Why Trump seeks to scare where other presidents soothed

President Donald Trump, concerned his travel ban could be stopped cold in the judicial branch after a less-than-stellar rollout, is leaning into fear, attempting to ratchet up terror concerns by telling audiences that he has learned considerably more about terror since taking office last month.

Trump and his top aides are well aware that his travel ban would benefit from public approval, so Trump made the case Wednesday that he knows more about terrorism than most. He suggested that Americans — at least those who don’t get classified briefings — don’t understand the terror threat against the United States.

“Terrorism is a tremendous threat, far greater than people in our country understand,” Trump told a gathering of sheriffs in a Washington hotel.

Seemingly hinting at information gleaned from his classified briefings, the President added: “Believe me. I’ve learned a lot in the last two weeks, and terrorism is a far greater threat than the people of our country understand.”

Ari Fleischer, who served as Bush’s White House press secretary during 9/11, said all presidents use “realistic, worse-case scenarios” to push their agendas.

He cautioned the tactic could be abused and result in undermining an administration.

“Like anything, you can go too far. You can exaggerate, you can get facts wrong, you can hype it to a degree where you lose credibility,” he said. “But it is been a time honored tradition in American politics to use a worst-case scenario to drive an agenda.”

It’s also a tactic that’s worked for Trump. Throughout the 2016 campaign, Trump urged his supporters to worry about terror and pushed them to do so by painting the world as an increasingly dangerous place.

“People are scared,” Trump said in his June Republican National Convention acceptance speech. “The attacks on our police, and the terrorism in our cities, threaten our very way of life. Any politician who does not grasp this danger is not fit to lead our country.”

More Americans said terrorism was a pressing concern in 2016 than any point since 2003.

According to a CNN poll released in 2016, 71% of Americans said further acts of terrorism are very or somewhat likely in the United States over the next several weeks, a number that has not been that high since March 2003.

Trump is also suggesting he knows more about the need for the ban than the judges overseeing the legal challenges, who are not privy to confidential briefings.

Americans are largely split on Trump’s executive order, which bars citizens of seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the US for 90 days, all refugees for 120 days and indefinitely halts refugees from Syria.

Voters generally disapprove of key aspects of Trump’s order, according to a Quinnipiac University poll out Wednesday. It found 51% of the public oppose suspending travel to the US for 90 days from seven countries, 60% oppose suspending all refugee immigration for 120 days and 70% oppose indefinitely suspending the Syrian refugee program.

Trump’s order went before a 9th Circuit Court of Appeals three-judge panel on Tuesday where lawyers from Trump’s Justice Department squared up against the states of Washington and Minnesota. The court is expected to rule on Trump’s order by the end of the week.

The President knocked the arguments against his travel ban Wednesday, telling the same group of sheriffs that “even a ‘bad high school student’ ” could understand the language of his order and find in his favor.