--- title: Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump description: If you aren't abandoned by peers, the most effective way to deal with Trump is through collective action canonical: https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/ author: Jeffrey Sonnenfeld article:opinion: true article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2025-07-07T20:30:30.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-10-19T08:08:40.613Z article:section: Ideas og:title: Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump og:description: If you aren't abandoned by peers, the most effective way to deal with Trump is through collective action og:url: https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd816e4192a1360b5/6998c80bf1b082c0396f17f4/donald-trump-124.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 2400 og:image:height: 1350 og:image:alt: US-POLITICS-TRADITION-MILITARY-PICNIC og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump twitter:description: If you aren't abandoned by peers, the most effective way to deal with Trump is through collective action twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd816e4192a1360b5/6998c80bf1b082c0396f17f4/donald-trump-124.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump > Sponsored content. 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A paid TIME subscription is separate and available at time.com/subscribe-agent. ### Sources * TIME Newsletters: [time.com/newsletters](/c/time-nl-inside-2026q3/newsletters?i=bce52da5-c611-4eb5-94c9-cd65e1d17c73&cr=time-nl-inside-2026q3-v1) ## Video: White House Meeting Between Trump and Netanyahu Scheduled to be Behind Closed Doors [Watch (HLS stream): White House Meeting Between Trump and Netanyahu Scheduled to be Behind Closed Doors](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/3wCZLlJl.m3u8) (2:40)  _Published 2025-07-07. One thing is certain about the reception awaiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington today—it will be far more favorable than the one he encountered at Kibbutz Nir Oz. Roughly a quarter of the small community of Nir Oz's residents were murdered or abducted to Gaza on Oct. 7th. Among those taken alive by Hamas terrorists, many were murdered in captivity while Netanyahu repeatedly blocked ceasefire attempts. Many families of hostages, realizing that Netanyahu was prolonging the war for his political survival, publicly denounced the Israeli Prime Minister and appealed to President Donald Trump for help._ by [Jeffrey Sonnenfeld](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-sonnenfeld/) ## Jeffrey Sonnenfeld Jul 7, 2025 8:30 PM UTC One thing is certain about the reception awaiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington today—it will be far more favorable than the one he encountered at Kibbutz Nir Oz. Roughly a quarter of the small community of Nir Oz's residents were murdered or abducted to Gaza on Oct. 7th. Among those taken alive by Hamas terrorists, many were murdered in captivity while Netanyahu repeatedly blocked ceasefire attempts. Many families of hostages, realizing that Netanyahu was prolonging the war for his political survival, publicly denounced the Israeli Prime Minister and appealed to President Donald Trump for help. by [Jeffrey Sonnenfeld](https://time.com/author/jeffrey-sonnenfeld/) ## Jeffrey Sonnenfeld Jul 7, 2025 8:30 PM UTC Donald Trump threatens schools and businesses to pay the tributes he demands or suffer the consequences. Trump is a bully when it comes to perverting government powers for illegitimate partisan purposes.Some leaders recently have succumbed to such efforts and paid the piper, while others have resisted. Private entities such as media companies dependent on FCC clearance, law firms reliant upon access to government buildings like court houses and requiring security clearances to defend clients, and universities reliant on government research funds are being victimized for political retribution, while other institutional leaders stand by traumatized and fearful. The leaders of Harvard and law firm Paul Weiss, represented by the same Trump-friendly lawyer, Richard Burck of Quinn Emanuel, took opposite paths in dealing with the same adversary Donald Trump. Can they both be right? Trump’s allies threaten to cripple these enterprises even though the Constitution is on the side of his victims. The draining, long appeals process endangers an enterprise’s perishable assets in the loyalty and well-being of its constituents, ranging from customers, employees, and clients to partners, researchers, and students. Paramount paid $16 million to the Trump Library fund to settle a lawsuit Trump filed against it, following itsCBS’s _60 Minutes_ interview with Kamala Harris last year, which her then-campaign rival, Trump, did not like. Six months earlier, Disney agreed to pay an equal amount for an ABC broadcast to which Trump objected to. In both cases, as there was no misconduct, there were no apologies offered and no admission of guilt, in an effort to protect their reputations by refusing contrition for their journalism. Similarly, several law firms such as Paul Weiss, Skadden Arps, and Kirkland & Ellis were threatened by Trump to have access to federal buildings and government security clearances cancelled and their clients were threatened with commercial repercussions if they continued to do business with the firms. Some firms settled preempting a White House executive order. Given their clients’ needs for such access and their clients’ fiduciary duties to their shareholders, they made concessions in the way of offers of legal work that was already covered by the existing donated time and for causes these firms already long addressed. Thus, the concessions gave Trump an illusion of victory and a dignified path for retreat, truly winning nothing. While their peer firms, such as Jenner Block, Perkins Coie, and Wilmer Cutler, are rightly celebrated for resisting similar Trump threats, the nature of the business mix of these litigation-focused firms had [less flight risk](https://www.wsj.com/opinion/why-paul-weiss-struck-a-deal-with-trump-law-firm-business-model-35bf7978?gaa%5Fat=eafs&gaa%5Fn=ASWzDAh5OkKmjci5ZMlk9g9z%5FHbNMF%5FcIw1TIB0AuM6WXwFti27rn5R08YMK&gaa%5Fts=686ad7e2&gaa%5Fsig=FhVoeyUBwwQ5pAvpmv0N1hvsio7x1XQGOmVAuxVyWLOCERE6sL3tJ9xOrpkTL6Xcn7LUmLIpBlLEw1mrr4%5FT8Q==) of corporate transaction lawyers. Some universities, such as Columbia, have made concessions while others, such as Harvard, have resisted federal government intrusion into private strategic decisions and freedom of academic expression. Harvard, like other universities, had [governance failures](https://fortune.com/2024/01/10/yale-management-professor-harvard-board-failures-education-leadership-sonnenfeld/) and had shown an indifference to pockets of antisemitism, which had not been properly addressed. The Harvard of today is very different than the Harvard of two years ago in the eyes ofinternal critics such as [Steven Pinker](https://urldefense.com/v3/%5F%5Fhttps:/reason.com/podcast/2025/05/07/steven-pinker-can-harvard-be-saved/%5F%5F;!!JqX-yBvFPUQ!gOSU6rVhxVYM%5FRLaInPWgu0VjQnYJA3psMSU2ne1WITZU6rsYQLkEbppzvzXNKHRFE4YtiV9eaDAfF7Au3-gTe93a27k$) who salute Harvard’s progress against ideological filters. Even the Anti-Defamation League’s assessment of antisemitism on campuses has shown marked [improvement at Harvard](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/08/opinion/trump-democracy.html) – with the school, led by a Jewish president and a Jewish board chair, now no worse than the average U.S. university, if not better than both. But Trump still brandishes the specter of [institutional antisemitism](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/06/30/us/politics/trump-harvard-civil-rights-law.html), [among other false accusations](https://urldefense.com/v3/%5F%5Fhttps:/www.thecrimson.com/article/2025/5/27/trump-attacks-harvard-with-inaccurate-accusations/%5F%5F;!!JqX-yBvFPUQ!gOSU6rVhxVYM%5FRLaInPWgu0VjQnYJA3psMSU2ne1WITZU6rsYQLkEbppzvzXNKHRFE4YtiV9eaDAfF7Au3-gTSjn3BTC$), to try to seize government control of Harvard’s admissions, faculty staffing, and curriculum decisions for its own political biases. Harvard has been fighting Trump’s unconstitutional intrusion into the strategic decisions of a private enterprise and winning four times in a row in federal lawsuits against Trump. After losing multiple court rulings to Harvard, Trump’s threats against the university appear to be imploding. Last week, after his fifth court loss, this one permanently blocking his halt of international visas to Harvard students, Trump tried to declare victory with a conciliatory tone on his Truth Social [posting](https://urldefense.com/v3/%5F%5Fhttps:/www.cnn.com/2025/06/20/politics/harvard-trump-potential-deal%5F%5F;!!JqX-yBvFPUQ!gOSU6rVhxVYM%5FRLaInPWgu0VjQnYJA3psMSU2ne1WITZU6rsYQLkEbppzvzXNKHRFE4YtiV9eaDAfF7Au3-gTTEh74-y$) “They have acted extremely appropriately during these negotiations, and appear to be committed to doing what is right.” Yet still billions of dollars of research grants are at risk on top of the confiscatory new tax provisions targeting the endowments of such wealthy schools, costing billions more. Late last month, Harvard’s president and provost confirmed to major donors that talks with the Trump White House had resumed. Trump also hinted that a deal with Harvard was [imminen](https://urldefense.com/v3/%5F%5Fhttps:/www.reuters.com/world/us/trump-administration-expects-deal-with-harvard-by-end-june-washington-post-2025-06-25/%5F%5F;!!JqX-yBvFPUQ!gOSU6rVhxVYM%5FRLaInPWgu0VjQnYJA3psMSU2ne1WITZU6rsYQLkEbppzvzXNKHRFE4YtiV9eaDAfF7Au3-gTeGn0Gvx$)t, but some Harvard faculty worried about the terms of a prospective deal appearing to look like capitulation, while others worried that the university’s battle over purist principles of academic freedom was quixotic and too costly. Both Garber and Paul Weiss managing partner Brad Karp have been criticized for their different approaches to conflict with Trump. The context was different between such cases. Paul Weiss attracted White House vindictiveness when its chairman Brad Karp attempted to rally the legal community to defend peer firms which had been previously targeted. Initially, the legal community not only failed to defend peers targeted by the White House, but firms, such as Sullivan Cromwell, benefited from such disputes for commercial and partisan purposes. Isolated, Karp had to fortify his firm and mollify Trump with face-saving concessions while gaining numerous new clients during this period of distress. Only later did several hundred mid-sized law firms come to support large firms under the White House attack. By contrast, hundreds of colleges and universities rallied immediately to the defense of Harvard and 60 other schools under attack from the White House. An [immediate wave](https://som.yale.edu/story/2025/fortune-harvards-defiance-trumps-authoritarian-incursion-supported-over-70-past-and) of a hundred schools catalyzed a massive collective [statement of defiance](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/04/27/us/trump-university-presidents.html) of such intrusion into campus life. The victims are not just collegial organizations such as law firms and universities. The nation has seen many icons of American enterprise victimized in the same way Paramount/CBS and Disney/ABC were attacked. Various firms such as Amazon, Delta Airlines, Coca-Cola, Walmart, Harley Davidson, AT&T, Ford, GM, Merck, and Bank of America were wrongly attacked by Trump for partisan reasons, many for merely [speaking the truth](https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/04/opinion/business-ceo-trump-tariffs.html) about the devastating consequences for Trump’s reckless tariffs, along with other revenge trade practices. Trump even told Harley riders to [buy foreign made](https://fortune.com/2024/07/30/trump-dump-stocks-targets-crashing-markets-finance-politics/) bikes instead of Harley when the company had to close one US factory and open one in Asia to import bikes in the EU due to EU retaliatory trade barriers in reaction to Trump tariffs. The silence of the business community to such White House overreach has been deafening. While the [National Association of Manufacturers](https://fortune.com/article/ceos-trump-tariffs-recession/) and the US Chamber of Commerce have spoken up, it’s time for other influential but more cautious organizations, like the Business Roundtable, to learn the lessons the universities taught the law firms. The difference receptions that Garber and Karp have received make clear that the most effective way to deal with Trump is through collective action but if abandoned by peers, leaders can make needed cosmetic concessions to allow their adversary a dignified path for retreat. Leaders must learn this wisdom. ## Transcript [00:00] Tonight, President Trump will host the prime minister of Israel, Benjamin Netanyahu, [00:04] for dinner, where they will discuss [00:05] the positive developments taking place in the Middle East region. [00:09] Just about the the visit of Prime Minister Netanyahu today. [00:12] It was just wondering why that is not open to the press and previous visits by him. [00:17] We've had Oval Office press conferences. [00:19] Does that reflect somehow the kind of sensitivity of this particular visit? [00:23] No, they're having a private dinner. [00:25] There's many important matters that are obviously ongoing in the region. [00:28] As you know, the utmost priority for the president right now in [00:32] the Middle East is to end the war in Gaza and to return all of the hostages. [00:37] Also, as you know, there was [00:38] a cease fire proposal that Israel supports that was sent to Hamas, [00:42] and we hope that they will agree to this proposal. [00:44] We want to see all of the hostages released. [00:47] That's on the top of the president's mind. [00:49] So that will be discussed, as well as [00:50] the many other positive developments we've seen in the Middle East. [00:53] Look, right now, the president is focused on today [00:56] and and to get Hamas to agree to this cease fire. [00:59] I don't want to comment on the details of [01:01] the arrangement out of respect for these negotiations, [01:04] but a agreeable and appropriate cease fire proposal has been sent to Hamas. [01:08] And I can also tell you, [01:09] special Envoy Witkoff intends to travel to Doha later this week, [01:13] where he will continue to engage in these discussions. [01:16] And the Qataris and the Egyptians have been incredibly helpful partners in mediating [01:20] these negotiations and discussions to bring [01:23] peace to this region and end this conflict once and for all. [01:26] Two questions on Israel. [01:27] You suggested that Hamas is the impediment currently to a ceasefire. [01:32] So if not a ceasefire deal, [01:33] then what does the president hope to [01:35] achieve with tonight's dinner with the Prime Minister? [01:38] Again, you guys are getting around to a lot of hypotheticals. [01:41] I don't want to get ahead of the president, [01:43] but there are many other issues to discuss with [01:46] Prime Minister Netanyahu tonight related to the region and just the entire world. [01:50] So this will be a dinner to talk about Operation Midnight Hammer, [01:53] which was incredibly successful, [01:54] to talk about peace in Gaza and ending that conflict, [01:57] as well as many other topics of discussion in relation to Israel and the United States. [02:03] But as for the takeover of Gaza, [02:05] I don't believe the president ever said that. [02:06] I think he discussed a rebuilding of Gaza once this war is over. [02:10] This has become an uninhabitable place for human beings. [02:13] And the president has a big heart. [02:15] He wants this to be a prosperous, [02:17] safe part of the region where people and families can thrive. [02:21] And there will be a need for rebuilding effort when the time comes. [02:25] But right now, we need to end this war, [02:27] and we need to bring all of the hostages home. [02:30] The president is adamant about that. Look again. [02:32] I will let the president speak for himself [02:34] later if he decides to comment on the details of the agreement. [02:37] But out of respect for the discussions, [02:39] I won't do that from the podium. ```json [{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"OpinionNewsArticle","@id":"https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/"},"headline":"Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump","datePublished":"2025-07-07T20:30:30.000Z","dateModified":"2026-10-19T08:08:40.613Z","description":"If you aren't abandoned by peers, the most effective way to deal with Trump is through collective action","url":"https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/","keywords":["Donald Trump"],"thumbnailUrl":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd816e4192a1360b5/6998c80bf1b082c0396f17f4/donald-trump-124.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","author":[{"@type":"Person","name":"Jeffrey Sonnenfeld","jobTitle":"","url":"https://time.com/author/jeffrey-sonnenfeld/"}],"articleSection":"Ideas","image":[{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/bltd816e4192a1360b5/6998c80bf1b082c0396f17f4/donald-trump-124.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=1200:675&height=675","width":1200,"height":675,"headline":"US-POLITICS-TRADITION-MILITARY-PICNIC","caption":"US-POLITICS-TRADITION-MILITARY-PICNIC","creditText":"Brendan Smialowski—AFP/Getty Images","representativeOfPage":true}],"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Time","url":"https://time.com/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://time.com/images/logo.png","width":528,"height":156},"foundingDate":"March 3, 1923","sameAs":["https://www.facebook.com/time","https://www.instagram.com/time/?hl=en","https://twitter.com/time","https://www.pinterest.com/timemagazine"]}},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/section/ideas/","name":"Ideas"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/tag/donald-trump/","name":"Donald Trump"}},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"item":{"@id":"https://time.com/7300674/leaders-donald-trump/","name":"Leaders Must Learn the Art of Dealing with Donald Trump"}}]},{"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"VideoObject","name":"White House Meeting Between Trump and Netanyahu Scheduled to be Behind Closed Doors","description":"One thing is certain about the reception awaiting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Washington today—it will be far more favorable than the one he encountered at Kibbutz Nir Oz. 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