Trump relying on government officials in final campaign stretch

CNN — As President Donald Trump makes a hurried final push for reelection, he is relying not only on his campaign staff but on government officials to transmit his message to voters, a breach of longstanding norms that have mostly been erased over his four-year tenure. So far this week, White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany has made several appearances from what appeared to be the Trump campaign headquarters studio in Arlington, Virginia, raising questions about her current role within the Trump campaign given her taxpayer-funded position. “I’ve never seen something like this before.” A Trump campaign official said McEnany was appearing in a “personal capacity on a volunteer basis” and that news programs hosting her were “instructed not to refer to her with her White House title.” And White House deputy press secretary Sarah Matthews said McEnany “was appearing in her personal capacity as a private citizen.” But she was not the only White House official to participate in campaign activities this week. Stephen Miller, who has orchestrated Trump’s hardline immigration policy, spoke in his “personal capacity” as a “Trump campaign adviser” during a briefing with reporters on Wednesday, baselessly claiming that Biden would “incentivize child smuggling” if elected president. Larry Kudlow, the National Economic Council leader, said a day later on another campaign-organized call that Biden would “raise taxes and re-regulate large sectors of the economy.” Two hours earlier he was standing in front of the White House, identified as a White House economic adviser, during an interview on Fox News.