Betrayal review: Trumps final days and a threat not yet extinguished – The Guardian

Trumpworld is in legal jeopardy. The 45th presidents phone call to Brad Raffensperger, urging the Georgia secretary of state to find 11,780 votes, may have birthed a grand jury.

In Manhattan, the outgoing district attorney, Cyrus Vance Jr, has empaneled one of those, to look at Trumps business. As a Vanity Fair headline blared, The Trump Organization should be soiling itself right now.

In Washington, the Department of Justice indicts Steve Bannon, chairman of Trumps 2016 campaign and a pivotal figure in the Stop the Steal movement second time round.

For Trump, out-of-office has not translated into out-of-mind. He thrives on all the attention.

Amid it all, Jonathan Karl dives once again into the Stygian mosh pit, this time with Betrayal, a sequel to Front Row at the Trump Show, a New York Times bestseller.

In that book, in the spring of 2020, ABC News chief Washington correspondent prophesied that Trumps war on truth may do lasting damage to American democracy. Sadly, he wasnt wrong. Front Row preceded by months a coup attempt egged on by a defeated president. Looking back, Trumps embrace of birtherism, alternative facts and crowd violence were mere prelude to the chaos that filled his time in power, his final days in office and all that has come and gone since then.

In his second book, under the subtitle The Final Act of the Trump Show, Karl gets members of Trumps cabinet to speak on the record. They paint a portrait of a wrath-filled president, untethered from reality, bent on revenge.

Karl captures Bill Barr denouncing Trumps election-related conspiracy theories and criticizing his election strategy. Appearing determined to salvage his own battered reputation, Trumps second attorney general tells Karl his president was making it too much of a base election. I felt that he had to repair the bridges he had burned [with moderate voters] in the suburbs.

By that metric, Glenn Youngkin, Virginias governor-elect, has a bright future, a politician who puts suburban dads and rural moms at ease. No wonder Republicans think they have found a star, and with him a winning formula.

As for Trumps claims about rigged voting machines, Barr realized from the beginning it was just bullshit and says the number of actual improper voters were de minimus. No matter, to Trump: he continues to demand Republican legislatures carry out post-election audits.

Karl delivers further confirmation of Mitch McConnells fractious personal relationship with Trump, a man the Kentucky senator reportedly repeatedly mocked. According to Karl, McConnell, then Senate majority leader, sought to formally disinvite Trump from Joe Bidens inauguration. Kevin McCarthy, the chief House Republican, leaked the plan to the White House. In turn, Trump tweeted that he would not attend.

McConnell attempted to thread the needle, placating Trump while keeping the GOPs Koch brothers wing onside. But once he acknowledged Bidens victory, the damage was permanently done. McConnell was an object of Trumpian scorn.

That the senator jammed Amy Coney Barrett on to the supreme court days before the 2020 election and before that played blocking back for Brett Kavanaugh is now rendered irrelevant. Trump wants McConnell out of Senate leadership. Adding insult to injury, Trump recently told the Washington Post McConnell wasnt a real leader because he didnt fight for the presidency, and said he was only a leader because he raises a lot of money.

You know, Trump said, with the senators, thats how it is, frankly. Thats his primary power.

Hes not wrong all the time.

Betrayal also documents a commander-in-chief who scared his own cabinet witless. After Trump junked the Iran nuclear deal, for example, Tehran thumbed its nose back. Drama ensued, because Trump wanted to know his options.

Chris Miller, then acting defense secretary, tells Karl that to dissuade Trump from ordering the destruction of Irans uranium enrichment program, he chose to play the role of fucking madman his words, not Karls which meant advocating that very course of action. According to Karl, not even Mike Pompeo, then secretary of state and an Iran hawk, played along.

Oftentimes with provocative people, if you get more provocative than them, they then have to dial it down, Miller explains to Karl. Theyre like, Yeah, I was fucking crazy, but that guys batshit.

Here, the reader might pause to imagine a campaign slogan for Trump in 2024: Fucking crazy, but not batshit.

On a similar note, Karl depicts Rudy Giuliani, Trumps crony and attorney, as a walking timebomb. Jared Kushner, Trumps son-in-law and chief adviser, avoided the former New York mayor. Mark Meadows, Trumps last chief of staff, saw him as a corrosive force.

Im not going to let Rudy in the building for any more of these, Meadows reportedly told Chris Christie, New Jerseys former governor, and Bill Stepien, Trumps campaign manager, as they prepared for debates with Biden.

These days, Giuliani is suspended from the bar, reportedly under investigation and unable to persuade Trump to pay his bills. Christie and Trump are at loggerheads too, over sins real and imagined, past and present.

As for Meadows and Stepien, they are in the crosshairs of the House select committee focused on the US Capitol attack. From the looks of things only Kushner and his wife, Ivanka Trump, have so far remained intact, ensconced in Florida, sufficiently distanced from Big Daddy.

Despite such fallout, Betrayal concludes with words of warning. Karl rightly contends that Trumps betrayal of American democracy highlighted just how vulnerable the system is.

The continued survival of our republic, he writes, may depend, in part, on the willingness of those who promoted Trumps lies and those who remained silent to acknowledge they were wrong.

In a hypothetical rematch, Trump leads Biden 45-43. Among independent voters, he holds a double-digit lead. Dont hold your breath.

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Betrayal review: Trumps final days and a threat not yet extinguished - The Guardian