Key Point: “[Trump’s] team’s pivot to a general election campaign has been more chaotic, with backtracking and second-guessing. … Many of the hiccups have revolved around Trump’s takeover of the Republican National Committee. … The headlines about Trump’s bumpy takeover of the RNC caused concern at the highest levels of his campaign.”

Axios: Trump’s team shows growing pains in pivot to general election

By: Sophia Cai and Alex Thompson

• [Trump’s] team’s pivot to a general election campaign has been more chaotic, with backtracking and second-guessing.

• Why it matters: Many of the hiccups have revolved around Trump’s takeover of the Republican National Committee. His team now has rehired many of the 60 staffers who were fired when Trump took control last month.

• It’s the latest in a series of reversals by Trump’s team at the RNC, now led by chair Michael Whatley and Lara Trump, his daughter-in-law.

• Those who’ve been rehired include most of the RNC’s staff in key states, including five regional political directors and most of the committee’s state directors. Some are unsure what their roles are now.

• Reality check: Part of the Trump team’s challenge is that his primary campaign involved only a few dozen people. Now that the RNC is essentially a part of Trump’s campaign, the entire operation needs to grow quickly.

• Zoom in: The team’s growing pains were evident from the start of Trump’s takeover of the RNC.

• On his first day, new chief operating officer Sean Cairncross alerted the 60 staffers that they were being asked to resign and reapply, in an email that misspelled his name.

• After a backlash over the RNC’s reported plans to cut community centers and an early voting program, Whatley sent out a memo stating his support for those programs.

• Lara Trump initially said she hoped to hire conservative activist and conspiracy theorist Scott Presler, who called the Jan. 6 riot at the Capitol “the largest civil rights protest in American history.” (The RNC didn’t hire Presler. But a Trump spokesperson told Axios he’ll be registering voters at an upcoming RNC event.)

• The RNC got more unwanted attention for asking job candidates whether they thought the 2020 election was stolen.

• And after Lara Trump suggested the RNC might pay Donald Trump’s legal bills, the team rushed to reassure RNC members that it wouldn’t.

• The intrigue: The headlines about Trump’s bumpy takeover of the RNC caused concern at the highest levels of his campaign.

• On March 15, Trump co-campaign manager Susie Wiles told senior staffers that the new RNC’s first week had gotten awful media coverage and things had to change, Axios has learned.

• Separately, Wiles pressed fellow senior adviser Chris LaCivita — who was overseeing the changes at the RNC — about her concerns, three people familiar with the matter told Axios.