An article from Max Fisher in the New York Times titled "What Happens When You Fight a ‘Deep State’ That Doesn’t Exist" says that Trump's fight against the 'Deep State' demonizes civil servants as "partisan agents."
The phrase 'Deep State' suggests there are systems within our government who operate outside of the democratic process to influence and undermine the administration.
Fisher maintains that civil servants want to go back to remaining apolitical and behind the scenes:
"If the president and his institutions come to see each other as an enemy, trust could be difficult to restore."
"The Trump administration, in its fight against the “deep state,” could risk exacerbating the very problems it has pinned on shadowy bureaucratic forces: leaking, internal conflict and the politicization of institutions like intelligence agencies.
American institutions do not resemble the powerful deep states of countries like Egypt or Pakistan, experts say. Nor do individual leaks, a number of which have come from President Trump’s own team, amount to a conspiracy.
The diagnosis of a “deep state,” those experts say, has the problem backward..."