The Making of the President 2016: How Donald Trump Orchestrated a Revolution

Other books by Roger Stone

Jeb! and the Bush Crime Family

The Clintons’ War on Women

Nixon’s Secrets

The Man Who Killed Kennedy

Copyright © 2017 by Roger Stone

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Cover photo credit Matt Doyle (Contour by Getty Images)

Print ISBN: 9781510726925

Ebook ISBN: 9781510726932

Printed in the United States of America

Acknowledgments

Dedicated to President Richard M. Nixon, who first recognized Donald Trump’s potential to become leader of the Free World.

Also dedicated to Juanita Broaddrick, a brave and courageous woman who told the truth about being sexually assaulted and bitten by Bill Clinton and spoke out despite pressure on her to remain silent.

This book is also dedicated to Dr. Jerome S. Corsi, mentor, colleague, and one of the most effective investigative reporters writing today.

Thanks also to Dr. Eric Paddon, Christopher Cox, Kevin Ryan, Jacob Engels, Saint John Hunt, Michael Caputo, A. Gore Vidal, Randy Short, John Kakanis, Tyler Nixon, Kate Koptenko, Milo Yiannopoulous, Matthew J. Boyle, Matt Drudge, Alex Jones, Stephen K. Bannon, David Urban, Ed McMullen, Susie Wiles, Matt Labash, Tucker Carlson and Laury Gay. In addition, the book is dedicated to my mother, who passed away at ninety-five in 2016. If you are familiar with Tony Soprano’s mother Olivia, you completely understand my Sicilian mother. She insisted that Hillary Clinton was a crook and a liar. I only regret that she did not live long enough to vote for Donald Trump, who she danced with at my wedding.

Also dedicated to my beloved wife Nydia, a woman of infinite patience and wisdom.

Roger Stone

New York City

Table of Contents

Preface

Part 1   How Donald Trump Hijacked the Republican Presidential Nomination

Chapter 1   Trump vs. the Elites

Chapter 2   Round One: GOP Candidates Debate

Chapter 3   Round Two: GOP Primaries Pick Trump

Part 2   How Hillary Clinton Stole the Democratic Presidential Nomination

Chapter 4   Bernie Sanders, the Old Socialist, Challenges Hillary Clinton, the President Presumed

Chapter 5   Round One: Hillary Declares Victory over Sanders

Chapter 6   Round Two: Hillary Pivots to Attack Trump

Photos

Part 3   How Trump Won the White House

Chapter 7   The Vice Presidential Picks and the National Nominating Conventions

Chapter 8   The Presidential and Vice Presidential Debates

Chapter 9   Closing Arguments

Conclusion: Trump Wins

Appendix A

Appendix B

Endnotes

PREFACE

The Trumpster

On November 8th, 2016, Donald John Trump was elected the forty-fifth President of the United States. This is a singular accomplishment that can only be attributed to the talent, energy, and foresight of Donald Trump himself.

Trump’s sprint across eight states in the closing days led to the greatest upset since 1948, when President Harry S Truman barnstormed across the country by train, breaking all railroad speed regulations, making six or seven stops per day, and ensuring his victory over New York Governor Thomas E. Dewey. The physical energy that Trump expended going down the stretch was indeed Herculean. There is no question that his final push into Wisconsin, Michigan, and returning to western Pennsylvania, was an act of pure will that, while Clinton was already celebrating, propelled him to victory.

The 2016 election was the first in which the mainstream media lost its monopoly over political media coverage in the United States. The increasingly vigorous alternative media, whose reporting standards are superior to the networks and the cable news behemoths, is where more and more voters are getting their information.

Trump’s skillful courting of the conservative media, like The Daily Caller, Breitbart News, WND.com, and InfoWars, made Trump the first presidential candidate to reach these disaffected and highly motivated Americans effectively. At the same time, Trump’s relentless attacks on the media as unfair and dishonest came right out of the Nixon playbook, where both Nixon and Trump exploited the resentment of the biased media, so hated by their supporters.

Trump’s willingness to challenge openly the media outlets that went after him kept them somewhat honest in their coverage of his campaign but the relentless cable news networks’ attacks on him were unlike anything I have seen in the nine presidential campaigns in which I worked. The media dropped all pretext of objectivity. Their motives and tactics were naked.

Most of this would largely backfire. American voters have finally become hip to the fact that the media and the political establishment work hand-in-glove to conceal many facts from the American people. The voters no longer believe the media.

Donald Trump is his own strategist, campaign manager, and tactician, and all credit for his incredible election belongs to him. I’m just glad to have been along for the ride. I wanted him to run for President since 1988 and had served as chairman of his Presidential Exploratory Committee in 2000, as well as serving as a consultant to his 2012 consideration of a candidacy.

I have worked for Trump with the Trump Organization, the Trump Shuttle, Trump Hotels & Casino Resorts, and several political explorations over a forty-year period. He is perhaps the greatest salesman in US history, with the spirit of a promoter and the infectious enthusiasm of an entrepreneur who likes making money and winning.

Trump waged the first modern all communication campaign, eschewing polling, expensive television advertising, sophisticated analytics, and all of the traditional tools of a modern presidential campaign.

At the same time, Trump’s campaign was centered around a set piece rally, just as Richard Nixon’s campaign had been. That Trump ran as the candidate of the Silent Majority, appealing to forgotten Americans, running as the law and order candidate and in the end, the peace candidate, was not accidental. Trump’s campaign was much like Nixon’s. He understood that politics is about big issues, concepts, and themes, and that the voters didn’t really care about wonkish detail. If they had, then Newt Gingrich would have been president.

Although there are similarities between Ronald Reagan’s victory in 1980 and Trump’s ascendancy to the presidency, Trump’s election is less an ideological victory and more a manifestation of a genuine desire for a more competent government. Like Nixon, Trump is more pragmatic, interested in what will work, as opposed to what is philosophically pure. He’s tired of seeing America lose. He is exactly the cheerleader the country needs.

Like Truman’s whistle-stop events, Trump rallies became the focal point of his entire campaign, amplified by the cable news networks that carried his rally speeches around the clock. He drew enormous crowds and voters found him funny and genuine. All the while, his trusted press aide Hope Hicks was booking as many one-on-one interviews into his schedule as humanly possible. There was literally a time when you could not turn on the television without seeing and hearing Donald Trump. The cable networks of course did it for the ratings. The fact that Trump was unrehearsed, un-coached, and unhandled, meant that voters found him refreshing and authentic.

I met Donald Trump through Roy Cohn, the legendary mob and celebrity lawyer, who was an attorney and advisor to the young real estate mogul.

In 1979, I signed on to run Ronald Reagan’s campaign for president in New York, among other northeastern states. I was given a card-file that supposedly held Governor and Mrs. Reagan’s friends in New York who might be solicited for help. Among them was a card for Roy M. Cohn, Esq. with the law firm of Saxe, Bacon and Bolan. I called Cohn’s office to make an appointment.

When I arrived at Cohn’s brownstone law firm on the Upper East Side, I cooled my heels for about an hour in the waiting area. Finally, I was told to go to a second floor dining room where Mr. Cohn would meet me. He was wearing a silk dressing gown. His heavy-lidded eyes were bloodshot, most likely from a late night of revelry. Seated with Cohn was his client, a heavy-set gentleman who had been meeting with Cohn.

Meet Tony Salerno, said Roy.

I was face-to-face with Fat Tony Salerno, at that time the boss of the Genovese crime family. In October 1986, Fortune magazine would call the seventy-five-year-old Salerno America’s top gangster in power, wealth, and influence.

It’s true that as a New York developer, Donald Trump bought concrete from a mob-connected company controlled by Salerno. On the other hand, the State of New York, the City of New York, and most major developers bought their concrete there as well, the reason being their excellent union relationships. The company had a virtual monopoly on concrete, with the state and federal government among their biggest customers. The company was properly licensed to do business in New York State.

After Salerno left, we got down to brass tacks and I pitched Cohn on helping Governor Reagan in New York State. Roy was nominally a Democrat, the son of a legendary Tammany judge, and a quiet power in the New York Democratic Party.

He was so feared because of his viciousness in the courtroom, that most plaintiffs settled immediately when they learned that Cohn was opposing counsel. Trump used this power with Roy as his attorney.

So how can I help you, kid? This Jimmy Carter is a disaster. I told Stanley Friedman and Meade Esposito that the peanut farmer was no damn good, Cohn exclaimed. Ronnie and Nancy are friends from the 1950’s when I was working for Joe McCarthy, the poor dumb drunk son-of-a-bitch. Ronnie stood up to the Commies in Hollywood and was a personal favorite of J. Edgar Hoover.

I told Cohn I needed to start a finance committee, locate and rent a headquarters, have phones installed, and launch a legal petition-gathering effort to put Reagan delegates’ names on the New York Republican primary ballot.

Cohn stared out a picture window, then suddenly said, What you need is Donald Trump. Do you know Donald Trump? I told the beady-eyed lawyer I only knew Trump from the tabloids. Cohn said he would set up a meeting immediately but Donald was very busy and could only give me a limited amount of time.

Roy also told me that I had to go to Queens to meet with Donald’s father, Fred Trump. Fred is a personal friend of Barry Goldwater and has been generous to conservative and Republican candidates and causes. I guarantee you he likes Reagan, said the twice-indicted attorney.

Following Cohn’s advice, I went to see Donald Trump.

At the appointed hour, Norma Foederer, Trump’s longtime gatekeeper and assistant, ushered me into Trump’s office. It’s a pleasure to meet you, Mr. Trump, I said. Please call me Donald, the mogul said with a smile.

Trump was interested in politics just as he was interested in sports. He was savvy in the use of legal political money and employed a platoon of lobbyists over the years. He had a low regard for Carter and, as he put it, this George Bush is a dud.

Ya see, Reagan’s got the look, he said. Some guys have the look. Sinatra. JFK. And your man, Reagan. People are hungry for a strong leader, as Carter looks vacillating and weak. Trump asked quite a few questions about polling and agreed to join the Reagan finance committee, raising $100,000, split between himself and his father.

Once The Donald was on board, I heard from him constantly. He wanted the latest polling and wanted to see poll results between Reagan and Carter in some western and southern states. Trump helped facilitate our rental of a once grand, but now shabby mansion, on 52nd Street, next to the 21 Club.

The old brownstone had been magnificent in its day, but at some point in the 1970s, it was divided up into office space and ultimately fell into disrepair. It had a nasty green carpet and the cheapest possible cubicle dividers. It had the advantage of many smaller rooms for offices as well as a cavernous conference room where volunteers could stuff envelopes or make phone calls to prospective Republican primary voters. A day did not go by without a rat running across my desk. At the same time, the location couldn’t be beat.

The 21 Club was Roy Cohn’s clubhouse, as well as a favorite of Donald Trump’s. One day, vaudeville comedian George Jessel dropped by after lunch at the 21 Club. A New York Times photographer captured the moment of me and the over-the-hill comic with a beaming George L. Clark, New York State party chairman, and a Reagan supporter since Reagan’s challenge to sitting President Gerald Ford in 1976.

Trump was repeatedly implored by state Republican leaders to run for governor or mayor. In 2006, for example, the New York State Senate Republican’s wily leader Joe Bruno convinced the New York State Independence Party, which controlled a valuable ballot position, to announce that they would cross-endorse Donald Trump for Governor if he would seek the Republican nomination. It was a hot story for twenty-four hours, until The Donald threw cold water on it. I always thought he should have let it run a while, said Bruno, but now I understand the job was too small for him … His timing of running [for president] in 2016 allowed him to take unique advantage of a perfect storm when it comes to voter disenchantment and the widespread belief that the system is rigged against the little guy. Sure, he’s sometimes crude but his voters love it. It’s like sticking your thumb in the eye of the establishment who have run the country into the ground, said the ex-prizefighter.

Donald has a wicked sense of humor and is enormously fun to hang out with. He has always had an exceptional eye for female beauty. He has the same eye for architecture, preferring towering buildings with clean lines, lots of brass, and always large signage. His construction standards are above and beyond industry norms and he has always enjoyed a good relationship with organized labor, which is particularly important in Democrat-dominated New York City.

Notwithstanding the glitter and gold of his buildings, there really is nothing fancy or pretentious about Donald Trump. He likes meatloaf, cheeseburgers, and diet coke. He thrives on a steady diet of cable news.

While the rest of the country may have been fooled by his genius, I, in fact, knew that he had quietly trademarked the phrase Make America Great Again with the US Patent and Trademark Office only days after Romney’s defeat. He told me on New Year’s Day 2013 that he was running for president in 2016. When I pointed out that some in the media would be skeptical that he would actually run based on his previous flirtations with public office, he replied, That will disappear when I announce. And so it did.

President Donald J. Trump. I like the sound of it, but then I’ve liked the idea since 1987. I can’t take credit for the idea of Donald Trump running for president because the first known progenitor of the idea was himself a former president. It was Richard M. Nixon who first noticed the potential for a presidential bid by Donald Trump.

I had grown close to the former president after I was assigned the job of briefing him weekly on the status of Governor Ronald Reagan’s campaign against Jimmy Carter.

Nixon met Trump in George Steinbrenner’s box in Yankee Stadium and was immediately impressed. Your man’s got it, Nixon said to me in our regularly scheduled Saturday morning phone call in which the former President satisfied his voracious appetite for political gossip and intelligence.

Nixon would famously write to Trump claiming that Mrs. Nixon had seen Donald on the Phil Donahue Show and thought if he ever ran for office he would win. This is typical of Nixon’s circumlocution. In this case he attributes his own thoughts to Mrs. Nixon.

I did not see the program, but Mrs. Nixon told me that you were great, Nixon wrote Trump (underlining the word great in his own hand). As you can imagine, she is an expert on politics and she predicts whenever you decide to run for office you will be a winner!

Trump was intrigued by Nixon’s understanding of the use of power. Nixon’s pragmatism also appealed to the New York developer. At Nixon’s request, I extended an invitation to Donald and his wife Ivana for a weekend in Houston. Joining this cozy foursome was former Texas Governor John Connally, who had been gravely wounded during the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.

Connally had actually screwed Nixon in Texas in 1968, appearing at a last-minute Dallas rally for Hubert Humphrey, reneging on a secret agreement to deliver the Texas bourbon Democrats to Nixon. Nevertheless, Nixon was always impressed with Connally’s swagger and certitude and he was also a prized ally for Nixon because of Connally’s historic association with John Kennedy. In 1972, Connally made good on his earlier promise to help Nixon, heading a group called Democrats for Nixon before formally switching to the Republican Party and serving as Nixon’s Treasury Secretary. It was Connally who sold Nixon on wage and price controls, perhaps one of the greatest blunders of Nixon’s presidency.

Nixon was in rare form. He and Trump spoke privately for hours, with the New York real estate mogul peppering the former president with questions. For both Trump and Nixon this was an important and pivotal moment. Nixon came out of his self-imposed exile and Trump absorbed as much as he could from the former president, who was downright impressed by the Manhattan businessman. As the weekend’s activities wound down, both Trump and Nixon had to return home, and that’s when Donald invited Nixon back to New York on his private 727 jetliner.

Had he lived to see the 2016 presidential race, Nixon would surely have savored the fearlessness and ferocity with which Trump routinely lambasted the mainstream media. If there is a single figure in American political history who has had to endure a news media as hostile and antagonistic as Richard Nixon did, that figure is without doubt Donald J. Trump.

In 1989, I was working for Donald Trump as a lobbyist in Washington handling currency transaction rules that his casinos were subject to. I believed I had worked out regulatory language acceptable to the regulators, subject to Donald’s approval. I called Donald at his office asking if I could jump what was then the Eastern shuttle from DC to New York and meet him at noon in his Manhattan office.

Donald told me he couldn’t meet because he was leaving for Atlantic City with a group of his executives by helicopter. I convinced him to wait for me, sending the executives on ahead and having the chopper return to pick up Trump and bring him to Atlantic City later.

Shortly after I was ushered into Donald’s office, his ashen-faced assistant Norma Foederer told Donald that New Jersey State Police Superintendent Clint Pagano was on the phone. Trump put him on the speaker. I’m sorry to say that the helicopter your company chartered crashed in the pinelands and everyone aboard was killed. Are you certain? Trump asked. One hundred percent, said the veteran cop.

The women at the Trump Organization were openly weeping with Trump losing Steve Hyde and Mark Etess, his two top gaming executives. Hyde was a Mormon with twelve children and a pleasure to work with when I represented the casino company on a few issues.

Donald had Norma place calls to the widows. He spoke to each of them and, in some cases, Trump’s call about their husband’s death was their first news of the cataclysmic event. While Trump may have booked other appointments after mine, I know that his life was spared to save our Republic and restore our economic vitality.

This was the point at which I realized that Trump had been put on Earth for this larger purpose. This was the point that I realized he would be President.

Trump’s First Run for the White House, 1999–2000

If I couldn’t win, if I felt I couldn’t win, I wouldn’t run. I absolutely would not run. I’m not looking to get more votes than any other independent candidate in history, I’d want to win.

Donald Trump, on Larry King Live, October 9, 1999¹

It was mid-September 1999 and the two of us just sat in his office on the twenty-sixth floor at Trump Tower on Fifth Avenue in New York City, in uncomfortable silence. It seemed to go on forever. But I knew as well as anybody, Trump never stayed quiet for too long.

Those rare silent moments are usually broken by a major pronouncement. I sat there and waited as he pored over the morning newspapers.

As he continued to read, Trump flashed that now famous frown and shook his head in disgust. I’m pretty sure it’s going to be Bush and Gore, he said breaking the eerie stillness of the room. They are both absolutely terrible—just terrible. What’s going on in this country?

It wasn’t the first time he had asked me that question. And I knew it wasn’t going to be the last.

He looked me squarely in the eyes and, with a hint of a smile, said: Roger, I want to take the next step. I want to see if Donald Trump can win the White House. Is this country ready for President Trump? The one thing I do know is that I’m better than any of those assholes who are running.

It was a decision I had been urging him to make for months—to set up an exploratory committee to test the waters. In fact, we had already put together a book, The America We Deserve,² which outlined his domestic and international policies.

It was due out January 1, 2000 from St. Martin’s Press, in anticipation of a possible Trump bid for the White House.

The book was produced to sustain interest should he become a candidate and to let people know where he stood on the issues. It presented a much more moderate view of Trump than the one most people have today.

And there was good reason for this: In 1999, Trump was hoping to attract support from people in the Reform Party, which was basically made up of moderates—compared to 2016, when he was trying to win support from Republicans who are generally conservatives.

Of course his stand on certain issues changed. In politics, you play to your audience—plain and simple! Trump knows this better than anyone.

Looking back, one particular comment in the book stands out today: I believe non-politicians represent the wave of the future, he wrote.

It’s astonishing now, in retrospect. It was like Trump was forecasting 2016.

Although we talked about the White House over and over again, that day in his office was the first time he had actually given me the nod to get things rolling.

The Reform Party

Trump’s fellow-billionaire Ross Perot had been working hard for weeks in an attempt to persuade Trump to run as a Reform Party candidate for president who could offer a viable alternative to the two candidates. The enormously successful Texas businessman had run for the White House in 1992 as an independent and pulled in nearly 19 percent of the popular vote against President George H. W. Bush and his Democratic challenger Bill Clinton.

Perot went on to create the Reform Party three years later and became its presidential nominee for the 1996 election. Running against Clinton and Bob Dole, Perot still managed to pull in 8.4 percent of the popular vote.

Although Perot’s vote totals had fallen in four years, the 1996 results were still dramatic for a third-party presidential candidate. Despite being mocked at times by the mainstream media for his political naïveté, Perot had managed to tap into a developing undercurrent of political distrust and disgust of career politicians by voters.

Joining Perot in encouraging Trump to enter the race was Jesse Ventura, the one-time professional wrestler who once was known as Jesse The Body Ventura. Running as a Reform Party candidate, Ventura stunned America when he was elected governor of Minnesota in 1998.

Of course, if you ask me, Jesse would have won in Minnesota, even without his Reform Party affiliation. He could have run as a candidate for the Communist Party and still captured the governor’s seat.

Every wrestling fan—and there were tons of them—loved Jesse. He is smart. He is engaging. He is a beloved celebrity. He is outspoken. And the man on the street identifies with him.

The same can be said about Donald Trump, whom I believed could personally build on that formula in 2016 and ride it right into the White House.

But for now, Trump was carefully learning from Perot and Ventura. At times, Trump would jokingly refer to them as the nutty billionaire and the wrestler. But the fact is that he took their advice seriously and particularly admired both men. But more importantly, Trump was quick to recognize the two had discovered an electorate discontent in Middle America that was just beginning to rear its head.

Strangely enough, bolstering Trump’s confidence was a poll conducted by the National Enquirer in 1999, interviewing one hundred Amer-icans—a small sample, about one-tenth the sample size of a standard national poll—but the respondents were reportedly clamoring for Trump to get into the race.

New York Times reporter Adam Nagourney was with Mr. Trump and me on the twenty-sixth floor of the Trump Tower office when Trump was looking over the National Enquirer poll.

"‘Those are the real people,’ Mr. Trump declared of the Enquirer readers, earnestly laying his hands across his desk, Nagourney report-ed. Roger Stone, his paid consultant, who was sitting across the desk, offering Mr. Trump the occasional pointer during the forty-five-minute interview, added, ‘That is the Trump constituency.’"³

And I meant it. But the truth of the matter is I never seriously believed he had a shot at becoming President in 2000. The time really wasn’t right for him yet.

People were just becoming disenchanted with Washington politicians. They still had a long way to go before outsider Donald Trump could come to the rescue. There was still an economic collapse ahead, terrorism on 9/11, and mounting immigration problems—all ingredients for Trump’s triumph in 2016.

But for now it was full-speed ahead. Despite Perot’s strong showing in the previous two presidential elections, I had serious reservations about whether Trump could win the White House as the presidential nominee of the Reform Party. Clearly, the Reform Party did not have the organization the Democrats or the Republicans had.

But the truth is we had nothing to lose by first seeing how voters would react to this billionaire real estate magnate from New York City.

An Exploratory Committee

At Trump’s suggestion, I set up the exploratory committee and put myself in charge. Maybe in some small way he could have an impact on the election, while he looked toward the future. As I said, Trump had absolutely nothing to lose by forming the exploratory committee.

And let’s not forget—we’re talking Donald Trump, who likes publicity, likes adulation, likes making waves, but also had some things he really wanted to say to the American public.

There was also a windfall available. Because of Perot’s showing four years earlier, the Reform Party’s presidential candidate was entitled to nearly $13 million in federal matching funds. If Trump ran and captured the nomination, he could at least start off using OPM (Other People’s Money).

But as you would expect, money has never been an issue for Trump.

My first goal was to attract maximum publicity when Trump announced the formation of an exploratory committee to decide whether to enter the race for the Reform Party’s nomination. It was an easy goal, since publicity is never too difficult when you’re talking about Donald Trump. It’s a given that Donald Trump attracts publicity.

We decided to have him announce the formation of his exploratory committee on CNN’S Larry King Live on October 8, 1999. Larry’s show was hot back then and we believed it was the perfect forum for his announcement.⁴ Before he went on, we brainstormed what Trump should say to Larry. I was concerned the committee announcement might not be strong enough to get him maximum exposure the following day in newspapers and on television. After all, there had been constant speculation about it for weeks.

I looked at him with a big grin and said: "If Larry asks you who you would select as a running mate, just say ‘Oprah.’ Everybody loves Oprah! The press will eat this up. It’s a win, whenever you throw out her name.

Just prior to the Larry King appearance, I called a CNN connection I had known for years. If you want a big story out of Trump’s appearance on King, have Larry ask him who he would pick as a running mate if he runs for president, I said. And I promised the producer, with a wink, Trump’s answer will absolutely shock everyone. Despite the producer’s promise to pass along the info to Larry King, we had no way of knowing for sure whether Larry would take the bait and actually ask Trump the question.

Larry agreed to tape the interview with Trump during the day and air it later that night on his show. Trump had badly wanted to attend a dinner with Jesse Ventura that evening and schmooze with some of the Reform Party people.

Early in the interview, Trump dropped Bombshell Number One: So I am going to form a presidential exploratory committee, I might as well announce that on your show, everyone else does, but I’ll be forming that and effective, I believe, tomorrow, Trump told the crusty interviewer. And we’ll see. I mean, we’re going to take a very good, strong look at it.

And just minutes later, Larry went for it and asked him if he had a vice presidential candidate in mind. Trump hesitated briefly as if to ponder his answer and then stunned everyone including King—and no doubt Oprah herself. Oprah. I love Oprah, Trump said. Oprah would always be my first choice. She’s a terrific woman. She is somebody that is very special. If she’d do it, she’d be fantastic. I mean, she’s popular, she’s brilliant, she’s a wonderful woman. The following day the newspapers and TV news were filled with talk of Trump and Oprah.

The press ate it up and so did we!

As a result of his comments on King’s show, we were flooded with media requests for interviews. And Trump was well prepared. Over and over again, he stressed how seriously he was looking into running.

Unless I thought I could win the whole thing, I would have no interest, he told one newspaper.

And Trump, through his upcoming book and interviews, was very clear on where he stood on the issues.

Abortion? Trump was very pro-choice. I hate the concept of abortion, he said. I hate it. I hate everything it stands for … but I just believe in choice. It was a far cry from his pro-life stand in 2016.

Guns? In his book, he wrote that he generally opposed gun control. However, he supported a ban on assault weapons and a longer-waiting period to buy firearms. Again, a more moderate Trump than the one we see today.

Health care? Trump called himself very liberal on the issue and stressed he was a believer in universal health care.

But he was also ahead of his time in warning against terrorism, saying: It’s time to get down to the hard business of preparing for what I believe is the real possibility that somewhere, sometime, a weapon of mass destruction will be carried into a major American city and detonated.

Taking on Buchanan

We hit the ground running, but there was one person who stood in Trump’s way of getting the Reform Party’s nomination—my old colleague from the Nixon White House, Pat Buchanan, who badly wanted to be the next president. Buchanan worked for Nixon as an advisor and speechwriter. Brilliantly talented, Buchanan was the genius who came up with the phrase Nixon made famous, appealing as he did in 1968 to the Silent Majority. He was shrewd. He was smart. But he could also be thin-skinned at times. Pat Buchanan was the perfect foil for Trump.

As brilliant as Buchanan is, he is prone to saying some pretty wild things that come back to bite him. It might be that sometimes Buchanan is just too honest. In his 1999 book, A Republic, Not an Empire,⁵ he wrote that Hitler was no threat to the United States in 1938, at the start of World War II in Europe. Even if that was true, the concept did not play to an American public that saw Hitler as the monster he truly was.

I was the one who noted it to Trump. You just don’t get many opportunities like this in politics. And when you do, you have to hit hard—VERY HARD. It was an unfortunate thing for Buchanan to say, but we were going to remind the world every chance we could that Buchanan said it. Trump couldn’t wait to nail him on it. He was like an animal going after raw meat. Trump fired one shot after another—and never stopped.

On September 26, 1999, in a television appearance on CNN’s Late Edition, Buchanan tried to explain that his book was not written to be sympathetic to Adolf Hitler during World War II. We had every right, and we were more than right … just and moral to smash (Germany and Japan), Buchanan insisted. It was a noble cause. There’s nothing in that book that says otherwise.⁶

I typed up a statement from Trump and faxed it to the show, challenging Buchanan’s statements and quoting Trump as saying: Pat Buchanan’s stated view that we should not have stopped Adolf Hitler is repugnant. I think it is essential that someone challenge these extreme and outrageous views by Pat Buchanan. [He] denigrates the memory of those Americans who gave their lives in the Second World War in the effort to stop Hitler.

In my haste to get Trump’s statement out, I misspelled Hitler’s first name—something the New York Daily News took us to task for. But in the end, I didn’t care. We were already successfully painting Buchanan as a Hitler sympathizer.

I later told Trump that no one has ever lost an election by kissing babies, smiling, and attacking Adolf Hitler. At my urging, Trump continued to take advantage of every opportunity to remind people about Buchanan’s words on the Führer. On October 25, 1999, Trump gained widespread publicity when he changed his party registration from Republican to the New York Independence Party—making him eligible for the Reform Party’s nomination. And he escalated his attacks on Buchanan.

Denouncing Patrick J. Buchanan as a ‘Hitler lover,’ Donald J. Trump announced today he was resigning his Republican registration in advance of a possible challenge to Mr. Buchanan in his expected quest for the Reform Party Presidential nomination, Francis X. Clines wrote as his lead paragraph in the New York Times article published on October 25, 1999.⁷

‘It’s a very great possibility that I will run,’ said Mr. Trump, the real estate and casino millionaire.

And about Buchanan, Trump said: Look, he’s a Hitler lover. I guess he’s an anti-Semite. He doesn’t like the blacks. He doesn’t like the gays. It’s just incredible that anybody could embrace this guy.

He also had this to say about Republicans: I really believe the Republicans are just too crazy right now.

It couldn’t have worked out any better. With the New York Times articles appearing on the eve of a speech in which Buchanan was expected to jump the GOP ship to become a Reform Party candidate, Trump was able to attack Buchanan, change party affiliation, and throw out a giant tease he was likely to run—all at the same time.

Now the next thing we had to do was get the Trump message out all over the country. We carefully plotted out trips for Trump. Our mission was to get maximum exposure and be able to begin to connect with average Americans in the heartland as well as on the coasts. But there was still one big announcement to make to lay the groundwork for a national tour. In an effort to cement his relationship with the working class and make his billionaire status more acceptable to voters, Trump unveiled a tax on the rich in early November. This would be a one-time net worth tax on the wealthiest Americans: individuals and trusts worth $10 million or more. A 14.25 percent levy on such a high net worth would have raised $5.7 trillion and wiped out the national debt. It also would have saved the government $200 billion a year in interest payments, allowing for a middle class tax cut.

It was unbelievable how much publicity Trump attracted by attacking Hitler (through his attacks on Buchanan) and by saying we should tax the rich. Like the timing of his changed party affiliation, it just could not get any better.

Hitting the Campaign Trail

Now it was time to hit the road.

The first trip was down to south Florida in mid-November. The Sun-Sentinel in Fort Lauderdale headlined its story on his appearance this way: Trump: I’ve got what it takes to be President.⁸

Never shy, Trump boasted his qualifications for the White House.

When you look at the other candidates, did they make a billion dollars in a short period of time? I don’t think so, Trump said. I’ve done things that people said couldn’t be done.

And the newspaper noted: Trump’s visit to Miami marks the beginning of a ninety-day drive to win over ‘the people,’ aided by a bevy of public relations firms—and his new campaign adviser Roger Stone, mastermind of presidential campaigns for Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan.

Once again, the game plan for Trump was simple: play to your audience. And he did just that.

The Sentinel reported:

After standing for the pre-revolutionary Cuban national anthem, and calling Fidel Castro a killer during his speech, Trump was regaled with cheers of Viva Donald Trump! Viva! by about 40 veterans of the [Bay of Pigs] invasion.

The cheers continued after nightfall, when about 400 Cuban-Americans turned out to hear Trump speak at the Radisson Crown Plaza in western Miami, organized by the Cuban-American National Foundation.

If I could meet Castro right now, I would have two words for him: Adios, amigo, Trump told the crowd. We must not reward Fidel Castro with trade, hard currency or respect. He’s a murderer, he’s a tyrant, he’s a bad guy.

As far as Cuban Americans are concerned—Fidel Castro was their Hitler. And Trump knew this and capitalized on it.

During his two-day visit to Miami, he met with Cuban-American leaders; attended a Reform Party rally; was the guest at a reunion of veterans of the Bay of Pigs invasion; and met with members of Brothers to the Rescue, a Cuban exile group that drops anti-Castro leaflets over the island nation.

Trump succeeded in doing exactly what he set out to do. He got a great reception and he garnered great publicity.

Then it was on to Los Angeles for two Reform Party events, a visit to a Holocaust memorial, a speech to 17,000 people at a motivational conference, and an appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno.

But he hit his first bump in the road during an appearance at a meeting with leaders of the California Reform Party.

Trump was here to present himself as a triumphant developer, a new book author, and the potential next leader of the free world, Adam Nagourney noted for the New York Times in an article published on December 10, 1999. It was a cantankerous meeting with leaders of the California Reform Party, whose support Mr. Trump would presumably like should he run for president. For many, the most memorable moment came when someone asked if Mr. Trump supported the Reform Party platform.⁹

Well. Nobody knows what the Reform Party platform is, Trump loudly responded.

A man offered Trump a copy of the platform as boos rang out from the crowd.

The fact is that no one really cares about a party platform except those people who write it. Unfortunately, those were the exact people Trump was addressing. Also, the Reform Party platform was more important than usual because the platform planks in this case defined how and why the Reform Party in 1999 was different from the GOP, the party from which most Reform Party members had come (including Donald Trump).

For the New York Times, this encounter raised the fundamental question about Trump’s two-day exploratory trip to the West Coast. Is he serious? Nagourney asked in the article, wondering if Trump really was a presidential candidate. As Mr. Trump’s performance with the Reform Party leaders here suggested, the developer’s command and interest in the details of running for president sometimes seemed tenuous.

Yes, it was a misstep, but not a big one. I swore I’d never let him make that kind of mistake again.

But there were lighter moments during that trip. Speaking at a meeting of the Reform Party, he went out of his way to note the television cameras taping him.

"By the way, that camera is 60 Minutes, he said pointing one out. Don’t worry about them. It’s just a small program on television."

Never forget: Trump loves the attention.

When he appeared on The Tonight Show, Leno asked how things were going. Trump shot back: Oh, so much press. So much press out there. And he wasn’t lying. I did everything I could to make sure that for the few days we were in Los Angeles, Donald Trump was the biggest celebrity there.

Like every other celebrity hungry for press in Hollywood, we made certain Trump paid the requisite visit to The Ivy restaurant. For those of you who don’t know about The Ivy, it is the place where stars gather in Tinseltown. It’s a nondescript brick building on Robertson Boulevard, surrounded by its trademark white picket fence. The inside looks as if it could have been furnished by your grandmother—fluffy seat cushions, fluffy pillows, and patterned draperies. The paparazzi sit outside waiting to see exactly who shows up. The prices are high and the food is good. But no one goes there for the food. You go to be seen, or you go to watch. And it is not the usual haunt for your typical political candidate. But then again, Donald Trump has never been your TYPICAL political candidate. Even before The Apprentice, Trump projected celebrity.

And, believe me, all eyes were on him as he walked into the restaurant. Everybody stopped to watch him. Few celebrities could bring The Ivy to a halt, but Trump did. He stopped by Rod Stewart’s table to say hello and then made his way over to Michael Bolton to wish him well.

He blew them all away.

But we caught some heat over his appearance at a Tony Robbins motivational event.

Trump had a deal with Robbins where he would give ten speeches and Robbins would pay him $100,000 a speech. So, of course, we scheduled his exploratory campaigning to coincide with the time he was scheduled to be in California for the Robbins event. It just made sense.

Trump visited the Holocaust Museum in Los Angeles. He did a very highly publicized event on the rooftop of his hotel for Reform Party officials, and then he went out to Anaheim to do his speech for Robbins. Some people got ticked off that he was mixing politics and business. But Trump didn’t care. He later told me: I’m the only guy who explored running for president and made money on it. Keep in mind, he was only exploring a run for president. He wasn’t yet a candidate.

A Learning Experience

Trump was beginning to get concerned about troubling signs coming from factions inside the Reform Party. Infighting, different political philosophies, and general personality conflicts—common problems in politics but especially difficult in relatively small US third parties trying to make their mark—were starting to take its toll on the reformers.

It’s something both Trump and I had feared from the beginning. He believed that if he ran and the Reform Party collapsed, fingers would wrongfully be pointed at him. We started to become convinced the party was going to implode even if Trump never became a candidate.

Trump traveled to Minnesota to brainstorm with Jesse Ventura in early January 2000. Ventura was becoming disgusted with the Reform Party. He confided to us that he was thinking of pulling out completely. But for now, he was staying and trying to make the best out of it. Even though we were growing more and more certain the time wasn’t right for him to run, Trump still kept stirring the pot and acting like a candidate-to-be. In Minnesota, he knocked George W. Bush and Vice President Al Gore, whom he noted were both born into well-heeled families.

There’s a big difference between creating a lot of wealth and being a member of the lucky sperm club, which a number of different people that are running right now are, Trump said in a joint appearance with Ventura.

As if rehearsed, Ventura quickly added: I’m not a member of that club either.

And Trump did his utmost to differentiate himself from the mainstream candidates.

He called the field of GOP candidates a bunch of stiffs and attacked front-runner Bush, saying he’s no Einstein. If people think he’s dumb, he’ll have a hard time winning the election. And he once again went after Buchanan calling him a loser.

Despite his mounting doubts about joining the race, he continued to insist he was seriously considering entering.

I am looking very, very seriously as to whether or not it can be won, he said of the presidential race. If I can win, I think I can do a very good job.

But in his