President Theodore Roosevelt referred to the presidency as a “bully pulpit,” which could be used to persuade legislators to embrace his sweeping policy agenda, from environmental legislation to antitrust protections. To Roosevelt, the word “bully” meant “superb” or “excellent.” Today, the term has taken another meaning. 

President Donald Trump bullies through coercion, threats, and retribution to serve his interests.

Increasingly, some of Trump’s tried-and-true tools for coercion are backfiring on him. In stark contrast to Roosevelt’s advice to “speak softly and carry a big stick,” Trump is barking loudly but has apparently fumbled his threatened stick.

The unexpected common link between Trump’s recent setbacks, from the surrender of his demands to own Greenland, to his shifting explanations for his seizure of Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro, to the spreading outrage over the indiscriminate brutal cruelty of ICE raids around the nation, is that they represent the simultaneous failure of Trump’s typical intimidation tactics. In our book, Trump’s Ten Commandments, we identify 10 of Trump’s favorite go-to leadership tools. Several of these tools have been failing Trump amidst recent setbacks.

Trump’s first go-to leadership tool is to begin every negotiation by assaulting the other parties. Trump tends to open any negotiation with audacious demands, insults, and threats. Most negotiation experts recommend building a foundation of trust as if you were building a fire: you ignite tinder, branches, kindling, and finally toss on a bigger log once the blaze is established.

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But instead of building trust, Trump likes to begin by shattering it, believing that later terms offered will look reasonable compared to the suffering initially threatened. Over the past year, this approach has worked for the President, even if it came at the cost of shattered trust. A fury of confusing,........

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