Two stories in recent days indicate that when President Trump declares publicly that his administration’s policies are changing . . . they may not actually change.

First, BuzzFeed reported that a Trump tweet about the G7 summit joint statement simply . . . had no real effect.

Shortly after leaving the G7 Summit in Canada in June, President Donald Trump tweeted to say he had instructed US officials not to endorse a statement he had agreed to just hours earlier with other world leaders. Trump was displeased with something Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said during the summit’s closing press conference, which the president was following on TV from Air Force One.
But almost two months on, those instructions from Trump have never been acted upon, apparently ignored, two sources who were directly involved in the G7 process told BuzzFeed News.
US inaction means Trump effectively endorsed the final statement after all.

Then The Hill reported that back in November, a series of Trump tweets about the importation of elephant trophies seemed to overrule a forthcoming decision the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service — but a lack of follow-up left the agency in confusion and improvising a policy in response to the president’s statements.

Within minutes, Gavin Shire, the head spokesman at FWS, asked the group if he should take down a website posting from earlier that evening saying that the ban was lifted.
By the next morning, a Saturday, the situation wasn’t any clearer for Interior staff. Heather Swift, press secretary at Interior, warned employees not to “engage” with the issue on social media, while an exasperated Shire declared, “I can’t keep up with these people!”
Greg Sheehan, FWS’s principal deputy director and its top official, seemed to be almost as much out-of-the-loop as the other staffers.
“Until we get additional clarification on the intent and breadth of the President’s decision to review ‘Big game Trophy decision’ we have been asked to abstain from issuing any permits for both Lions and Elephants,” he told top staff the day after Trump’s tweet.

Five months later, the Fish and Wildlife Service announced it would review all applications to import animal trophies on a “case by case” basis.

You could interpret this as the “Deep State” federal bureaucracy ignoring presidential instructions and failing to respect the authority of the duly elected head of the executive branch.

Or you could interpret this as a president who doesn’t think about issues in terms of policy and law and who simply reacts publicly on Twitter to whatever the day brings. Departments and federal agencies respond to executive orders and memorandums, and the more specifically they’re written, the less wiggle room those agencies have. That’s more or less the job of the president; responding on Twitter to what’s on Fox & Friends isn’t.

A Tweet can’t change federal government policy.