随着危机笼罩天空，特朗普隐身幕后且话题偏离联邦航空管理局下令全国范围内罕见的航班停飞，但总统避开镜头，转而在社交媒体上发帖谈论娱乐产业和加利福尼亚州民主党籍州长。
As Crisis Circled the Skies, Trump Kept Out of Sight and Off Topic The F.A.A. called a rare halt on flights nationwide, but the president stayed away from cameras and issued social media posts on the entertainment industry and California’s Democratic governor.
周五晚间，航班停飞近五小时，美国民众听到了来自国土安全部长和交通部长的消息。他们没有听到特朗普总统的声音。
With flights grounded for nearly five hours Friday evening, Americans heard from the homeland security secretary. They heard from the transportation secretary. They did not hear from President Trump.
至少没有关于全国性停飞的消息——这是联邦政府自中期选举以来面临的首次重大危机。此次停飞导致全美约1万个航班停飞或延误，并证实了专家多年来的警告：国家的航空安全系统岌岌可危。
At least not about the nationwide ground stop, the first major crisis the federal government has faced since the midterm elections. The halt grounded or delayed some 10,000 flights from coast to coast and confirmed what experts have been warning for years: that the nation’s flight safety system is perilously fragile.
相反，这位总统在白宫幕后，当晚在社交媒体上发布了其他话题的信息。
Instead, the president, who remained behind the scenes at the White House, posted messages to social media that night on other topics.
“让我们的娱乐产业再次伟大！”他在危机期间于Truth Social上写道，呼吁提供税收激励以吸引电影制作回流美国。
“MAKE OUR ENTERTAINMENT INDUSTRY GREAT AGAIN!” he wrote on Truth Social, in the middle of the crisis, calling for tax incentives to lure movie production back to the United States.
自民主党在中期选举中大胜以来，特朗普先生极少公开露面，他的缺席显得格外引人注目，以至于国土安全部长马克韦恩·马林在周五晚间危机最紧张时刻，试图向全国保证总统全程参与了应对，只是没有像往常那样站在镜头前。
The absence of Mr. Trump, who has made few public appearances since Democrats swept the midterms, seemed notable enough that Markwayne Mullin, the homeland security secretary, sought to assure the nation in the heat of the crisis on Friday night that the president was fully engaged, if not in his more common spot in front of the cameras.
“这就是特朗普总统的做事风格，”马林在新闻发布会上说，“他安排领导人到位，然后授权他们领导。人们甚至会问，为什么总统不说话？因为他授权了达菲部长和我们出面向你们解释发生了什么。”他指的是坐在身旁的交通部长肖恩·达菲。
“This is what President Trump does,” Mr. Mullin said in a news conference. “He puts leaders in place, and he allows them to lead. They even ask, you know, why is the president not talking? It’s because he’s allowed Secretary Duffy and us to go out there and explain to you what took place.”He was referring to Sean Duffy, the transportation secretary, who appeared beside Mr. Mullin on Friday night.
截至周六上午，特朗普仍未就停飞令发表评论。相反，他开始攻击加州州长、民主党人、政治对手加文·纽森，指责后者为500多名死刑犯减刑，而州长是在一周多前采取这一行动的。
By Saturday morning, Mr. Trump still hadn’t commented on the ground stop. Instead, he began attacking Gov. Gavin Newsom of California, a Democrat and political rival, over his commutation of death penalty sentences for more than 500 inmates, an action the governor took more than a week ago.
让下属充当坏消息的传达者是政治上的老套路。特朗普决定不公开回应这场在全国产生连锁反应的危机，而国会民主党人已经誓言要调查政府对停摆的处理。
It is an old strategy in politics to let underlings be the bearers of bad news. Mr. Trump’s decision not to engage in public on a crisis with cascading effects across the country comes as Democrats in Congress have already vowed to investigate the administration’s handling of the shutdown.
周五晚间特朗普避而不谈此事之际，穆林和达菲在试图解释这场影响数万人的故障时，有时显得互相矛盾。
With Mr. Trump steering clear of the topic on Friday night, Mr. Mullin and Mr. Duffy appeared at times to contradict each other as they tried to explain the breakdown that affected tens of thousands of people.
据两位知情人士透露，穆林告诉记者称，瘫痪是因为新技术升级“压垮了旧系统”，交通部官员对此感到措手不及。
Transportation Department officials, in particular, were caught off guard when Mr. Mullin told reporters that the meltdown had occurred because new technology upgrades had “overwhelmed the older system,” according to two people familiar with the matter.
当时，部门官员尚未认定究竟是什么导致老旧系统过载，并引发瘫痪蔓延至全国。达菲也试图在穆林发言后温和地纠正方向，强调是旧设备而非新技术过载并失效。周六，达菲告诉记者，偏远地区一次常规路由器更换触发了全国性瘫痪，但官员尚无法确定是因零件故障还是承包商失误。
At the time, department officials had not made a determination of what precisely had overloaded the antiquated system and caused the meltdown to spiral across the country. Mr. Duffy also tried to gently redirect after Mr. Mullin’s remarks, stressing that old equipment, not new technology, was what had overloaded and failed. On Saturday, Mr. Duffy told reporters that a routine router replacement in a remote area had triggered the nationwide outages but officials could not yet say whether it had been because of a faulty part or a contractor error.
达菲在周六的一份声明中说：“我们非常感谢穆林部长及其团队的合作，让我们共同度过了这段充满挑战的时期。”当被问及停飞期间特朗普在哪里时，官员们为总统辩护，并对其大加赞扬。
In a statement on Saturday, Mr. Duffy said: “We’re deeply grateful for Secretary Mullin and his team’s partnership as we worked through this challenging time.”When asked where Mr. Trump was during the ground stop, the officials defended the president and heaped praise on him.
“我们俩都跟他谈过了，”达菲说。“他同意了。我跟他在电话里谈过，在椭圆形办公室也谈过。马尔韦恩也是。”
“Well, the two of us have talked to him,” Mr. Duffy said. “He’s in. I’ve talked to him on the phone. I’ve talked to him in the Oval. So has Markwayne.”As the agency leaders addressed the media, Stephen Miller, the newly installed White House chief of staff, and Steven Cheung, the communications director, watched off to the side.
在机构负责人向媒体发言时，新任白幕僚长斯蒂芬·米勒和通讯主任史蒂文·张在一旁观看。被要求置评时，白宫援引了达菲和马林的言论。
Asked for comment, the White House referred to the comments of Mr. Duffy and Mr. Mullin.
达菲说，国会应为停飞令负责，因为立法机关未能为联邦航空管理局更新技术提供资金。国会助手称，议员们私下质疑联邦航空管理局花费已拨款资金的效率，民主党人则说政府将驱逐移民等问题置于航空安全之上。
Mr. Duffy said Congress was to blame for the ground stop because the legislative branch had failed to fund updated technology for the Federal Aviation Administration. Lawmakers have privately questioned how efficiently the F.A.A. has spent money already appropriated, congressional aides say, and Democrats say the administration has prioritized issues like deportations over air safety.
“我想要500亿美元，”达菲说。“特朗普总统是个建设者。他将建设这个网络，为美国人民兑现承诺。”
“I want $50 billion,” Mr. Duffy said. “President Trump is a builder. He’s going to build this network and deliver for the American people.”
他补充道：“当达菲部长说他是我们拥有过的最伟大的总统时。你们从未有过像特朗普总统这样的建设者和领袖来领导这个国家，拥有愿景并组建团队。”
He added: “And when Secretary Duffy said he’s the greatest president we’ve had. You’ve never had a builder and a leader like President Trump lead this nation, have a vision and put the team together.”Ever since Republicans were routed in the midterm elections, Mr. Trump has been keeping somewhat of a lower profile. Before the midterms, he embarked on a blitz of rallies across the country in which he spoke to the public nearly every night.
自从共和党在中期选举中惨败以来，特朗普一直保持着相对低调的姿态。在中期选举前，他曾在全国范围内进行集会狂欢，几乎每晚都公开演讲。
This week, he appeared in public sparingly: once at an impromptu appearance with the U.F.C. president Dana White as a follow-up to a post that Mr. Trump acknowledged was an attempt to distract from bad news cycles, and at a speech on Veterans Day.
本周，他公开露面很少：一次是在终极格斗冠军赛主席达纳·怀特的即兴露面中，这是对特朗普承认旨在转移不利新闻周期的帖子的后续；另一次是在退伍军人节的演讲中。
Former Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene, Republican of Georgia, who was once a close ally of the president’s, noted that Mr. Trump has never been shy in putting his full focus on his construction projects, such as the attempted repairs to the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. But she noted that he seemed unengaged during the F.A.A. crisis.
前众议员、佐治亚州共和党人玛乔丽·泰勒·格林曾是总统的亲密盟友，她指出，特朗普在全力以赴关注他的建设项目方面从不羞怯，例如对林肯纪念堂倒影池的修缮尝试。但她指出，他在联邦航空管理局危机期间似乎缺乏投入。
“Trump constantly railed about fixing the reflection pool so much that he used the last day before massively losing the midterms to give a speech in front of the reflection pool bragging about he fixed the reflection pool,” she wrote on social media. But in a crisis that led to Mr. Duffy’s call for billions to upgrade air traffic systems, she wrote, “President Trump doesn’t even issue so much as a Truth Social post.”
“特朗普不断抱怨要修好倒影池，甚至在中期选举大败的前一天，还特意站在倒影池前发表演讲，吹嘘自己修好了倒影池，”她在社交媒体上写道。但在一场导致达菲呼吁拨款数十亿美元升级空管系统的危机中，她写道，“特朗普总统甚至连一条 Truth Social（真相社交）帖子都没发。”
She added: “While everyone was freaking out thinking we are under some sort of attack, Trump didn’t even bother to address the nation.”
她补充道：“当大家都惊慌失措、以为我们遭遇了某种袭击时，特朗普甚至懒得对全国发表讲话。”
On Saturday afternoon, Mr. Trump finally publicly acknowledged the matter, but only obliquely and through another’s words. He posted a quote attributed to Senator John Kennedy, Republican of Louisiana, that appeared to reference a desire for more funding for the F.A.A.: “The FAA Funding should be a stand alone Bill — We should get Democrat support for that!”With the crisis largely over, though with many flights still canceled and disruption rife, the president posted again about the need for tax credits for the movie industry.
周六下午，特朗普终于公开提及此事，但只是间接地、借用他人之口。他转发了一段归因于路易斯安那州共和党参议员约翰·肯尼迪的言论，似乎暗示希望为联邦航空管理局（FAA）争取更多资金：“联邦航空管理局的资金应作为一项独立法案——我们应争取民主党对此的支持！”尽管危机基本结束，但大量航班仍取消、混乱依旧，总统随后又发帖谈论电影行业需要税收抵免。玛吉·哈伯曼、卡伦·德米尔吉安和凯特·凯利参与了报道。
Maggie Haberman, Karoun Demirjian and Kate Kelly contributed reporting.