I think since Trump first announced his plan to run for President, he has repeatedly employed a PR tactic that is widely misunderstood.
Namely, he lets potentially damaging information leak on his own terms and weathers the storm in such a way that inoculates him, politically.
The entire Mueller investigation may be an example of Trump using this strategy. He has complained about it numerous times but never once has he lifted a finger to stop it. He has never pushed his AG to stop it.
Most revealing is Trump’s reaction when legislators challenge Mueller or Rosenstien on his behalf - rather than support their efforts he backs off and expresses a desire to remain uninvolved.
Could it be that Trump likes being the subject of a witch hunt? I think he’s figured out that when people are inundated with allegations that Trump did this, Trump did that, Trump is a racist, Trump is a moron, Trump is dangerous, Trump promotes violence, Trump violates women, etc., etc.....
... people eventually come to the conclusion that nobody could be THAT bad - the fault must be with his accusers - Trump is the victim, the underdog - and Americans love an underdog.
If I’m right, Trump is playing this to a T. He purposely draws fire, he baits his enemies into telling lies about him, the people see him being unfairly attacked, and they rally around him.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
I wouldn’t be surprised if he has leaked “damaging” things or had others do it. I wouldn’t be surprised if he has at times behaved mysteriously in order to invite a scandal that will later be disproven. I bet he has sent Giuliani, Bannon, Cohen, and others to say things designed to appear contradictory or unsupportive - just so that he can lure his enemies down a rabbit hole.
For example, when Melania was hospitalized and there was some mystery surrounding her living arrangements and her reasons for not being seen in public or by her husband’s side. The MSM tried to spin it into a matter of marital discord. It seemed to me that Trump could have dispelled those rumors and ended such speculation, but that he chose to let the MSM dig themselves deeper and deeper into a hole. Then, a week later they are walking hand in hand, and the MSM looks nasty, petty and foolish.
Trump has done it the same way for decades. Whatever the issue is, he throws a whole lot of ideas out there. I have heard him repeat over the years this same idea: you have to be flexible on the path to finish the journey, and you have to be willing to walk away if you find that it’s not worth it. So he’ll say “we can do this, we can add that, we can change over there” and depending on the reaction he follows in that direction until all his obstacles are removed.
And that is what he does with people who cooperate. When you make him angry, he gets loud and says things like “hit ‘em back 10 times harder”. In this case, the left and other of Trumps enemies and opponents have become total suckers for their own propaganda. They have been saying for years that Trump is crazy, and dangerous, and dumb. So when Trump said he was willing to use Nukes on North Korea, or that he is willing to put up $200 billion in tariffs on European cars etc - his opponents believe that he is crazy enough to actually do it. So they come seriously to compromise and walk away from what they think is the ledge.
This is why Trump appears erratic and contradictory at times. In his head he knows he will ultimately need to be conciliatory and agreeable with whomever’s on the other side of the table. But before they get to the table he also has to confuse and scare and worry them. This is basically what he did with Putin, too. The media and all those intel-agency people are dumb as rocks. Trump has been much more strict and imposing on Russia than Obama ever was. Obama’s (and Hillary’s) tactics were foolish. They kowtowed to everyone in public, Hillary brings a stupid “reset” button, Obama tells Medvedev “psst tell Vlad I’m only pretending to be mean” etc etc. If you kiss the ass of your opponent in public, what kind of leverage will you have to extract concession in private? I have no idea what really went on with Obama’s Iran deal because it was such a bad deal. But you could argue that we got such a crap deal - Obama was not negotiating with Iran he was negotiating for Iran, so they just kept asking for more and more, and agreeing to less and less. Trump slaps sanctions on Russia, goes to NATO and says “let’s spend more money because Russia is a threat”, he says “hey EU stop giving Putin so much money find new sources for natural gas” and this kind of action gets Putin’s attention. Now he knows Trump is serious. And that is why they got along. Trump walked into Helsinki with a long list of sanctions against Russia, which he could then use to leverage Putin into making a deal in return for Trump backing off.
Almost nobody in the media understands this.