Trump 'looks panicky' behind the scenes: WH correspondent

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to the members of the media after disembarking Air Force One as he arrives at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland, U.S., April 12, 2026.

As the consequences of the war on Iran continue to spin out and President Donald Trump repeatedly takes to social media to lash out against the Pope and other critics, many are beginning to “worry about his mental health,” writes iPaper White House correspondent Anushka Asthana. While the president has repeatedly attempted to put a positive spin on the news cycle’s accumulating disasters, reporters who see him every day say he “looks panicky” behind the scenes.

Since launching the war, writes Asthana, “Trump’s world — and pretty much everyone else’s – has been turned upside down.”

For most people, this has meant grappling with war, rising prices, shattered alliances, and the conflict’s other wide-ranging impacts. For Trump, it has meant confronting the fact that he’s gotten himself into a situation he can’t get out of, as starting the war has proven to be much easier than ending it.

And as Asthana explains, “Americans want out. In a recent Ipsos poll, 66 per cent said they wanted the U.S. to end its involvement in the conflict quickly, even if all of the goals are not achieved, compared with 27 per cent who are keen for Trump to push on.”

Those numbers have Trump and the GOP worried about approval ratings and midterm elections, and “as the domestic pressure increased, so have Trump’s frustrations. This has been most visible through his increasingly angry Truth Social posts.”

Asthana has no shortage of examples to cite. From “Open the F-ckin’ Strait,” to “a whole civilization will die tonight,” to calling the Pope “WEAK on crime” and “terrible for Foreign policy,” Trump has been especially erratic with his messaging in recent weeks, even for a president known for his unfiltered approach to communication. As his behavior becomes more and more bizarre, anticipation is rising in the White House and among the journalists covering it.

“There is now a frantic mood in the White House,” says Asthana. “More of us journalists are cramming into the briefing room each day to witness what will happen next. You can see the increasing frustration for Leavitt as she looks to justify what Trump is saying.”

Trump’s flailing hasn’t helped diminish any of the crises that have shaken his second term to the point where they threaten to bring down his presidency altogether. Rather than solving or even deflecting from these problems, “Trump’s increasingly unpredictable outbursts point instead to a President who isn’t getting his own way — and is struggling to find a way out of the mess he has created.”

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