President Donald Trump was attending the National Prayer Breakfast, but showing no sign of grace. Lips pursed, face alternating between anger and frustration, he lashed out at enemies who had brought him to the doors of impeachment. He brandished the day's newspapers, waving them above his head. The first headline: "ACQUITTED." The next: “Trump Acquitted." It was Feb. 6, 2020.
Close aides believed Trump had crossed a psychological line during his Senate trial. He now wanted to get even; he wanted to fire every single last "snake" inside his government. To activate the plan for revenge, Trump turned to a young take-no-prisoners loyalist with chutzpah: his former aide John McEntee.
By the end of that year, Trump also had a second tool in his armory, a secret weapon with the innocuous title, "Schedule F." The intention of this obscure legal instrument was to empower the president to wipe out employment protections for tens of thousands of civil servants across the federal government.
The mission for McEntee and the power of Schedule F dovetailed in the lead-up to the 2020 election as Trump planned (but lost) a second term and fumed over perceived foes.
If former President Trump runs again in 2024 and wins back the White House, people close to him say, he would turn to both levers again. It is Schedule F, combined with the willpower of top lieutenants like McEntee, that could bring Trump closer to his dream of gutting the federal bureaucracy and installing thousands devoted to him or his "America First" platform.
The reporting for this series draws on extensive interviews over a period of more than three months, with more than two dozen people close to the former president and others who have firsthand knowledge of the work underway to prepare for a potential second term. Most spoke on condition of anonymity to describe sensitive planning and avoid Trump’s ire.
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