to the article. Further improvements can be made there. Power~enwiki (talk) 02:27, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support changes and support doing the edit already. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:32, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Extended-confirmed-protected edit request on 15 June 2017

000033m (talk) 20:58, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Not done: it's not clear what changes you want to be made. Please mention the specific changes in a "change X to Y" format. EvergreenFir (talk) 21:00, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Russia redux

Dear fellow editors, please bear with me as I bring up yet another discussion about the Russia–Trump affair(s). The current version of this Trump biography mentions Russia in five places:

• section "Russian interference in election", under "2016 campaign", stating that US intelligence accused Russia of interfering to help Trump, and Trump's rejection of the ensuing "witch hunt"
• section "Interactions with Russia", also under "2016 campaign", detailing investigations of connections between Trump associates and Russian officials
• section "Dismissal of James Comey", under "Presidency", where the "Russia thing" is mentioned as one of the reasons for firing him
• a paragraph mentioning the intelligence reports and denials by Trump, Wikileaks and Putin, under Presidency / Transition / "Pre-inauguration events"
• a paragraph about Trump's overtures to Russia under "Foreign policy"

I would suggest consolidating all this except the foreign policy bit into a single section called "Russia controversies", which would have two sub-sections:

1. "Election interference" about the 2016 events including interference reports, denials and other reactions
2. "Investigations" about the ensuing investigations into Russian connections of Trump and some of his associates, and related testimonies.

This second section would incorporate the Comey dismissal. Per WP:SUMMARY this should be kept relatively short, as other articles cover the issues in great detail. I'm not sure where this section should be included: it certainly is connected with the 2016 campaign, although it has also significantly affected Trump's transition and presidency. Perhaps the best approach would be to give it a top-level section, which would sit between "Presidency" and "Awards". Comments welcome. — JFG ^talk 09:15, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - The material should remain in the proper context. See WP:CSECTION. The Comey dismissal is all about Trump. I oppose removing material that is both relevant to the subject and and historically significant. Any major removal of material should be preceded by a consensus.- MrX 11:37, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - These are all separate things: 1. Russian interference in the election, 2. Trump and Trump family ties to Russia, 3. Trump campaign associates ties to Russia, 4. Investigations into all the Russia connections, and 5. Trump's efforts (such as the firing of James Comey, use of executive privilege) to squash or shape said investigations. Attempts to lump these together will confuse the reader, although it is possible one or two parts could be combined. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:15, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Quite the opposite: having these issues smattered around the article is more confusing to readers. I am proposing to build a solid section on all things connecting Trump with Russia; contents would be mostly the same as today, except redundancies. — JFG ^talk 13:30, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Context is important. Controversial matters should be woven into the prose in a context that makes sense. Deliberately lifting all these things out and putting them in a "controversies" section is bad writing. As MrX pointed out, it violates WP:CSECTION, which attempts to summarize the view of controversy sections espoused by Jimbo Wales. -- Scjessey (talk) 14:29, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support as long as the Russian interference in our election remains its own section. -SusanLesch (talk) 14:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose Separate things should be kept separate, unless a link is confirmed. Emir of Wikipedia (talk) 17:13, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose There is ample reason to include each of these items where they are. --MelanieN (talk) 18:45, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
• Comment I disagree with the assertion that the Comey affair's relevance in this article is related to Russia at all. The "Russian interference in election" should still be deleted entirely IMO as being biased and entirely related to events after the 2016 presidential campaign; the remaining sections need editing but are fine to keep for now. Power~enwiki (talk) 19:05, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

entirely related to events after the 2016 presidential campaign Huh? The interference (hacking, releasing, trolling fake news) all happened DURING the 2016 presidential campaign. The FBI investigation of it began in July 2016. Obama announced it in October 2016. It's true the sources we cite are from 2017, but they are talking about things that happened during 2016 campaign. --MelanieN (talk) 19:37, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

There's no reference to any actions taken during the 2016 campaign, just "high confidence that the Russian government attempted to intervene". I'm not sure what actions it is suggested that Russia actually took, other than:

1. those already discussed in "Interactions with Russia"
2. hiring people in the Balkans to post to Twitter. Power~enwiki (talk) 19:42, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Then we can add a lot more detail, but I thought we were trying to SHRINK the article. The Russians had done enough, by October, for the president of the United States to call them out publicly. And to impose significant sanctions in December as punishment for ... nothing? --MelanieN (talk) 03:47, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Shrink, yes, if possible. If there are important details not mentioned, they should be added. I'm not sure what they would be, perhaps the Podesta emails? Power~enwiki (talk) 03:53, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose. It's all fine where it is. Context is important. -- BullRangifer (talk) 15:16, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support Redundant and out-of-place content should be removed and/or consolidated. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:20, 14 June 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose merging everything Russia into one section, but support removing unnecessary repetition, as long as it doesn't impede the reader's ability to understand one subsection without reading the rest of the article. I think the Comey dismissal merits its own subsection, independent of whatever we have on Russia. ~Awilley (talk) 23:42, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

Comment. I agree with AWilley that "unnecessary repetition" should be removed. An aside: At some point we ought to address whether Russian interference in election should be reworded to "Allegations of Russian attempts to interfere in election". (As far as I know, Comey's testimony has yet to be fact-checked.) --Dervorguilla (talk) 00:50, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Bulk revert

@MrX: You have reverted in bulk a lot of changes I made recently; this is unnecessarily undoing lots of work, most of it unrelated to Russia, where I understand we disagree on the level of detail that is warranted in this bio. We share a common goal to improve the article. Please self-revert and I'll be happy to discuss each of my edits on its own merits. — JFG ^talk 13:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

I didn't revert you per se. I restored the material that you removed, contrary to consensus. In particular, there were strong objections to removing material about the Comey dismissal. I'm happy to discuss your proposed changes, but let's get consensus before injecting them into the article. Does that seem reasonable?- MrX 13:28, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

OK. Looking at your edit more closely, I see that you essentially restored the Comey section prior to my summation efforts, and ditto for the Trump University section. I'll open a discussion section for each of the two proposals. — JFG ^talk 17:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Comey section

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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Summation of the Comey dismissal section[2]

Before

After

On May 9, 2017, Trump dismissed FBI Director James Comey, attributing the action to recommendations from Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Rosenstein had written a memo criticizing Comey's conduct in the investigation about Hillary Clinton's emails. But Trump himself seemed to contradict the White House claim that he had acted because of the Clinton email issue identified by Rosenstein. On May 11 he stated, "When I decided to [fire Comey], I said to myself, I said, 'You know, this Russia thing with Trump and Russia is a made up story, it's an excuse by the Democrats for having lost an election that they should have won.'" In the same interview he said he had intended all along to fire Comey, regardless of any recommendations. Also on May 11, a White House spokesperson directly tied the dismissal to the Russian investigations, saying the White House believed firing Comey was a step toward letting that probe "come to its conclusion with integrity". Multiple FBI insiders said they believe the real reason Comey was fired was because he had refused to end the investigation into Russian connections to the election, and in fact had intensified his involvement with the investigation, receiving daily instead of weekly briefings on its progress. According to memos written by Comey documenting his interactions with Trump, in February 2017 Trump said, “I hope you can see your way clear to letting this go, to letting Flynn go. He is a good guy. I hope you can let this go”, in relation to the FBI investigation into Michael Flynn, who was forced to resign as National Security Advisor after it was discovered that that he misled the Vice President about communications with a Russian ambassador. In March 2017, Trump separately asked Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and Director of the National Security Agency Michael S. Rogers to issue statements saying there was no evidence that his campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election, after Comey had informed the House Intelligence Committee that the FBI was investigating the possibility of collusion. Both Coats and Rogers declined to issue the requested statement. They reportedly regarded Trump's request as extraordinary but not illegal. They believed it was more of a public relations request. They exchanged notes about the conversation, and Coats recorded a memo about it.

On May 9, 2017, Trump dismissed FBI Director James Comey, attributing the action to recommendations from Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy AG Rod Rosenstein, which criticized Comey's conduct in the investigation about Hillary Clinton's emails. However Trump stated on May 11 that he was concerned with the ongoing "Russia thing" and that he had intended to fire Comey earlier. According to a Comey memo of a private conversation on February 14, 2017, Trump said he "hoped" Comey would drop the investigation into Michael Flynn, who had been forced to resign as National Security Advisor after it was discovered that he had misled the Vice President about communications with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak. In March and April, Trump had told Comey that the ongoing suspicions formed a "cloud" impairing his presidency, and asked him to tell the public that he was not personally under investigation. He also asked DNI Dan Coats and NSA Director Michael S. Rogers to issue statements saying there was no evidence that his campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election. Both refused, considering this an inappropriate request, although not illegal. Comey eventually testified on June 8 that while he was director, the FBI investigations did not target Trump himself. The Washington Post later reported that within days of Comey's dismissal, the FBI started investigating whether Trump had obstructed justice. Trump's lawyer Jay Sekulow stated that he had not been notified of any such investigation.

Sources

Please express your support for the proposed text, improvement suggestions or opposition to summarizing. — JFG ^talk 17:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - The proposed version leaves out Trump's shifting reasons for the firing and the memos, and replaces it with Trump's hopes and feelings. I have previously opposed a similar rewording proposal.- MrX 17:31, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

The short version still mentions "Trump's shifting reasons", just in a shorter way: the Rosenstein / Sessions letter, then the Holt interview where he admitted wanting to fire Comey regardless, Trump's veiled request to drop the Flynn investigation, and finally the "cloud over the presidency" issue, which came to light recently and was not yet in the long version. We also have Trump's requests to Comey, Coats and Rogers to acknowledge publicly the lack of personal investigation or evidence of campaign collusion. I cut out Trump's rambling quote and the White House / FBI insiders squabble. What do you want to add? — JFG ^talk 17:44, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support the trim overall - we do need to trim the size of this article, keeping in mind that it is a biography - with a few tweaks. 1) Add Comey's eventual public statement that Trump was not personally under investigation. 2) Add "Comey testified" or "Comey said" attribution to the Flynn "Trump said he hoped" statement - since Trump denies he said it. --MelanieN (talk) 18:41, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: I have incorporated your suggestions in the prose. Are you ok with the result? — JFG ^talk 11:32, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Yes, I support as amended. Thanks. --MelanieN (talk) 16:48, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support. Thank you again. -SusanLesch (talk) 23:22, 14 June 2017 (UTC)
• Qualified support - per suggestions made by MelanieN. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:30, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
• Support as amended by MelanieN. --Dervorguilla (talk) 00:53, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

• WAIT a minute - I think we need to add a sentence. It was revealed earlier this week that Trump himself is now under investigation, over possible obstruction of justice. Trump himself has publicly admitted that he is, and that it is about firing Comey.[3][4] I think this needs to go in the "Dismissal of Comey" section, and there is no need to wait for confirmation, since Trump himself has confirmed it. How about something like this:

However, on June 16 it was revealed that Trump himself is under investigation for possible obstruction of justice, particularly involving the firing of Comey.

Sources

Striking this. An alternate version of this is now in JFG's proposal above; another suggestion from Scjessey is below. --MelanieN (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I started the sentence with "however" because the rest of the paragraph is about saying that he was NOT under investigation (which he wasn't - until he fired Comey, partly because Comey wouldn't say publicly that he wasn't under investigation - and as a result of that firing, now he is. How ironic is that?). Thoughts? --MelanieN (talk) 17:10, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Oh, and we should probably modify the preceding sentence - "Comey eventually testified on June 8 that the FBI investigations did not target Trump himself." - to add "while he was at the FBI" or "as of May 9" or some such thing Because of course Comey was only talking about the situation up until May 9; he wouldn't have known what the situation was on June 8, and in fact I don't think there's any need to say June 8 in the sentence. How about "In June Comey testified that as of May 9 the FBI investigations did not target Trump himself." --MelanieN (talk) 17:50, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Striking. Revised version of this is in JFG's proposal above. --MelanieN (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG, MrX, SusanLesch, Scjessey, and Dervorguilla: What do you think about the above two suggestions? --MelanieN (talk) 17:56, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Added a sentence about the obstruction investigation at the end, attributed to WaPo instead of the vague "it was reported". No need to specify that Comey only referred to the situation until he was fired; that's kind of obvious and we're trying to summarize. — JFG ^talk 19:18, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: I'd be tempted to go with something like: "Comey testified on June 8 that while he was director, the FBI investigations did not target Trump himself. Subsequently, The Washington Post reported on June 16 that Robert Mueller was investigating Trump for obstruction of justice." -- Scjessey (talk) 21:00, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I like that better. Flows better, and dates are clear. JFG? --MelanieN (talk) 21:08, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Oppose "it was revealed" anything (a pet peeve). I support the addition, however, using a real subject and verb. If Trump tweeted, then please say so. Many news sources cite his tweets. -SusanLesch (talk) 21:20, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

@SusanLesch: We already got rid of "it was revealed". The current choices are what is now in JFG's proposal above (his modification of my suggestion), or the new proposal by Scjessey. --MelanieN (talk) 22:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, @MelanieN: Can we edit the final sentence of JFG's version? To 1) identify Mueller (at this first mention), and 2) to date the inquiry back to early May? I've hit my allotment at The Washington Post but perhaps this article gives the day the investigation began. Please delete "June 16" which makes no difference to anybody. Also we could add that Trump "seemed to confirm". -SusanLesch (talk) 23:42, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Here's a rewrite that needs sourcing: -SusanLesch (talk) 00:23, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

The Washington Post reported, however, that since shortly after he fired Comey, Trump was being investigated by FBI special counsel Robert Mueller for obstruction of justice, a development that Trump seemed to confirm in a tweet.

Thanks. Just one tweak: Mueller is not the "FBI special counsel", he is the "special counsel". --MelanieN (talk) 00:40, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

My gosh. Thank you for the correction. -SusanLesch (talk) 02:09, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I support that addition with the correction. I'm not clear on what two suggestions MelanieN referred to, but I guess the wording here supersedes it anyway. I am firmly opposed to the wording: "Trump felt that the ongoing suspicions formed an undue "cloud" above his presidency;" which reads like bad fiction and should not be stated in Wikipedia's voice because it's not a verifiable fact.- MrX 01:45, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@MrX: That is definitely verifiable: Trump expressed his frustration in several tweets and public addresses, and Comey noted in memos and in Senate testimony that Trump had told him exactly that, in order to try and convince him to absolve him publicly. [Yeah, too many "him"s here, but I suppose it's clear who is who.] Now, perhaps the wording could be improved to not sound like bad fiction! Any suggestion? — JFG ^talk 17:01, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: You're missing the subtle point. The source did not conclude how Trump "felt", it said

"On March 30, Mr. Comey said, he received a call in his office from the president. “He described the Russia investigation as ‘a cloud’ that was impairing his ability to act on behalf of the country,” Mr. Comey wrote.... He encouraged Mr. Comey to “lift the cloud” by saying publicly that he was not under investigation. Mr. Comey did not do so."
— [5]]

.

It should be reworded. Something like: "Trump asked Comey to tell the public that he was not personally under investigation, which he said created a "cloud" over his presidency." (I believe it's clear who is who in this wording as well.)- MrX 19:49, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Alright, nobody is in Trump's head and stomach to assess his "feelings", so let's stick to what he said (taking Comey's testimony at face value): Trump told Comey that the ongoing suspicions formed an undue "cloud" above his presidency, and asked him to tell the public that he was not personally under investigation. Flows well into his requests to Coats and Rogers in the next sentence. — JFG ^talk 22:38, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

JFG, that is not a faithful representation of what the source wrote (which I quoted directly above). There is no mention of "undue" and your wording makes the metaphor seem more like a weather report.- MrX 13:41, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

Removed "undue", Changed the "weather report" cloud above his presidency to a direct quote of Comey's word cloud impairing his presidency. Are we good to go now? — JFG ^talk 05:51, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I support SusanLesch's proposal, with a slight tweak to get rid of the passive voice:

The Washington Post reported, however, that within days after Comey's dismissal, the FBI launched an investigation into Trump for possible obstruction of justice, a development that Trump seemed to confirm in a tweet.

Sources

Note that the investigation was begun "days after" Comey's firing per WaPo, which was before there was a special counsel. And I agree with "seemed to confirm" since the WH is now saying Trump was merely repeating what he had read in the papers. --MelanieN (talk) 17:29, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

This kind of confusion is what we get for chasing the tweets… Simpler to just say However, The Washington Post reported that within days of Comey's dismissal, the FBI started investigating whether Trump had obstructed justice. — JFG ^talk 22:25, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I can support that. Yesterday MSNBC had a discussion that said the subject of an investigation might not even know he is the subject (that the investigator does not have an obligation to inform the investigatee, if that's a word). -SusanLesch (talk) 22:59, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks, SusanLesch; you had me at "investigatee"! Was Nixon then a Watergatee? — JFG ^talk 23:25, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I can support that. --MelanieN (talk) 04:37, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

Looks like we are converging. I have amended the proposed text accordingly. @Dervorguilla, MelanieN, MrX, Scjessey, and SusanLesch: Can you vouch for the full text as it now stands? — JFG ^talk 07:45, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

STOP per WP:PUBLICFIGURE (see below). We need two sources, not one. And to "better inform the reader", we ought give an incident description, not just the incident type (obstruction of justice). For example: Within days of Comey's dismissal, the FBI started investigating Trump's reason for firing him: whether Trump did so because Comey was continuing the Kelly investigation or because he was failing to find leakers in the intelligence community. --Dervorguilla (talk) 13:24, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

Come on, D. Trump has given a whole series of reasons for firing Comey - because of the Hillary email investigation (nobody believed that), because he was "not doing a good job" and the FBI was "in turmoil" (promptly contradicted by multiple sources), and because he wanted to remove the "pressure" of the Russia investigation (which he basically said several times). I don't think he ever said "because he wasn't investigating the leaks", did he? In any case, this brief summary item is not getting into the reasons why Comey was fired, just the fact that he was. And the fact that an investigation was launched "within days". As for needing two sources (I assume you mean two sources that he is under investigation for obstruction of justice), we have two: the newspaper reports, and Trump's own tweets. --MelanieN (talk) 18:15, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

@Dervorguilla:, I don't think we need to delve into details of the myriad reasons why Trump may have fired Comey, or why he might be accused of obstruction. (Trump has been accused of so many things we could write several articles about Trump's alleged nefarious schemes… oh wait, we have several articles about Trump's alleged nefarious schemes! ) We are just trying to summarize verifiable facts here: Comey was investigating Russia and Trump associates, and he wouldn't say whether Trump was directly targeted. Trump fired Comey, then he was reportedly placed under investigation (hopefully we shall learn more soon). Eventually Comey testified that Trump was indeed not targeted earlier. Are we good to go now? — JFG ^talk 05:51, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: I don't like it, mainly because of the use of "however". The sources say that the investigation into Trump began after Comey was fired, but as written it makes it look as if Comey's testimony that Trump wasn't under investigation was inaccurate. We must make it clearer that there's a "cause and effect" situation. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:47, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

Agree with Scjessey. If Comey was fired May 9 then it makes no sense to highlight his June 8 testimony that Trump was not being investigated. The only important date is May 9. -SusanLesch (talk) 14:44, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

We need to use Scjessey's earlier rewording of the previous sentence as well as SusanLesch's rewording of the last sentence. That gets rid of the lack of clarity about what time period Comey was referring to, and justifies the use of "However". The two sentences together are, Comey testified on June 8 that while he was director, the FBI investigations did not target Trump himself. However, The Washington Post later reported that within days of Comey's dismissal, the FBI started investigating whether Trump had obstructed justice. --MelanieN (talk) 18:06, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

BTW I am not following all of the dozen-or-so current threads on this page, so if my input is desired somewhere, please ping me. Thanks. --MelanieN (talk) 18:22, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks MelanieN. I have amended the last two sentences per your suggestion. I kept the word "eventually" because it shows that Comey took a long time before eventually accepting to say publicly that his investigation did not target Trump. Are we good to go now? @Scjessey:, is this enough of a "cause and effect" to your liking? @SusanLesch: can you live with this version? — JFG ^talk 05:51, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: Compare (1) "The Washington Post later reported that within days of Comey's dismissal, the FBI started investigating whether Trump had obstructed justice"; (2) Catherine Lucey and Hope Yen, "Trump Attorney Says President Not under Investigation", AP, June 19, 2017; and (3) WP:PUBLICFIGURE (if you cannot find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting the allegation or incident, leave it out). It's clear why we're applying Public Figure policy to this allegation, right? (And maybe to questionable single-source facts in general?) --Dervorguilla (talk) 06:33, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Well, we're chasing the news, and that's not healthy towards article stability for a prominent BLP. Rather than bludgeoning the article with the denial by Trump's attorney, I would advise stopping at the Comey testimony and skipping the WaPo report. We should only mention the obstruction of justice investigation if and when it gets officially confirmed. — JFG ^talk 06:45, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: I'm still not getting why we need to have "however" in there. It's there as a sort of "but wait!" comment, which smacks of narrative. With that said, I'm perfectly happy with what we have now and the inclusion of "however" is not a deal breaker for me. -- Scjessey (talk) 12:37, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I can live without the "however", which does detract from a factual recount of events. Some other editors insisted to add it, and I obliged, because I can also live with it. Now I notice that we have two "howevers" in this section of prose, so just out of concern for style, I'd be inclined to let one go. The first "however" is stronger, as it highlights Trump's sudden change of narrative regarding his rationale for firing Comey. The second "however" introducing the investigation report is not really necessary, the sentence stands on its own merits without it. What do our fellow editors think? — JFG ^talk 12:54, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Go ahead as far as I am concerned. "However" is not a deal breaker because you say the Washington Post "later" reported something. Only nits: mentioning another date (June 8) that doesn't matter, and a wikilink for The Washington Post that we don't need. -SusanLesch (talk) 15:41, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: Yes, I am OK with the two sentences as you now have them in the box above. And I would be OK with omitting "However" and "June 8" if that is what people prefer. --MelanieN (talk) 16:30, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done Amended the draft accordingly: no "however", no extra dates, and a quote from the lawyer's interview with Dickerson. I added his name, Jay Sekulow, because we happen to have an article on him. Removed link on the WaPo because it's linked earlier in the article. — JFG ^talk 17:16, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Quick survey on obstruction of justice investigation

It is unclear whether Trump is actually being investigated for obstruction of justice. How should we cover this?

A: Mention the WaPo claims as in current draft, and add the denial by Trump's lawyer, e.g. "On June 18, Trump's lawyer stated that he had not been notified of any such investigation." (cite AP source or Chris Wallace interview)

B: Mention nothing; stop after Comey's testimony.

Opinions, please. — JFG ^talk 06:51, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

A lawyer denying his client did something wrong isn't really newsworthy, is it? -- Scjessey (talk) 12:37, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

A newspaper relaying anonymous sources on alleged Trump misdeeds isn't really newsworthy any longer, is it? This has been the greatest political soap opera for the last two years since the very day Trump announced his candidacy. Some readers may be suffering from "Watergate fatigue", the newest incarnation of "Crying wolf syndrome". But it surely is still fun to write about… Personal opinions aside, our WP:BLP policy is clear, specifically the WP:WELLKNOWN section: either include the accusation and the response, or say nothing. Do you prefer A or B? — JFG ^talk 12:48, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• A without the lawyer denial 1. In the same interview he stated he was under investigation. 2. The administration has stated muliple and well document falsehoods. 3. The reporting from the NYT, WSJ, and WP have been dead on in these stories. I believe that the WP uses 5 sources for this one(would have to reread). No reason to doubt the story and every reason to doubt the administration, who hasn't been WP:RS about crowd sized at the swearing in.Casprings (talk) 12:57, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm half-seriously expecting Trump to be indicted about lying on his crowd size too! — JFG ^talk 13:09, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• B until this investigation is confirmed. — JFG ^talk 13:10, 19 June 2017 (UTC)
• C (or A without the lawyer denial, as Casprings said) - @JFG: Come on, dude! We do not need the comment from Trump's paid mouthpiece, but I absolutely insist we have the Washington Post reporting. Let's not even pretend for a nanosecond that Trump's lawyer is a "reliable source" in the same way the Post is. Jeez. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:29, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm not calling Trump's lawyer a reliable source from a journalistic standpoint; as an official representative of Trump, he is a reliable source for Trump's statements about this affair (do we have any such thing as a primary-source and a half?). Of course Trump might bypass him and tweet something else tomorrow entirely, just like he bypassed his press staff and his own written statement about the reason to fire Comey. If that happens, we can update… We can't let a BLP criminal accusation stand in Wikipedia without the accused person's reply, no matter if Trump, Clinton, Putin or the Pope. — JFG ^talk 14:34, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• A without the lawyer denial. He was all over TV on Sunday saying "Trump is not under investigation!", but interviewers got him to admit that actually, the target of an investigation would often not know if he was under investigation or not. (Look at all the time Trump spent trying to find out from Comey if he was under investigation!) To say "he has not been notified of any such investigation" is kind of stating the obvious. I agree we should not say that Trump confirmed it since the meaning of his tweet has been called into doubt. --MelanieN (talk) 15:30, 19 June 2017 (UTC)
• I've changed my mind. A as is. It's true that sources usually include the accused party's denial when charges are reported; this is a similar case. And the way you have phrased it ("hasn't been notified") is actually quite a good representation of what he actually said was eventually forced to admit. --MelanieN (talk) 15:55, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Except - again with the dates - do we have to say "on June 18"? We shouldn't assume that our readers are keeping a timeline to know what these dates mean. Just "Trump's lawyer stated".--MelanieN (talk) 16:33, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• A. Trust yourself. -SusanLesch (talk) 16:15, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• B. The statements by Trump and his lawyer have been ambiguous so they don't count for much, and they are not particularly reliable either. On the other hand, no one in this thread has mentioned that many reliable sources have said that no full scale investigation has been launched yet. For example (emphasis added):

• Collinson, Stephen. "Trump defiant as pressure grows", CNN (June 19, 2017): "Law enforcement sources have told CNN that the special counsel is gathering information and considering whether there is evidence to launch a full scale obstruction investigation."
• "'This Week' Transcript 6-18-17: Newt Gingrich, Rep. Adam Schiff, and Douglas Lute", ABC News (June 18, 2017): "PIERRE THOMAS, ABC NEWS SENIOR JUSTICE CORRESPONDENT....Now, my sources are telling me he's begun some preliminary planning. Plans to talk to some people in the administration. But he's not yet made that momentous decision to go for a full scale investigation."
• Schmidt, Michael S., et al., "Mueller Seeks to Talk to Intelligence Officials, Hinting at Inquiry of Trump", The New York Times (15 June 2017): "Robert S. Mueller III, the special counsel examining Russia’s meddling in the 2016 election, has requested interviews with three high-ranking current or former intelligence officials, the latest indication that he will investigate whether President Trump obstructed justice, a person briefed on the investigation said on Wednesday."

Additionally, immediately after the WaPo article, DOJ issued a statement cautioning people not to believe anonymous officials, and of course such anonymous officials also said for months that Comey was investigating Trump when Comey clearly was not doing so. Anyway, the anonymous sources of WaPo are now saying something different from the anonymous sources of NYT, CNN, and ABC. It would really be wrong for us to unilaterally decide that WaPo has got it right whereas NYT, CNN, and ABC are useless. Anythingyouwant (talk) 17:10, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• Comment – I have tentatively added Jay Sekulow's statement to the current draft, with a quote from his interview with John Dickerson, so people can judge what the final text would look like with option A. If option B is chosen, the WaPo quote and the lawyer's reply will both be removed. — JFG ^talk 17:24, 19 June 2017 (UTC)
• Notice – Seeing no new comments over two days, I have inserted the revised draft in the article, including version A of the obstruction statements. I'll leave the survey open for a few more days, in case new opinions change the consensus or new facts emerge. Thanks to all who participated to build a consensus version! — JFG ^talk 03:51, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Trump University section

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

Summation of the Trump University section[6]

Before

After

Trump University LLC was an American for-profit education company that ran a real estate training program from 2005 until at least 2010. After multiple lawsuits, the business is now defunct. It was founded by Trump and his associates, Michael Sexton and Jonathan Spitalny, and offered courses, charging between $1,500 and $35,000 per course. In 2005 the operation was notified by New York State authorities that its use of the word "university" violated state law, and after a second such notification in 2010, the name of the company was changed to the "Trump Entrepreneurial Institute". Trump was also found personally liable for failing to obtain a business license for the operation. In 2013, the State of New York filed a $40 million civil suit alleging that Trump University made false statements and defrauded consumers. In addition, two class-action civil lawsuits were filed in federal court relating to Trump University; they named Trump personally as well as his companies. During the presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly criticized Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel who oversaw those two cases, alleging bias because of his Mexican heritage. Trump later said that his concerns about Curiel's impartiality were not based upon ethnicity alone, but also upon rulings in the case. The Low v. Trump case was set for trial on November 28, 2016 in San Diego. Shortly after Trump won the presidency, the parties agreed to a settlement of all three pending cases. In the settlement, Trump did not admit to any wrongdoing but agreed to pay a total of $25 million. The litigants agreed to the settlement just an hour before a hearing regarding Trump's latest request to delay the trial until after the inauguration. Jason Forge, the attorney for the plaintiffs, said he "definitely detected a change of tone and change of approach" from the Trump representatives after the election. The settlement was called into question on March 6, 2017, when Sherri Simpson, a Florida bankruptcy lawyer and former Trump University student, filed an objection.

Trump University LLC was a for-profit education company founded by Trump and his associates, Michael Sexton and Jonathan Spitalny, that ran a real estate training program, charging between $1,500 and $35,000 per course. In 2005 the operation was notified by New York State authorities that its use of the word "university" was misleading and violated state law. After a second such notification in 2010, the name of the company was changed to the "Trump Entrepreneurial Institute". Trump was also found personally liable for failing to obtain a business license for the operation. In 2013, the State of New York filed a $40 million civil suit alleging that Trump University made false statements and defrauded consumers. In addition, two class-action civil lawsuits were filed in federal court relating to Trump University; they named Trump personally as well as his companies. During the presidential campaign, Trump criticized Judge Gonzalo P. Curiel who oversaw those two cases, alleging bias in his rulings because of his Mexican heritage. Shortly after Trump won the presidency, the parties agreed to a settlement of all three pending cases, whereby Trump paid a total of $25 million and denied any wrongdoing.

Sources

Please express your support for the proposed text, improvement suggestions or opposition to summarizing. — JFG ^talk 17:21, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support - I'm fine with this and I've self reverted with an explanation.- MrX 17:37, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks! — JFG ^talk 17:46, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support. Good trim. --MelanieN (talk) 18:43, 13 June 2017 (UTC)
• Support. Looks great. One minor suggestion:

  In 2005 the operation was notified by New York State authorities that its use of the word "university" was “misleading” and violated state law. After a second such notification in 2010, the name of the company was changed to the "Trump Entrepreneurial Institute."...

  Schistocyte (talk) 23:41, 13 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done, thanks. — JFG ^talk 04:43, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

• Support - Very good. More of this, please! -- Scjessey (talk) 13:31, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Template-protected edit request on 14 June 2017

Hi. Could someone please fix the missing links in #19 in Current Consensus for link 3 and link 4. Thank you. -SusanLesch (talk) 23:41, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

 Not done However, @SusanLesch: you should be able to edit that now, lowered protection. — xaosflux ^Talk 00:48, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done. Thank you kindly, @Xaosflux:. -SusanLesch (talk) 01:01, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Good catch, SusanLesch, thanks for your assistance in maintenance! — JFG ^talk 20:14, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

45th President of the United States to 45th president of the United States

Howdy. An Rfc at WP:MOSCAPS is in progress & so far, de-capitalizing appears to be the favored interpretation. If that's going to be the result, then it's best we start de-capitalizing here, at all the US presidents & vice presidents intros, as well as all the US governors & lieutenant governors intros. Thus here, we'd have "...45th and current president of the United States", instead of "...45th and current President of the United States". GoodDay (talk) 19:38, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

No rush. Ping us back when that RfC is closed. It has only two !votes at this time, one for uppercase and one for lowercase, and a long-winded back-and-forth between editors arguing over job titles in general. I can't see how you can assert that "de-capitalizing appears to be the favored interpretation". Again, there is no rush. And please sign your posts. — JFG ^talk 19:25, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Indeed, no rush. More input at the Rfc would help though ;) GoodDay (talk) 19:38, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for signing, GoodDay! I'm afraid I don't have an opinion one way or the other about the RfC, but surely this thread may get the attention of some "regulars"… — JFG ^talk 20:01, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

John Miller pseudonym

Trump is known to have used the pseudonym John Miller publicly, in interviews with journalists about himself including his career and personal life. He has acknowledged in court that he used the pseudonym.[7] His use of this alternative name has also received a great deal of attention. I therefore believe we should mention it in the article. --Tataral (talk) 19:39, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

See Donald Trump pseudonyms. Anythingyouwant (talk) 20:01, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Is this this section upholding WP: NPOV.

Hatting. This suggestion appears to be a non-starter since the proposing editor has been indeffed for socking. --MelanieN (talk) 16:41, 21 June 2017 (UTC)
The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.
I recently added a section from Presidency of Donald Trump to the article. It was this. Is this fair? I personally don't considered Trump an authoritarian, but the article on his Presidency strongly suggests he is. If should either be removed in both, and added in both. Important aspect: During his presidency, critics have argued that Trump was showing signs of authoritarianism. According to Princeton history professor Julian Zelizer, early in his presidency Trump appeared to have been surprised by the checks and balances that placed limitations on the power of US presidents. He complained about the legal limitations on his power, and called Senate and House of Representative rules "archaic" and stated that he had thought of increasing his power. He attacked courts which made rulings against his executive orders. Trump suggested that he was considering breaking up the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit after it ruled against his executive order on the funding of sanctuary cities. Trump is often critical of the media and had previously expressed interest in changing libel laws, with his Chief of Staff stating in April 2017 that the administration was considering the constitutional implications. The conservative columnist for the National Review, Jonah Goldberg finds the frequent leaks from Trump's inner-circle as "hilarious" and "oddly reassuring," as it indicates that Trump will prove to be ineffective as an authoritarian. Ezra Klein editorialized that the biggest threat is not "that Trump will build an autocracy. It’s that congressional Republicans will let him." Trump also expressed admiration for the authoritarian leaders of other nations while causing incidents with the leaders of liberal democracies. During the presidential campaign and early in his presidency Trump praised Russian president Vladimir Putin, although this relationship appeared to suffer after Trump launched an attack on Syria, Russia's ally, for its chemical attacks. In April 2017, Trump congratulated President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of Turkey for winning a referendum that integrated his office into the executive branch of the Turkish government; political analysts have characterized this planned action as a significant move towards authoritarianism. On April 30, he invited President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines, who has numerous human rights abuses that have been reported in the Philippines during Duterte's tenure to the White House. Critics, however, have also linked his praise for authoritarian leaders in the aforementioned countries to the Trump Organization's conflicts of interest with the administration, suggesting that he would try to use his presidential influence to help his existing business interests (as well as expand upon them) in Turkey, Russia and the Philippines. In his first overseas tour, Trump had a congenial time with authoritarian Middle Eastern leaders in Saudi Arabia, promising not to lecture them on human rights. He then proceeded to Europe where he had lectured and admonished the leaders of European liberal democracies straining US-European relations. A number of professors of law, political science and history have criticized Trump's firing of FBI Director James Comey, arguing that Trump's action destabilizes democratic norms and the rule of law in the U.S. Some have argued that Trump's action creates a constitutional crisis. Parallels have been drawn with other leaders who have slowly eroded democratic norms in their countries, such as Turkey's Recep Tayyip Erdoğan or Hungary's Viktor Orbán; political science professor Sheri Berman said those leaders slowly "chipped away at democratic institutions, undermined civil society, and slowly increased their own power." sources The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it. References Would do you guys think? Is it fair to add it, or is this biased? Personally, I'm mixed. Although it is much more favorable to the "against-side". PerfectlyIrrational (talk) 22:01, 20 June 2017 (UTC) This article is far too long as-is. Ignoring the possible bias completely for now, there is still no way that this content can be added with this length. Power~enwiki (talk) 22:24, 20 June 2017 (UTC) Fair enough, sorry for snapping at you. PerfectlyIrrational (talk) 22:38, 20 June 2017 (UTC) Way, way too much. We've been falling all over ourselves here trying to trim non-essential information from this huge (yuuuge) biography page. Propose a one-sentence addition, with at most three sources, and we'll talk. --MelanieN (talk) 01:19, 21 June 2017 (UTC) Two remarks: The section copied from the Presidency article has been widely contested as an editorial attack piece, see Talk:Presidency of Donald Trump#RfC: Possible POV of §Authoritarian tendencies Calling Trump authoritarian or fascist has been rejected several times in this bio: Talk:Donald Trump/Archive 16#Alleged authoritarianism, Talk:Donald Trump/Archive 19#Allegedly racist and fascist, Talk:Donald Trump/Archive 33#Fascism?, Talk:Donald Trump/Archive 49#Description as only "populist, protectionist, and nationalist" Even if reduced to a few lines, this suggestion is a bit of a non-starter. I'm not opposed to mentioning various views of Trump's leadership style and ideology, including extreme opinions, but any proposed text along those lines would certainly have to go through a formal RfC before being added. — JFG talk 03:24, 21 June 2017 (UTC) Notice – Looks like OP PerfectlyIrrational has been indeffed for recurrent disruptive editing and recently-uncovered socking.[8] — JFG talk 04:38, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

The lead section

The lead section is horribly written/outdated, perhaps because it was probably mostly written before he became president. The events for which he is most notable, his scandal-ridden presidency so far including his major initiatives/policies, are barely mentioned at all (and most of the material relating to his presidency are just trivia, such as him being the "oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency"). Instead nearly the entire lead section focuses on details of his early interest in politics in 1987, details of his campaign last year, and excessive details of his business career, which is really less impressive and certainly of far less importance than his presidency, which includes his failed Muslim ban, his failed healthcare reform (that is a very polite description indeed, which he hasn't really earned), his withdrawal from the Paris climate agreement (ditto), his (pro-Russian and anti-western/NATO) foreign policy, the lawsuit over corruption[9], his firing of the FBI Director, and now an ongoing investigation of him personally for obstruction of justice by the special counsel.[10] In short: It's time for a complete overhaul of the lead section, with at least a whole paragraph devoted exclusively to his actual presidency, including major policy initiatives and scandals, per WP:LEAD. --Tataral (talk) 23:49, 14 June 2017 (UTC)

I disagree. Trump was already notable for his real-estate career and for The Apprentice before becoming President. We shouldn't re-write the lede to focus on the first six months of his presidency. By the end of his first term, this may be the correct thing to do, but not now. Power~enwiki (talk) 02:42, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

The idea that the lead section should mostly focus on the Apprentice throughout his presidency is frankly absurd. The Apprentice is dwarfed in importance of what he does during his presidency. --Tataral (talk) 04:29, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

I agree in part, I think the lede is outdated indeed and I've suggested expanding it to include at least a summary of his presidency so far (the major events like writing EO 13769 and 13780, attempting to pass AHCA, enforcing border security, withdrawing from TPP and Paris Agreement, Gorsuch confirmed, etc.), all while keeping a neutral tone. I'm against including the Russia scandal right now, I think it needs more momentum, particularly if Mueller reaches a more solid conclusion in the future. NoMoreHeroes (talk) 03:02, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Sorry, but I think the lede is in pretty good shape. It has been exhaustively refined over a long period of time by many editors reflecting the entire political spectrum. Bear in mind that this is a biography of Trump's entire life. What some consider trivia, others consider biographically significant. Presidency of Donald Trump is where you need to delve into Trump's scandals and awful policies. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:37, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

"Exhaustively refined"? Hardly. Very little serious work on the lead section has taken place since he took office, and the few attempts to improve and update it have had few results. The lead section mostly reflects the situation from before he became President and is ridiculously outdated and hardly mentions what he is primarily known for at all. The lead section also reminds me of the notorious Vladimir Putin article where paid Kremlin agents have been at work for years to remove/downplay any criticism while filling the article with propagandistic praise (as many editors have agreed on on the talk page over the years). While it's true that the article needs to cover Trump's entire life, his previous activities and his golf resorts are not equally important as his presidency, and should be given much less weight in the lead section in particular. The fact that we don't even have a single paragraph that really discusses his presidency in the lead section is outrageous. --Tataral (talk) 14:24, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Trump's presidency is not part of his entire life? For the record I don't think the lead is poorly written, just incomplete. His presidency so far has been a major event and that's not even included in the lede. It basically just stops at "he became President on January 20, 2017 and that's it", as if nothing happened since then. NoMoreHeroes (talk) 14:39, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

I agree with the main point of your comment, that the lead section covers his life until he became President and then stops the day he takes office (or the day before, since it doesn't mention his inauguration crowd size etc etc). When I say the lead section is also badly written, I am thinking of sentences like for example "His political positions have been described by scholars and commentators as populist, protectionist, and nationalist." This is not a fair or accurate summary of the actual criticism, as discussed several times on this talk page already; but that's another matter, and the key issue here is that we should have at least a paragraph devoted to his presidency, including his policies and initiatives and other actions as President. Barack Obama's article includes a first paragraph summarizing the most important points, then a paragraph discussing what he did before he became president and ending with his election as president, and then two lengthy paragraphs in the lead devoted to what he actually did as President ("Obama signed many landmark bills" ... etc etc). (I think for now it would be sufficient with one paragraph devoted to Trump's presidency, since he hasn't been in office for as long as Obama). --Tataral (talk) 15:24, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

@Tataral: You mention, "The lead section also reminds me of the notorious Vladimir Putin article where paid Kremlin agents have been at work for years to remove/downplay any criticism while filling the article with propagandistic praise..." That article's Wikiproject assessment reads "B-class article"; Trump's reads "C-class". Does this disparity suggest to you that Putin's "agents" may be of higher quality than Trump's? --Dervorguilla (talk) 01:27, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

If you have something of actual substance to say, I'm more than happy to continue that conversation on Talk:Vladimir Putin. --Tataral (talk) 10:04, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Obstruction of Justice

As reported independently by the The Washington Post , The New York Times ,and Wall Street Journal, the section removed here [11] should be restored. Casprings (talk) 03:12, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

• Oppose - "investigating Trump for possible obstruction of justice" is not "Obstruction of Justice". If he announces he's found something and is pressing charges we can add it. Power~enwiki (talk) 03:16, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
  • I do support a 1-sentence reference to Mueller's appointment in the "Dismissal of James Comey" section, but nothing more. Power~enwiki (talk) 03:20, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

• I agree. The section blanking (with a blatantly false edit summary which misrepresents the edit in question by falsely pretending that it merely removes a link to an article discussed on AfD and which offers no rationale at all for blanking the whole section) constitutes simple vandalism and should simply be reverted. There is no doubt that this material belongs in the article; it's reliably sourced, extremely relevant content directly related to the subject of the article. Whether a different stand-alone article is discussed on AfD (where it's clear that it will be kept) is immaterial for whether we should mention the investigation here. --Tataral (talk) 04:25, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
• Oppose - The obstruction of justice allegations have not matured enough, so we are in a WP:NOTNEWS situation for the immediate future. Certainly something to monitor though. -- Scjessey (talk) 13:39, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
  • Per WP:NOTNEWS, "editors are encouraged to include current and up-to-date information within its coverage, and to develop stand-alone articles on significant current events." There is nothing in NOTNEWS to suggest that an article should not include relevant, well sourced, and up to date information.Casprings (talk) 14:00, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
• Support, but don't create a new section for every news development. It is very rare for a sitting US President to be investigated for criminal activity. There has been ongoing coverage since Comey's firing, more coverage after Comey's testimony, and now a surge in reporting following the Washington Post article. For now, the brief material should be added to the 'Dismissal of James Comey' section until there are more facts (not commentary) about the investigation.- MrX 14:27, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
• Support and Oppose I support it's inclusion in the article but oppose a separate section. Just work the content into one of the existing sections. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 15:24, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
• Probably merits a sentence in the Comey section. ~Awilley (talk) 16:49, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

JTBC: I'm not going to edit of course, but I just wanted to get this massage out. It's stunning that desperate Trump supporters are trying to shield this page from mentioning that the president of the United States is under criminal investigation for possible obstruction of justice of the probe into whether his campaign colluded w/ Russia. This is not a banana republic -- when Hillary Clinton was under criminal probe, it was mentioned in her article. Trump should not be different. Nobody suggested he's guilty -- but he's under investigation. This isn't just WaPO, but also NBC News. To those trying to stop the truth: you'll never succeed, and people will know that Trump is criminally investigated. And I consider myself centrist & neutral -- just stunned by the double standard between others to whom we did write they're under probe. Archway (talk) 11:32, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I feel compelled to say something here. I opposed the inclusion of this material when it was first proposed, on the grounds that it hadn't yet matured enough to be beyond doubt. We must be cautious not to jump the gun and defame the subject. I can categorically say that in no way was I trying to "shield" Trump from negative coverage. I don't want you to confuse my caution and desire to reflect Wikipedia policy with some kind of agenda. I am, in fact, delighted Trump is (apparently) under investigation. -- Scjessey (talk) 16:54, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

@Archwayh: Regardless of the merits of your arguments, calling your fellow editors "desperate Trump supporters" is not appropriate conduct on Wikipedia. Neither would anyone appreciate being called a "desperate Clinton supporter", a "desperate Bernie Bro" or a "desperate Putin troll". Thankfully, that election season is over. Scjessey is exactly right: we are all here to improve the quality of articles regardless of each person's opinions. Actually, the friendly confrontation between good-faith opinionated editors often results in net improvements to encyclopedic coverage and neutrality. Please focus on the edits, not the editors, and refrain from casting aspersions about what you may perceive as political motives. You may want to edit your signature to reflect the correct spelling of your username; that would ease replying to you. — JFG ^talk 20:12, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

First Financial Disclosure 2017

It has been released at this link or here with commentary. Should we mention this given the controversy regarding the speculation about "conflicts of interest", and Trump keeping his tax returns private? — Preceding unsigned comment added by Emir of Wikipedia (talk • contribs) 22:53, June 16, 2017 (UTC)

I don't think so. It seems like a fairly routine disclosure and the secondary source doesn't say much about it.- MrX 01:50, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I agree with MrX. If there's no news coverage, it's WP:MILL. Even if there is news coverage, it's unlikely to be important. Power~enwiki (talk) 06:21, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Worth a brief mention in the Donald Trump#Resignation section, as it clarifies his current legal standing towards The Trump Organization. — JFG ^talk 07:24, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

…and perhaps as a followup to his earlier asset disclosures in Donald Trump#Financial disclosures. — JFG ^talk 07:33, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Lede Section Rewrite

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

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I think the lede section needs updating. Here is my logic.

1. Lets take away some of the language that isn't historically significant. I got it, he beat 14 other GOPers. However, that isn't really that important and shouldn't be in the lede. 2. If we are going to mention the election, which we should, we have to mention Russian interference and the follow-on investigations. This is the event that seems to have the most important historical significance. 3. We should add significant policy achievements when and if they happen. While not in the suggested text become, if Trump were to sign the American Health Care Act, that should be in the lede. However, at this point he hasn't had any "historic" policy achievements but we should come to consensus that they should be added when/if they happen.

With that in mind, here is my suggestion.

Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.

Trump was born and raised in Queens, New York City, and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. Later, he took charge of The Trump Organization, the real estate and construction firm founded by his paternal grandmother, which he ran for 45 years until 2016. During his real estate career, Trump built, renovated, and managed numerous office towers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. Besides real estate, he started several side ventures and has licensed the use of his name for the branding of various products and properties. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. His net worth was estimated to be $3.5 billion as of 2017, making him the 544th richest person in the world.

In June 2015, he launched his campaign for the 2016 presidential election and was formally nominated at the Republican National Convention along with Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate. Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, generating much free media coverage. His political positions have been described by scholars and commentators as populist, protectionist, and nationalist.

Trump won the general election on November 8, 2016, in a surprise victory against Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton and commenced his presidency on January 20, 2017. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election while losing the popular vote. During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign. After the election, an FBI investigation into the Russian interference expanded to include whether any of Trump's associates colluded with the Russians. Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and a special counsel was then appointed to look into all Russia-related issues including possible obstruction of justice.

This is just to start a conversation, but I think we should start to reword the lede.Casprings (talk) 17:39, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Agree with #1, disagree with #2. It's premature to conclude that Russian interference has most important historical significance. The reality is that we don't know whether it had any significant impact on the outcome of the election. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 17:43, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

• • Foreign interference in an election to the degree Russia interfered is not normal and highly significant. It is unlikely we will know the impact because they used bots to inference news streams, release of negative information on Clinton and other techniques that make it impossible to measure the actual impact. That said, the degree of effort from Russia makes it clearly historically significant.Casprings (talk) 17:52, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
    • If they tried and failed, then it's not that historically significant. It's more like trivia. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 18:40, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
      • Well, 1. The person they wanted to be elected was. 2. They had significant influence on the information environment with bots, release of Clinton's emails, etc. That makes it pretty clear they did not fail.Casprings (talk) 18:46, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
        • 1. Correlation does not imply causation 2. Assumes facts not in evidence. The hacked e-mails received some, but not a lot of coverage prior to the election. Ditto for the bots. I forget who said it (FBI? NSA?), but they said they have no evidence Russia's efforts changed a single vote. Let's stick with what we know. We know they tried to influence the election. We have no evidence they were successful in changing the outcome. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 19:12, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
          • There is uncertainty over the effects. However, uncertainty is not the same as "no evidence" that they were effective. Moreover, given the investigations into both Trump and his Campaign that followed the election, one wonders how this is not historically significant whatever the actual effects.Casprings (talk) 19:23, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
            • We will never know if the intervention succeeded or not. Maybe the release of hacked emails was determinative; maybe it wasn't; the election was so close that a few tens of thousands of votes could have made it go the other way; we will never know. It doesn't matter. The Russian interference was unprecedented and it will be one of the main things his election is remembered for. --MelanieN (talk) 21:54, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
              • Actually, we do have evidence that it wasn't the Russians that swung the election to Trump, it was something else: Understanding the undecided voters. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 22:15, 15 June 2017 (UTC)
                • There are thousands of op-eds like this. They all think they know why the election went the way it did. None of them amount to evidence. --MelanieN (talk) 03:33, 16 June 2017 (UTC)
                  • There are thousands of op-eds from Clinton staffers who were hired to scientifically track undecided voters? Can you cite some examples, please? A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:37, 16 June 2017 (UTC)
                  • And actually, this is evidence - hard evidence. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 13:38, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Support as long as the following is deleted: ", and an investigation into rather Trump committed obstruction of justice." -SusanLesch (talk) 18:23, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Weak Support after reading the proposal, I agree the "Trump presidential campaign" part of the lede can be reduced. I disagree with the inclusion of "During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign. After the election, an investigation into his campaign's collision with Russian interference resulted in his firing of the FBI James Comey, the appointment of a special prosecutor Robert Mueller, and an investigation into rather Trump committed obstruction of justice." The most notable thing from his presidency so far is either (a) his failure on health-care; (b) his failure on the travel ban; or (c) appointing Gorsuch. Both (a) and (b) may be temporary, and (c) is WP:MILL for presidents. The 2017 Qatar diplomatic crisis isn't provably related to him either. I don't see a single thing from his presidency that compares to the material in the lede for Bill Clinton or George W. Bush's articles. A general statement along the lines of "Trump pursued a foreign policy friendlier to autocratic states like Russia and Saudi Arabia" would be fine with me if there's an NPOV way of saying it. Power~enwiki (talk) 19:44, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

It`s spelled lead — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2602:306:BD95:45F0:39:DE59:2CE5:42E4 (talk) 21:05, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

It's spelled either lede or lead. General Ization ^Talk 21:12, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

Overall pretty good. I do agree with including the Russian interference; it has dominated his life for months. But the final paragraph needs a lot of work.

• move the "oldest, wealthiest" sentence to second position, right after his inauguration.
• "his campaign's collision collusion": this assumes that collusion exists, which has not been proven.
• "an investigation into rather whether Trump committed obstruction of justice" - I'm not sure this is ready for inclusion in the lede, it is newly reported and there is not much meat to the story at this point.
  • Done. One point 2, it says it is an investigation into it. It doesn't say it is a fact.Casprings (talk) 22:07, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

How about this: "During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign. After the election, an FBI investigation into the Russian interference expanded to include whether any of Trump's associates colluded with the Russians. Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and a special counsel was then appointed to look into all Russia-related issues including possible obstruction of justice. (Optionally omit the last phrase depending on consensus) --MelanieN (talk) 21:48, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

• Thats good. Added.Casprings (talk) 22:08, 15 June 2017 (UTC)

How about "In May 2017, Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and a special counsel was appointed to look into possible obstruction of justice." Power~enwiki (talk) 01:21, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

MelanieN wording is more accurate. He was appointed to look at Russia and anything that came out of that.Casprings (talk) 01:48, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

More accurate is less important than shorter in the lede, as long as there's nothing inaccurate. I'm fine with including the obstruction of justice investigation, but mentioning Russia three times is excessive. Power~enwiki (talk) 01:51, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Well there is less accurate and there is incorrect. He simply was not appointed to look into obstruction of justice and the statement you wrote seems to indicates that was the reason he was appointed.Casprings (talk) 02:22, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

If you have to use the word "Russia" three times to describe it, it shouldn't be in the lede. Power~enwiki (talk) 02:26, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Why? Russia seems pretty relevant here and Trump's connections seem historic to me (And WP:RSes).Casprings (talk) 02:29, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Hi Casprings, thanks for this initiative. I agree that the section on the campaign can be shortened and we should include some description of Trump's first few months in office. However, we can't speak only about the Russia controversy; we need to describe some of his actual government policies and actions. Here's a list of the salient events since Trump took office (links to first 100 days and timeline):

• Surprise victory (we already say so), massive protests in reaction to election
• Many businesspeople appointed to Cabinet, resistance to some nominations, Neil Gorsuch in the Supreme Court
• Domestic policy: promoting local industry (Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines, coal mines), reducing government spending (hiring freeze, 2018 budget cuts), health care reform passed House, not Senate
• Environment: withdrawal from the Paris Agreement
• Immigration: stalled travel bans (EO 13769 and 13780), stronger border enforcement, Mexico wall not started yet
• Foreign policy: have NATO allies pay more for defense, speech to Muslim leaders against islamists, arms deal with Saudi Arabia, military strikes in Syria and Afghanistan
• Investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, dismissal of James Comey, special counsel
• "Drain the swamp" rhetoric, conflict with intelligence agencies, politicians from both sides, media

We should have a short sentence on each of these events. Anything I missed? Anything undue? — JFG ^talk 10:09, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

The proposed new text is certainly a lot better than the current one. I agree that the Russian election interference, the firing of the FBI director, the appointment of special counsel, the withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and the Muslim Ban (at the very least) need to be included. --Tataral (talk) 10:16, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

• I think you are right. Maybe take out the second paragraph and develop a paragraph on policy?Casprings (talk) 11:17, 16 June 2017 (UTC)
  • I think ideally we should have
    1. a brief first paragraph summarizing the key points (the current paragraph "is the 45th and current President of the United States. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality")
    2. a paragraph on his career/activities before he became President
    3. (for now) a paragraph on his presidential campaigns, ending with the 2016 election result
    4. a paragraph on his presidency, including his policies and other actions as President (Muslim ban and climate change), and the other most significant controversies (Russia, FBI/obstruction of justice etc.)
  • At a future point in time, it would possibly make sense to merge/shorten/condense paragraphs 2 and 3 into one to make room for an additional paragraph relating to his presidency (similar to the Barack Obama article). --Tataral (talk) 14:26, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

@Tataral: Please see my revised proposal below, which matches your proposed structure. The first three paragraphs should be relatively easy to agree upon; writing the fourth one, #Coverage of the early presidency, is the larger challenge. Comments welcome there. — JFG ^talk 05:30, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

The new poposal looks good, however the word Russia used three times is too much. Moreover , I would include the current information of "Trump first publicly expressed interest in running for political office in 1987. He won two Reform Party presidential primaries in 2000, but withdrew his candidacy early on." and his changing party memberships od D, R, I and Ref.--Joobo (talk) 11:07, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Why is that more important then his policy positions? I would exclude that, actually?Casprings (talk) 11:17, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

That would be too much detail, however we can't give the impression that he suddenly dropped into politics in 2015 out of nowhere, especially as the article has a lot of material about Trump's earlier political dabblings. Perhaps simply start this paragraph with "Trump had expressed interest in politics since 1987, and he entered the presidential race in June 2015." Also, I think we should keep a few words about his unlikely victory in the primaries. Perhaps don't mention the Republican convention and say "Trump defeated a wide field of 16 Republican politicians in the primaries, and picked Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate." — JFG ^talk 11:57, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Agree with JFG now.--Joobo (talk) 19:22, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I disagree. Most sources don't mention his 2000 Presidential run (and it's questionable whether it can be described as a serious campaign); it was never seriously mentioned in the context of his 2016 Presidential run. Expressing interest in politics in 1987 is also a useful detail for the article, but synthesis in the lede; it implies that his actions from 1988-2015 were in the context of a future presidential run, and that's not supported by sources. I feel it sufficient to note that he entered the 2016 race with no additional details. Power~enwiki (talk) 19:33, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Mentioning his early public interest in politics does not imply "that his actions from 1988-2015 were in the context of a future presidential run". If we omit that entirely, we don't fairly represent the article contents, which go into much detail about Trump's on-and-off presidential ambitions and political commentary. If you have a better way to phrase it, go ahead; perhaps remove the exact date, but it would be just wrong to jump directly to his 2015 announcement. — JFG ^talk 21:25, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

• Suggestion: After the 2016 election outcome, remove "and commenced his presidency on January 20, 2017", because it's obvious. If we really want to mention his start date, add it to the lead sentence: "Donald John Trump is the 45th and current President of the United States, in office since January 20, 2017." — JFG ^talk 12:02, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

• Comment this seems to be more or less agreed-upon, except for the Russia bit. If you insist on using the word "Russia" (or Russians) more than once to the lede, I'm going to demand a full and separate RFC before any discussion of Russia is added to the lede. If you can describe it using the word "Russia" only once, whatever you do is fine with me. Power~enwiki (talk) 18:23, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I think that is an unreasonable position. Russian interference, investigation into possible collusion, some of his closest aides having to leave because of Russia issues, a special counsel looking at all things Russian - these have been the dominant themes of his coverage by Reliable Sources throughout the first six months of his presidency. Those things have GOT to be in the lede, and I can see no justification for an arbitrary requirement to omit or limit the word "Russia" from that coverage. --MelanieN (talk) 14:40, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

We seem to have rough consensus on what to trim from the current lead, and on the need to add material covering the first few months of the presidency. We could proceed with the trimming immediately, and separately shape a proposal for the new covfefe coverage. Accordingly, I will open two discussions below. — JFG ^talk 21:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Break

Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.

Trump was born in Queens, New York City and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. He ran The Trump Organization, a real estate and construction firm, for 45 years until 2016. He also started several side ventures and licensed the use of his name for the branding of various products and properties. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. His net worth was estimated to be $3.5 billion as of 2017, making him the 544th richest person in the world.

He ran for U.S. President in 2016 and won in a surprise victory against Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton. Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, generating much free media coverage. Commentators describe his political positions as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election while losing the popular vote. During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign, sparking an FBI investigation. Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate issues involving Russia and the Trump campaign.

During the Trump Presidency, the United States started a process to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. The Supreme Court seated Neil Gorsuch. He attempted to impose a travel ban from several muslim majority states, but several federal courts issued a restraining orders preventing implementation and the case is awaiting review by the U.S. Supreme Court. US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen. Both his inauguration and certain policies, such as the travel ban, produced large protests throughout the United States.

This is what I worked on. My Thoughts.

1. Keep it short so I edited out some info I thought was of secondary importance. Also reworded to remove passive voice and use less words 2. Adds a short paragraph on his Presidency. Tried to only include what I thought was most important, but comments welcome Casprings (talk) 23:49, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

And furthermore!: (1) The US war effort in Afghanistan is not reported to have expanded yet; and it may be some time before it is so reported. (2) RT has yet to speak out more than once about expansion of the US war effort in Yemen, so it's unlikely that many mainstream sources over here have either. (3) Few if any polls have found that Trump was elected because Russia (meaning, emails). Reportedly, they've found he was elected because unemployment and unlawful immigration. Both of which have noticeably gone down since his formal election December 19. You may want to incorporate those widely reported facts into your proposal (without necessarily adding all, or any, of the many contradictory hypotheses about why they went down.) --Dervorguilla (talk) 01:27, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• Thanks for the comments. 1. That is actually being reported. See Afghanistan and Yemen. If this is supposed to be an encyclopedia article, one should look towards history. I think it is likely, even if the public is not currently interested, that the expanding war efforts will be seen as historic. 3. Unemployment rate has when President Obama left was 4.7 percent and is 4.3 currently. The rate changes all the time and I don't see these as likely historic (at least at this point). Those are my thoughts, but welcome other thoughts.Casprings (talk) 01:33, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• I think the final paragraph (presidency) is quite good. I have a problem with the final sentence of the paragraph before: "During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign and the Trump's Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate coordination between Russia and the Trump Campaign after Trump fired FBI Director James Comey. " It's run-on, tries to get too much into one sentence, and the non-chronological order is confusing. How about something like this: "During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign, sparking an FBI investigation. Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and the Trump's Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate issues involving Russia and the Trump campaign." --MelanieN (talk) 14:52, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• DoneCasprings (talk) 17:02, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Yeah, that sentence is quite long and we don't need to name Rosenstein in the lead. What do you think of my condensed proposal below? "Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey and faced accusations of obstructing justice." That says it all and includes 4 links to detailed articles. — JFG ^talk 16:02, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I think the special counsel is important and should be mentioned. I agree Rosenstein isn't important, but the alternative is passive voice - "a special counsel was appointed" - which isn't ideal. --MelanieN (talk) 16:10, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• I agree to this. You don't lose anything by telling the reader who appointed him and avoiding passive voice.Casprings (talk) 17:02, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

It occurs to me that "Russia interfered" belongs in the election paragraph, but firing Comey and the special counsel belong in the presidency paragraph. How should we resolve this? --MelanieN (talk) 16:15, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

In my opinion, you keep it like it is. It is logically connected.Casprings (talk) 17:03, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

The first paragraph should be brief and only summarize the key points, i.e. what he is most notable for, so we should retain the current first paragraph ("Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.") and not squeeze the second paragraph with a lot of details about his education and business activities into it, which makes it far less reader-friendly. For comparison, Barack Obama's first paragraph looks like this: "Barack Hussein Obama II (US: Listeni/bəˈrɑːk huːˈseɪn oʊˈbɑːmə/ bə-RAHK hoo-SAYN oh-BAH-mə;[1][2] born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who served as the 44th President of the United States from 2009 to 2017. He is the first African American to have served as president. He previously served in the U.S. Senate representing Illinois from 2005 to 2008, and in the Illinois State Senate from 1997 to 2004." --Tataral (talk) 16:42, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• Done.Casprings (talk) 17:02, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Merging the forked discussions

Alright, we seem to have some confusion after I opened the two threads below, intending to discuss the trimming of existing material in one thread, and the addition of new material in another. Some people followed the new threads, some others continued the discussion here. Sorry for the mess! I'll try to merge, one paragraph at a time. — JFG ^talk 18:42, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: Where, and how, are we supposed to express an opinion on these options? --MelanieN (talk) 19:40, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: For § 1, 2, 3: just below the table; for §4, in the #Coverage of the early presidency thread. — JFG ^talk 22:10, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Paragraph / Theme	Version A (Casprings thread) Version B (JFG thread) Version C (proposed merge)
§1. Who is Trump	A. Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality. B. Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States, in office since January 20, 2017. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality. C. Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States, in office since January 20, 2017. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.
§2. Life and career	A. Trump was born in Queens, New York City and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. He ran The Trump Organization, a real estate and construction firm, for 45 years until 2016. He also started several side ventures and licensed the use of his name for the branding of various products and properties. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. His net worth was estimated to be $3.5 billion as of 2017, making him the 544th richest person in the world. B. Trump was born and raised in Queens, New York City, and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. For 45 years, he managed The Trump Organization, the real estate development firm founded by his paternal grandmother. During his real estate career, Trump built, renovated, and managed numerous office towers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. Besides real estate, he started several side ventures and licensed the use of his name for the branding of various products and properties. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. As of 2017, his net worth was estimated to be $3.5 billion, making him the 544th richest person in the world. C. Trump was born in Queens, New York City, and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. For 45 years, he managed The Trump Organization, the real estate development firm founded by his paternal grandmother. His career focused on building or renovating office towers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. He started several side ventures and branded various products with his name. He produced and hosted The Apprentice television show for 12 years. As of 2017, he was the 544th richest person in the world with an estimated net worth of $3.5 billion.
§3. Campaign and election	A. He ran for U.S. President in 2016 and won in a surprise victory against Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton. Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, generating much free media coverage. Commentators describe his political positions as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election while losing the popular vote. During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign, sparking an FBI investigation. Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate issues involving Russia and the Trump campaign. B. Trump had expressed interest in politics since 1987, and he entered the presidential race in June 2015. He defeated sixteen Republican politicians in the primaries, and picked Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate. Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, earning much media coverage. His political positions have been described by scholars and commentators as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. Trump won the general election on November 8, 2016, in a surprise victory against Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election despite losing the popular vote. C. Trump had long expressed interest in politics; he eventually entered the 2016 presidential race as a Republican and defeated sixteen opponents in the primaries. Scholars and commentators described his political positions as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. His campaign received extensive media coverage. Many of his public statements were controversial or false. Trump won the general election on November 8, 2016, in a surprise victory against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election despite losing the popular vote. Russia was accused of interfering in the election to support his candidacy. (The Comey saga should be covered in the presidency paragraph.)
§4. Presidency so far	Proposed versions A. During the Trump Presidency, the United States started a process to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. The Supreme Court seated Neil Gorsuch. He attempted to impose a travel ban from several muslim majority states, but several federal courts issued a restraining orders preventing implementation and the case is awaiting review by the U.S. Supreme Court. US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen. Both his inauguration and certain policies, such as the travel ban, produced large protests throughout the United States. B. Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked two pipeline construction permits. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts. During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, signed an arms deal with Saudi Arabia, and asked NATO partners to increase their military spending. Trump's election and policies sparked numerous protests. Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey and faced accusations of obstructing justice. C. Too many differences to merge yet. Please continue the discussion on §4 at #Coverage of the early presidency.

Comments on § 1, 2, 3 here; comments on §4, please in the #Coverage of the early presidency thread. — JFG ^talk 22:10, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

1. B or C. I think there is some benefit to telling the reader when he took office. 2. A. I think it covers more of the topic and removes more of the less important facts. 3. Same as 2. 4. A. It is shorter and I think those facts are historic. I think we should start with that and debate rather we add or delete anything based on a judgement or rather it is likely historic in 100 years. For his actual term, we should think about that basic standard.Casprings (talk) 20:02, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

1. B or C. 2. C. 3. C. --MelanieN (talk) 22:27, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Let's see... 4-A gets rejected per WP:BLPSTYLE and WP:BURDEN. (Multiple high-quality RS emphasize that the effort in Afghanistan hasn't expanded yet; comaparatively few that it has.) 4-B gets rejected per WP:PUBLICFIGURE. (Only a single RS has reported that he's facing official accusations of obstructing justice. The source turned out to have been wrong, but that's not so much a policy issue.)
I'll let others try their hands at 1, 2, and 3. --Dervorguilla (talk) 08:21, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@Dervorguilla: This is the place to discuss §1–3, so your opinion would be welcome. Your remarks on §4 are duly noted at #Coverage of the early presidency. — JFG ^talk 09:25, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

1—B/C. 2—A. 3—B. That were my choices. --Joobo (talk) 13:41, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

For the record: 1. B/C, 2. C, 3. C. — JFG ^talk 14:27, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Comment. The current discussions about how to alter the first three paragraphs and also add a paragraph about his presidency seem quite unwieldy. I respect the work that went into the whole process so far, and am not suggesting for all that work to be discarded, but I do suggest just taking one paragraph at a time starting with a talk page section at the bottom of this page solely about the first paragraph, showing with Strike through and underline how each proposal would change the current paragraph, and having a survey solely about the first paragraph. Anythingyouwant (talk) 17:48, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Too many discussions already. A mix of the drafts has been pushed to the article, and we hope that regular editing will help cement a better version. Any new discussion, please start a new thread based on the article's current state. Fresh start! — JFG ^talk 06:57, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Consensus on trimming current lead

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

---

As discussed above, there seems to be rough consensus to trim the current lead and add some #Coverage of the early presidency. Here is a revised proposed text, as amended by discussions above, and some extra trim/copyedit on his real estate career:

Donald John Trump (born June 14, 1946) is the 45th and current President of the United States, in office since January 20, 2017. Before entering politics, he was a businessman and television personality.

Trump was born and raised in Queens, New York City, and earned an economics degree from the Wharton School. For 45 years, he managed The Trump Organization, the real estate development firm founded by his paternal grandmother. During his real estate career, Trump built, renovated, and managed numerous office towers, hotels, casinos, and golf courses. Besides real estate, he started several side ventures and licensed the use of his name for the branding of various products and properties. He produced and hosted The Apprentice, a reality television series on NBC, from 2004 to 2015. As of 2017, his net worth was estimated to be $3.5 billion, making him the 544th richest person in the world.

Trump had expressed interest in politics since 1987, and he entered the presidential race in June 2015. He defeated sixteen Republican politicians in the primaries, and picked Indiana governor Mike Pence as his running mate. Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, earning much media coverage. His political positions have been described by scholars and commentators as populist, protectionist, and nationalist. Trump won the general election on November 8, 2016, in a surprise victory against Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton. He became the oldest and wealthiest person ever to assume the presidency, the first without prior military or government service, and the fifth to have won the election despite losing the popular vote.

(Paragraph about early presidency to be added, please discuss in separate section.)

Please state your support for this part or suggest further changes. — JFG ^talk 21:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

A few possible improvements (with no major changes in meaning):

Donald John Trump ... is the 45th and current president of the United States... He was a businessman and television producer...

... He managed The Trump Organization, the real-estate development firm...
Trump had expressed interest in running for office since 1987... He defeated a field of 16 Republican politicians... Many of his campaign statements were controversial or false, generating much earned media coverage...

He became ... the fifth to have won election despite losing the popular vote...

--Dervorguilla (talk) 22:31, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

Please move these comments to the existing section "Lede Section Rewrite" above. Let's not have THREE separate discussions about the lede going on here. --MelanieN (talk) 00:58, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

OIC. You knew about the existing discussion, you just thought you would pre-empt it by adding two subsections spelling out different proposals. Not a helpful approach IMO. --MelanieN (talk) 01:00, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: You misunderstand my intent; perhaps I didn't make it clear enough. There are two parts to the rewrite proposal: one about trimming current contents, one about adding coverage of the presidency. I thought it would be more manageable to discuss each section separately, as they are independent of each other, and the first is a simple trim, while the other requires agreeing on scope and writing entirely new material – a more complex endeavour, and a likely longer consensus process. — JFG ^talk 05:18, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Your proposal here includes elements that are under discussion above. If you actually didn't mean for them to be under discussion here, that is confusing. If you DID mean to discuss those elements here while they are under discussion above, that is disruptive, and I would say that any "consensus" that develops here is invalid. Personally I will not be commenting on your suggestions until the earlier discussion about the lede is settled. --MelanieN (talk) 14:13, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@Dervorguilla: Thanks; I have incorporated your suggestions. I shortened the "field of candidates" further, stating just "He defeated sixteen Republican politicians": short and sticking to facts. Not sure we should specify "earned media" or "free media"; the adjective was disputed earlier. I shortened it further to "much media coverage", while keeping the link to earned media for curious readers. — JFG ^talk 05:38, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

On reflection, perhaps we could say "earning free media coverage" instead of "generating much (free/earned) media coverage". Would sound more encyclopedic too; what do you think? — JFG ^talk 05:42, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done Switched to "earning much media coverage" per discussion below. — JFG ^talk 06:43, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Note that I have disagreed, in the discussion below, and think "free" should be retained. So consensus had not necessarily been reached. Where are we supposed to discuss this? --MelanieN (talk) 16:20, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: About the exact wording of the media coverage, please continue the discussion in the dedicated section opened by Dervorguilla. We can apply the outcome here as soon as there is consensus there. — JFG ^talk 17:04, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

On another reflection, I returned the text to "expressed interest in politics since 1987" because his public statements didn't include anything about running for office until the 2000 campaign. — JFG ^talk 06:05, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Procedural note: please continue this thread at #Merging the forked discussions above. — JFG ^talk 19:27, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Coverage of the early presidency

There is consensus to add a paragraph covering the first few months of Trump's presidency. Which events should be included and how should it all be phrased? — JFG ^talk 21:19, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

First suggestion, to get the ball rolling… Picking up where we left off at election day:

…and the fifth to have won the election despite losing the popular vote, sparking numerous protests.

Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies and promoting an "America first" agenda. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked construction permits for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts, and the Mexico border wall was postponed. Trump vowed to cut regulations and reduce public spending, submitting a 2018 budget that trims several federal departments and increases the military budget. His proposed health care reform to replace Obamacare passed the House and is pending before the Senate.

During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, made an arms deal with Saudi Arabia and asked NATO partners to meet their own defense budget commitments. He ordered military strikes on Syria and Afghanistan. Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey and faced accusations of obstructing justice.

Looks a bit too long, but it's a start. Comments welcome. — JFG ^talk 22:36, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

I recommend rewriting the first sentence so it reads: "…and the fifth to have won election despite losing the popular vote." (1) Trump was the fifth president to so win election, not the fifth to so win the 2016 election. (2) He officially and definitively won election (in the Electoral College) some time after he lost the popular vote -- not while he was losing it. (3) The majority of the protests against Trump's victory may have been sparked by Trump's victory itself, not by his loss. (We do know that few such protests were sparked by Bush's analogous victory + loss in 2000.) --Dervorguilla (talk) 23:31, 16 June 2017 (UTC)

 Done — JFG ^talk 05:40, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

It's a good starting point for discussion, but as you said a little too long, so we need to remove something, and it would need to fit in a single paragraph to follow the structure recommended by WP:LEAD. I will look into this in more detail later today, but just one thing now: For example, I wouldn't mention the nomination of Gorsuch. The President nominates and appoints scores of people, and it seems odd to only mention Gorsuch by name among all the people he has appointed and nominated, including people in more prominent roles (Tillerson, Sessions and other key members of his cabinet etc.) In most countries the appointment of a judge would considered a routine matter anyway, and certainly not something that should be mentioned in the lead section of the head of government's biography (mentioning it below in the body of the article is fine). --Tataral (talk) 12:16, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I would leave out most of this. The health care bill (still just a gleam in his eye), his proposed budget (meaningless in terms of actually being enacted), the wall (postponed), the extended coverage of his first foreign trip (presumably one of many he will take) - I would dump all of that from the lede. In fact here are my suggestions:

Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies and promoting an "America first" agenda. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked construction permits for the Keystone XL and Dakota Access pipelines. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts, and the Mexico border wall was postponed. Trump vowed to cut regulations and reduce public spending, submitting a 2018 budget that trims several federal departments and increases the military budget. His proposed health care reform to replace Obamacare passed the House and is pending before the Senate.

During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, made an arms deal with Saudi Arabia and asked NATO partners to meet their own defense budget commitments. He ordered military strikes on Syria and Afghanistan. Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey and faced accusations of obstructing justice.

That's not to say that I approve the remaining wording, just that we need to start by deciding what (and what not) to cover. --MelanieN (talk) 14:24, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments, MelanieN. I generally agree with your cuts, except we should say something about immigration, terrorism and the travel ban, as all these issues were extensively debated over these months; much more than the pipeline stories, for example. Agree to remove anything that is not done yet, such as the border wall, the 2018 budget and the health care reform. Here's an update, condensed into a single paragraph per Tataral. — JFG ^talk 15:46, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

…and the fifth to have won the election despite losing the popular vote, sparking numerous protests.

Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked two pipeline construction permits. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts. During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, signed an arms deal with Saudi Arabia, and asked NATO partners to increase their military spending. Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey and faced accusations of obstructing justice.

@Tataral: Feel free to comment on this slimmer version. I kept Gorsuch because Supreme Court nominees are extremely significant appointments in the United States, and the replacement of Justice Scalia had been a controversial issue under Obama already (as his nominee Merrick Garland wasn't even invited for hearings by the Republican Senate). — JFG ^talk 15:50, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

1) Don't combine the paragraphs. They are separate topics, and anyhow, we have already virtually settled on the paragraph about his election, in the discussion above. A discussion you seem determined to ignore or bypass, unfortunately. 2) This "presidency" paragraph is an improvement. But User:Casprings' proposed paragraph in the discussion above is better. If you want, I will explain why. But I would propose you join constructively in THAT discussion, maybe work out a merger of your version and his. Having two entirely separate discussions on the same material like this is unhelpful and ultimately futile. --MelanieN (talk) 16:01, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Lead section recommends that the "lead section should contain no more than four well-composed paragraphs." If the lead section already includes three other paragraphs before the material discussed here, then it should be one paragraph and not two in order to avoid a total of five paragraphs. --Tataral (talk) 16:24, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

That's a generally good recommendation, but not an absolute. Very large and/or complicated articles often need more. -- BullRangifer (talk) 16:35, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

I don't think any articles need more paragraphs; that the manual of style's recommendations aren't always followed, because it can require a lot of hard work and can be more difficult for us as editors, is another matter. I think we should strive to write as good and well-composed a lead section as possible in this article. I've already proposed a basic structure which should be achievable. -Tataral (talk) 16:50, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: 1) Yes, we are close to consensus for the first three paragraphs above, until election results. I'm just picking up the last sentence of that one to add the protests in just three words, without starting a whole sentence anew. The paragraph on the presidency is separate: I mentioned merging two paragraphs because my first draft was longer. The formatting of the talkquote may have been confusing; I just added an extra line break. 2) I'm looking at the suggestionsby Casprings in the "Break" section and will attempt a merger here. — JFG ^talk 17:41, 17 June 2017 (UTC)

• A couple of comments: 1. An early revision had 3 sentences about Russia. That was WP:UNDUE, and I'm glad it's been trimmed. 2. I don't think the details of his first foreign trip will have enough lasting notability to be in the Lead. 3. One theme that seems to have been consistent during both the campaign and the presidency is seemingly continuous series of often self-created controversies. Not sure how to word that. 4. I don't think "sparking numerous protests" should be tied to losing the popular vote in the last sentence of the previous paragraph. (I think people protested because they didn't like what he stood for, not because he didn't win the popular vote.) ~Awilley (talk) 02:02, 18 June 2017 (UTC)

@Awilley: Thanks for your comments. Could you possibly also voice your opinion on the first three paragraphs as trimmed in the above thread #Merging the forked discussions? Regarding the presidency coverage: 1. OK 2. Possibly, too early to tell, but that's his most prominent foreign policy action to date. 3. Looks like a relevant observation but the article currently doesn't say that anywhere; do you have any sources analyzing those self-inflicted wounds with some hindsight? That could be woven in the article somewhere and then summarized in the lead. But that can wait. 4. I agree, will remove that part from the election paragraph, and add it to the presidency paragraph. — JFG ^talk 06:01, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Updated draft, per latest comments:

Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked two pipeline construction permits. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts. During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, signed an arms deal with Saudi Arabia, and asked NATO partners to increase their military spending. Trump's election and policies sparked numerous protests. Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, he dismissed FBI Director James Comey, which raised suspicions of obstructing justice.

More comment welcome. — JFG ^talk 06:14, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: Strike "faced accusations of obstructing justice" per WP:WEASEL; also, WP:PUBLICFIGURE says if you can't find multiple reliable third-party sources documenting an allegation or incident, leave it out. And only one (generally) reliable source (WaPo) has been found for the allegation that official accusations of obstruction of justice have been made. (In this case the RS got its facts wrong, but that's not our concern.)

Yes, unofficial accusations of obstruction have been made. But Trump doesn't need to face, isn't known to have "faced", and would appear to have no personal interest in facing, any of them. --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:35, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Changed to "which raised suspicions of". Still WP:WEASEL but that's what political discourse is focusing on at this point. — JFG ^talk 07:48, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Compare "stop-and-frisk. A police officer's brief questioning of a person when the officer reasonably suspects that the person has committed a crime." He's not a suspect. See WP:BLPSTYLE § BALANCE: Biographies must be fair to their subjects at all times. Also, this information relates to people's "suspicions" about Trump -- not to Trump himself. A section discussing people's suspicions about Trump would (as you're implying) take up the majority of the article. Yes, "that's what political discourse is focusing on at this point" -- which makes it good fodder for Wikinews. I'd rather we not invest any more of our time in this admirable but seemingly doomed project. --Dervorguilla (talk) 08:57, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm the first to despair over the incessant news-hounding that Wikipedia has become, especially on "hot" political issues. Perhaps that's the price to pay for having an essentially complete encyclopedia; news fodder provides the thrill of constant updates when all that could be written on exotic moth species has been incorporated. Now, we all want to make progress on this lead section: do you have a practical suggestion to amend the text? — JFG ^talk 09:32, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: It looks like I'm going to have to categorically deny your implication that I didn't give you "a practical suggestion to amend the text". To the contrary. I obeyed accepted WP:CON policies. I told you about a couple of my legitimate concerns. I tried to persuade you with reasons I believed were based on policy, sources, and common sense. And we do agree that the questioned passage violates the 'No Wikinews' policy. But you seem to be saying that the Trump project has a need to violate it, because "thrill of constant updates". I worry that we may not be heading toward a consensus that's allowable under generally accepted policies. --Dervorguilla (talk) 17:50, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@Dervorguilla: I'm not implying anything against your contributions, and I happen to agree that Wikipedia shouldn't attempt to be so close to the daily news. Unfortunately, plenty of editors jump to include the latest sensational thing they read or see elsewhere, and then we spent megabytes arguing over who said what when, and which part of the story is more citable / relevant / due. If we want to keep a modicum of balance and neutrality, we must reluctantly engage in those discussions. You may be interested in the "wait before creating articles on hot political news du jour" proposal at User talk:EEng#X-day/week "embargo" on articles on breaking-news topics.

Regarding the hot story du jour: is Trump being investigated for obstruction of justice? Well, if he is, that's lead-worthy; if he isn't that will be one more footnote in the Dismissal of James Comey and Russian interference saga. The problem today is that we don't know for sure one way or the other, as sources are contradictory (see #Quick survey on obstruction of justice investigation). To me, that means it stays out of the lead until things get clearer. Two new wordings have been proposed and are being discussed below: #Let's discuss both proposals, please. — JFG ^talk 20:20, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Said it better than I could! --Dervorguilla (talk) 20:33, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Some additional comments:

• Leave out "Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals". That is an inaccurate description of his cabinet. It leaves out "brain surgeons" and "campaign donors" for example. And it doesn't mean much since most presidents include some businesspeople, politicians, and military people in their cabinet. And above all it is OR; I don't see any reliable sourcing for this characterization. Just leave it out.
• Completely rewrite "Frustrated by ongoing investigations into Russian election interference and potential campaign collusion, hedismissed FBI Director James Comey, which raised suspicions of obstructing justice." . This is unacceptable for multiple reasons. It implies 1) that we know why he fired him (we don't), and 2) that the firing was the reason for the obstruction of justice investigation (we don't know that), and 3) that there are "suspicions" rather than merely an investigation. Casprings had a much better sentence on this subject above: "Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and a special counsel was then appointed to look into all Russia-related issues including possible obstruction of justice." I think we should use that. --MelanieN (talk) 16:23, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: The composition of the Cabinet is not OR: plenty of sources commented on Trump's unusual high number of CEO appointments and his "love for generals". The neurosurgeon is also a politician; campaign donors I'm not sure who you're talking about: Betsy DeVos? If that's her, I'm not sure we can say her campaign donations were the main reason she was appointed. Anyway, it's an unusual cabinet (for better or for worse depending on the reader's POV), I'm open to rephrasing this but it deserves mention.

The only unusual things about his cabinet are 1) the unusually high number of billionaires and 2) the fact that several were appointed to head departments they have historically opposed. Those things don't belong in the lede, but neither does this description IMO. --MelanieN (talk) 17:18, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm fine with rewriting the Comey story, as long as it does not exceed one sentence. Russian interference is already linked earlier, so indeed we don't need to repeat it here or assert that it was the main reason for firing Comey. Casprings' proposal looks good; maybe we can improve it a little to match the general tone of the lead? I'd say "Trump dismissed FBI Director James Comey in May 2017; the investigation on Russian interference and potential links with Trump associates was taken over by Special Counsel Robert Mueller". I would not mention specifically the obstruction of justice thing because it's too recent and still unclear (see discussion at the Comey section). — JFG ^talk 16:51, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Let's discuss both proposals, please

I see a problem. In this "coverage of the early presidency" section we have been discussing the JFG proposed version and comparing it only to "what is in the article now", but not to the original Casprings proposal. I am reproducing that here since it seems to have gotten lost in the jungle of multiple discussions here. It's way up under the section heading "break", plus an additional sentence was later proposed. I am going to reproduce it here after taking a couple of liberties with it, namely, moving the "Russia" sentences to the last paragraph, and adding Casprings' later proposal for a sentence about Comey's firing and the special counsel.

During the Trump Presidency, the United States started a process to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. The Supreme Court seated Neil Gorsuch. He attempted to impose a travel ban from several muslim majority states, but several federal courts issued a restraining orders preventing implementation and the case is awaiting review by the U.S. Supreme Court. US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen. Both his inauguration and certain policies, such as the travel ban, produced large protests throughout the United States. During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign, sparking an FBI investigation. In May 2017 Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate issues involving Russia and the Trump campaign.

IMO this was a good proposal and one that deserves equal consideration. I would like to see a table that includes this (Casprings) proposal side by side with the (JFG) proposal we are discussing here. In discussion we might choose one or the other, or propose tweaks to one or the other, or eventually come up with a merged version (not trying for one right now because they are so different, but as we discuss it.) --MelanieN (talk) 17:29, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Your wish for an up-to-date comparison table is hereby granted. — JFG ^talk 17:45, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Draft A (Casprings thread)	Draft B (JFG thread)
During the Trump Presidency, the United States started a process to withdraw from the Paris Climate Agreement. The Supreme Court seated Neil Gorsuch. He attempted to impose a travel ban from several muslim majority states, but several federal courts issued a restraining orders preventing implementation and the case is awaiting review by the U.S. Supreme Court. US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen. Both his inauguration and certain policies, such as the travel ban, produced large protests throughout the United States. During the election, Russia interfered to support his campaign, sparking an FBI investigation. In May 2017 Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein appointed a special counsel to investigate issues involving Russia and the Trump campaign.	Trump appointed a Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals, and nominated Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court. Over the first few months of his presidency, he signed dozens of executive orders, undoing several Obama policies. He withdrew the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Paris Climate Agreement, and unlocked two pipeline construction permits. He enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants, but his proposed travel ban on citizens from seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts. During his first foreign trip, Trump enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists, signed an arms deal with Saudi Arabia, and asked NATO partners to increase their military spending. Trump's election and policies sparked numerous protests. He dismissed FBI Director James Comey in May 2017. Special Counsel Robert Mueller took over the investigation on Russian interference and potential links with Trump associates.
Contents of Draft A	Contents of Draft B
This draft has 124 words, 7 sentences and 8 article links. It covers: Nominations: Supreme Court Executive actions: Paris withdrawal Immigration: travel ban, judicial halt Foreign policy: war efforts expansion Generalities: inauguration, protests, Comey dismissal, Mueller investigation	This draft has 141 words, 8 sentences and 17 article links. It covers: Nominations: Cabinet, Supreme Court Executive actions: TPP and Paris withdrawal, pipelines, undoing Obama policies Immigration: ICE reinforcement, travel ban, judicial halt Foreign policy: Riyadh speech, arms deal, NATO spending Generalities: protests, Comey dismissal, Mueller investigation
Themes highlighted in green are unique to each draft. Other themes are addressed in both.
Comments on Draft A	Comments on Draft B

I think mine is badass... I think we need to put some real thought on what is the most important facts here. It is still very early on, but what is most likely to meet Wikipedia:10YT or for this maybe even WP:100YT. Trump seems likely to be someone who has a high degree of historical significance and we should try to make a subjective judgment on what is likely the most historic, at least at this point. This can't be extremely long, which means a lot must be left out. That means, we have to make subjective calls to include and exclude. One way to frame this might be like this:

1. Topic Sentence 2. One Sentence on domestic policy 3. Second Sentence on domestic policy 4. One Sentence on Foreign Policy 5. Second Sentence on Foreign Policy 6. Cultural/political reaction to policies

Six sentences. Only the absolutely most important facts. That is my opinion.Casprings (talk) 17:54, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@Casprings: The Russian interference is introduced in §3 (in all variants A, B and C); you might want to remove it from $4 and perhaps add something else instead. — JFG ^talk 20:58, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

@JFG: I think someone else suggested putting it in that paragraph. I think it should be in the paragraph before and connected to the investigation.Casprings (talk) 21:01, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

I'm proposing a shorter version based on Casprings' content selections; JFG's version has far too many irrelevant details IMO. Gorsuch is WP:MILL; if we include it now I believe it will be removed once something is decided on health care. I'd rather wait for something to happen on health-care, and then add it. Power~enwiki (talk) 21:26, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

During Donald Trump's presidency, US war efforts continued in Syria, and Trump supported further "anti-terrorist" military actions elsewhere. The United States started withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement. His inauguration and many of his actions produced large protests throughout the United States. An attempt to impose a travel ban from several Muslim majority states was blocked by several federal courts; the case is awaiting review by the Supreme Court. In May 2017, Trump unexpectedly fired FBI Director James Comey, leading to an ongoing investigation by Special Counsel Robert Mueller.

I don't think that is bad. My thing, keep it short. Other shi..stuff will happen. We shouldn't start with a lot of text. Also, this is why we should squeeze words out of the paragraphs that come before.Casprings (talk) 21:29, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

Draft A (Casprings thread) would look significantly different in mainspace. Here's how it appears in the table:

"...US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen..."

Here's how it would most likely appear in the article:

"...US war efforts expanded in Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen..."

--Dervorguilla (talk) 23:34, 19 June 2017 (UTC)

• l like draft A. As in the table, not the pared-down-to-nothing version just above. Yes, Russia needs to be in the lede. --MelanieN (talk) 03:30, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

About the "Russia thing", a recent RfC rejected mentioning it, because there is so far no demonstrated connection with Trump himself, and explaining things properly would be too long for the lead. However, this may well be a case of WP:CCC, as this story is still in the headlines a year after it emerged with the DNC email leak. My draft C of the trim includes a brief neutral mention: Russia was accused of interfering in the election to support his candidacy; that's the most we should write in the lead. — JFG ^talk 05:00, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

That's not an accurate description of the outcome of the "recent" (March) RfC. It was closed "As I read it, Casprings has accepted that the content will not be added to the lead, and they would withdraw this RfC except that they want to discuss "When would it be appropriate to include this?". We are now discussing that question: is it now appropriate to include it in the lede? Considering how the subject has grown in importance and coverage in the three months since that RfC, I think it IS time to include it. Readers need to know what all the noise is about, and a brief explanation of the situation in the lede is appropriate. The draft A proposal is very well worded and I endorse it. I just noticed that the draft B proposal says "took over the investigation on Russian interference and potential links...", but that comes out of nowhere because the Russian interference has not been mentioned. That could leave readers saying "huh?" --MelanieN (talk) 15:18, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

@MelanieN: As I wrote, I agree that consensus has probably changed about mentioning Russian interference. Readers won't say "huh?" because it IS already mentioned in the proposed §3 of the lead (drafts A and C), about the election. This is why I did not include in my draft of §4. — JFG ^talk 18:24, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

I see. Thanks for explaining. --MelanieN (talk) 18:44, 21 June 2017 (UTC)

Proposal to add Casprings' "Presidency" paragraph to the lede now

There are still a few copy-editing issues and content disagreements, but I think enough of the major issues are worked out. There's a clear consensus it's better than the "no coverage of Trump's presidency" currently in the lede. I propose that "Draft A" in "Let's discuss both proposals, please" be added to the page now, but without any entrenched consensus for the specific wording at this time. Power~enwiki (talk) 06:09, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

I believe we should first settle on the trimming of the existing parts of the lead: please choose a variant for each of the first 3 paragraphs at the relevant section #Merging the forked discussions. Regarding this §4, we need more input about what should be covered or not, and to which degree of detail. Quite strange that we are only 4 people commenting here. Is everybody on summer break already? — JFG ^talk 15:25, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

This article (and talk page, particularly) is exhausting. I think that actually making changes will get new eyes (or follow-up changes at the article). I'll start by updating §1 now (the longer one initially); there's no particular controversy there. I'll also put a big comment for new editors. Power~enwiki (talk) 17:43, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

I second the suggestion to add the Casprings version of the final paragraph (Draft A) to the lede since there is nothing there now about his current presidency. If we don't do anything until everything is ready, nothing will ever get done. As for why more people aren't chiming here, that's not at all strange. No, it's not summer vacation. It's that everyone is screaming sick of these endless discussions, and has moved on to other things, both on Wikipedia and in Real Life. I am just about to that point myself; as I mentioned above, I am not following most of the discussions here and need to be pinged if my input is requested. Let's wrap up the discussions about the rest of the lede, archive the threads so we have a workable talk page again, and move on. --MelanieN (talk) 18:54, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

I've attempted to "split the difference". Hopefully normal editing (or more contained chat threads) will smooth the remaining rough edges. Power~enwiki (talk) 19:21, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

Thanks Power~enwiki, that surely is a good way to move forward. I have edited the paragraph further;[12] feel free to amend as necessary. — JFG ^talk 06:46, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

Issues/comments on both versions

I haven't followed the entirety of this lengthy discussion, but Casprings' proposal seems decent. I of course agree that we should mention Russia as it has largely dominated his presidency. My notes:

On JFG's version: There are several significant problems here / items I disfavor:

• "Cabinet composed of businesspeople, politicians and generals" because that is common to virtually all modern presidents.
• The wording of "enjoined Muslim leaders to reject radical Islamists" is also somewhat problematic for a similar reason: every modern president has called upon leadership to stop funding extremism. Trump is not unique in this regard. Riyadh speech is not important enough for lead section. Cuba, I think, would be more worthy of a mention.
• "enforced stricter controls on illegal immigrants" - this is somewhat vague, even for a lead section (what is "controls?") and not at all clear on this point. If this is about a rise in increase in deportations and raids or an increased focus on non-criminals, we should say so.
• "seven Middle-Eastern countries was opposed by the courts." - First, Somalia and Sudan are not Middle Eastern countries. Second, they were not merely "opposed" by the courts but actually blocked by the courts following legal challenges.
• "asked NATO partners to increase their military spending" - again, not really unique to Trump. Every U.S. president has asked NATO allies to increase their financial share. Obama did so as well. (Link). That's not unique. What is unique is that U.S. relationships with NATO allies have been historically strained.
• "unlocked two pipeline construction permits" - I disfavor the odd "unlocked" language - "grant permit" or "authorized" or "approved of" or virtually anything else is better. Frankly, I think the reversal of Obama environmental regulations is more significant than Keystone or the other pipelines.

On Casprings version:

• "several federal courts issued a restraining orders" - needs to be reworded. Courts initially issued temporary restraining orders, but these were later converted into nationwide preliminary injunctions, which re far more lasting and significant. (link)
• "certain policies, such as the travel ban, produced large protests throughout the United States" --> perhaps mention "protests through the U.S. and world" (there was definitely protests abroad)
• " the case is awaiting review by the U.S. Supreme Court" - this is not precisely accurate. The U.S. Supreme Court must first grant review, and the Court has not yet done so. We should not mention the Supreme Court until they either grant or deny certiorari (i.e., choose to hear or not hear the case).

Further notes:

• On the Russia investigation, we should link to the appropriate articles and should specifically mention Mueller.
• I support a brief mention of changes in Cuba policy. It's a major development (significant reversal) and some sort of Western Hemisphere reference is appropriate.
• Eventually we will have to include a note on health care and ACA review, whether a bill is enacted or not.
• Ditto the Mexico border wall: the ultimate outcome should be noted in the lead section when the time comes.

Neutrality^talk 20:15, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

I endorse everything Neutrality has said. Agree we don't have to mention the "first trip abroad" and should mention Cuba. IMO the border wall and AHCA will have to wait until something either reaches his desk or is definitively abandoned. --MelanieN (talk) 22

53, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

I also basically agree with all these judgements. This is good analysis and I would ask Neutrality to write a version of his own. I honestly thing that version might be about right.Casprings (talk) 23:06, 22 June 2017 (UTC)

@Neutrality: Thanks for your comments; I have addressed most of them in further editing of the version inserted in the article.[13] Feel free to amend as appropriate. — JFG ^talk 06:50, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

It looks like we haven't yet answered the question as to which statement most fairly represents the global balance of perspectives of high-quality sources: "Russia interfered..."; or "Russia was accused of interfering...".

To accomplish this, we need to consider established scholarship and the beliefs of the wider world. If the statements are (more or less) equally conspicuous in the global body of high-quality sources, we need to describe both. Maybe we can find a tertiary source that does this in a disinterested way.

Here's a compilation of the relevant statements in the body text: (1) [three persons stated it] "attempted to intervene"; (2) [a person affirmed it] "interfered"; (3) [a person told Congress of its] "efforts to interfere"; (4) [two persons called this a] "false narrative [of] interference [or a] fictitious explanation"; (5) [an organization] "accused [it] of trying to influence"; and (6) [three organizations] "have denied the allegations [of trying to influence]" the election. --Dervorguilla (talk) 07:45, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

@Dervorguilla: I am archiving this long thread. I would respectfully request that you open the discussion about Russian interference in a new thread, if you think it's worthwhile. Thanks for your understanding. — JFG ^talk 09:34, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.