Paranoia runs in dictatorships

President Donald Trump is increasingly morphing the White House residence into a second Oval. It’s become the place where Trump feels most productive, where he avoids meddling by his staff and where he speed-dials his network of confidants, GOP lawmakers and TV pundits.

  Politico

I think what they mean is he's stopped going to work at all and stays in his bedroom.

The residence was where Trump made the infamous July 25 phone call to the Ukrainian president that’s now at the center of impeachment proceedings. It’s where Trump often meets his personal attorneys to plot legal strategy or campaign advisers to shape 2020 campaign moves. And last week it became the location for a Trump meeting that’s as official as any, hosting Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell — the target of countless Trump Twitter attacks — along with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin for a Monday morning discussion of monetary policy.

So, he goes to the dining room from time to time.

Frustrated by the whistleblower complaint and a parade of administration officials testifying on Capitol Hill, Trump is as wary as ever of the staffers around him and distrustful of the traditional White House infrastructure. Working from his private quarters gives him space away from what he perceives as prying eyes and guards against his omnipresent fear of leaks to the media.

[...]

“The Oval presents itself as historic and it gives off a sense of power, but the residence has a sense of exclusivity,” said a former senior administration official, describing Trump’s affinity for conducting business there. “He works more in the residence because he is not constrained there by staffers knocking on the door.”

[...]

The president sometimes prefers to interview candidates for high-profile positions from his private quarters, so staff and White House journalists cannot monitor comings and goings.

Secrecy and paranoia. Great traits for a president.

On the rare occasion where Trump does venture out in Washington, he dines at his hotel or attends a fundraiser. He recently went to a rare Nationals postseason baseball game with a slew of Republican lawmakers.

Which proved to him that he can't go out in public and be adored.

But most days and nights, if Trump is not on the campaign trail or a foreign trip, he happily stays inside his White House bubble and the residence — working late into the night and very early in the morning.

Working. If that's what you call watching Fox & Friends, plotting with Sean Hannity and tweeting.

Trump’s predecessors all used the nation’s most prominent home — which now features 132 rooms and 35 bathrooms across six levels — in their own unique ways.

I'm sorry. HOW many people are normally in a president's residence?

The White House residence offers its own living room, study and the Yellow Oval Room for grander entertaining — in addition to the bedrooms, kitchen, dining and dressing rooms. Over 90 people work in the White House residence, both serving the president and his family as well as helping to throw hundreds of events each year for visitors.

[...]

[T]he bulk of his work in the mornings, late afternoons, evenings and weekends happens in his private quarters.

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He also uses it during working hours as a place to watch TV freely, tweet and serve as his own one-man communications director and political strategist.

Right.

...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.