Natalie Harp has dominated headlines lately — no small feat in a world occupied by the Iran and Ukraine wars, inflation, primaries, ICE arrests on city streets, and growing concerns about the food we eat. It feels like a throwback scandal: a much younger woman with an unusually intense devotion to an older, enormously powerful man, in this case the president. Inevitably, that has produced speculation about the nature of their relationship.
There is no public evidence of an affair, and frankly, I don’t much care.
But here we go.
During the Clinton years, we spent years debating whether a president’s private behavior told us something about his fitness for office. But after more than a decade of Trump controversies, this one seems unlikely to change anyone’s mind. You either trust him or you don’t.
I tried to ignore the story. In some ways, like the gold-plated décor and the planned monuments to himself, it is all too flattering for him. The only detail that caught my attention was that Harp does not have the now-familiar MAGA Botoxed face and inflated lips — more “girl next door,” even if she occasionally dresses like Ivanka.
But I’m not noticing.
There is too much going on.
Melania Trump has reentered the scene. The attacks have begun against those who mention the rather bizarre behavior surrounding Harp. Trump attacks the questioners. Supporters attack the press. Apparently, amid everything else happening in the country and the world, merely wondering about the president’s unusually influential aide requires a counteroffensive.
There is one decidedly unsexy question worth asking: did Harp have the proper security clearance for the information she was seeing? Reporting suggests that for much of her time close to the president, she did not. That deserves scrutiny, although irregular handling of sensitive information and access hardly begins or ends with Natalie Harp.
Beyond that, I have trouble summoning much outrage.
Maybe the relationship is exactly what some people suspect. Maybe it isn’t. Presidents have behaved badly before. Trump has survived scandals that would have ended the careers of politicians in another era. Nobody’s vote is likely to turn on Natalie Harp.
Meanwhile, there are forest fires burning everywhere, most of them of our own making.
We are at war with Iran. Ukraine remains unresolved. People are being swept into immigration detention. Relationships with longtime allies have been strained. Economic decisions made in Washington are reaching into Americans’ jobs, retirement accounts, grocery bills, and increasingly the safety and availability of the food we eat.
These are not distractions from the presidency.
They are the presidency.
Perhaps that is what bothers me about the Harp story. We have become so accustomed to spectacle that spectacle still manages to compete with consequence. A strange relationship, an unusual letter, a photograph, a dress — they are irresistible because they are easier to consume than war, constitutional power, immigration policy, or the complicated ways government decisions reach the dinner table.
So check the clearance. Ask whatever legitimate questions need to be asked.
Then let’s get back to the fires.
We’ve spent enough time on the president’s “trophies” — real or imagined.