Transcripts For CSPAN2 Art Of The Deal Roundtable 20161112

President s to work with and for . On, i didnt have a favorite president. Ou they were all so dempt in some ways. The only thing they really had is similar was a large ego. Some larger than others. Jerry ford didnt but enough of an ego to cause him to run for the house of representatives ino state of michigan and he he wand to be speaker of the house but they have so many things that were different that i couldnt have picked a favorite. A favorite first lady . Theyre all favorites. [applause] hell never say it, but we know. [laughter] thank you all for being here today, and please come and peck up the book five president s will be signing it in the tent in just a little while we appreciate your time and your attention. We [applause] and starting now on booktv, a block of programs about president elect, donald trump. Transition of president ial power, and president ial history. First up, a rounds table discussion of Donald Trumps book, the art of the deal. This was taped prior to the election. Our country needs a truly great leader. And we need a truly great leader now. We need a leader that wrote the art of the deal. We need a leader that can bring become our jobs, can bring become our manufacturing, can bring back our military. Can take care of our vets. Our vets have been abandoned. And we also need a cheerleader. Michael cruz what can we learn about donald trump about reading about the art of the deal . A lot and we should when with youre studying donald trump and i think ever been at this point in this country shob studying donald trump. Art of the deal is was foundational document and at this points it reads sort of in retrospect leak a campaign playbook. First and foremost what we can learn from the art of the deal is that he is selling fantasy and hes doing that in hyperbole those are his words. So, in fact, his words from the art of the deal are a plate of peoples fantasy, and people not always think big themselves but they can get excited by those who do. Thats why a little high perp lee never because something is biggest and greatest and most spectacular, i call it truthful hyperbole. Monica langley. Thats exactly what hes doing, and hes if not ashamed to say thats what he does. You know what i mean . Work for him and the life. I did write an article for the wall street journal, and asked him if this was his play book hiding in plain sight and he first was a little taken aback and then he said you know it is automatic and it comes naturally to me. So i guess youre right. And then he said running for Office Running for president the first office hes ever sought is like the biggest deal in my life. And so if i called this the campaign by negotiation and you ever seen that all the way through, and right now as hes trying to get the gop elite and the gop donors to come to his side its just a series of more negotiations. So he does a little bullying, he does a little cozy up and sweet talking. All of the things that are elements of the deal in this book. So, i mean, this comes naturally to him. It worked to get him to this point. To be the gop nominee. We will see if it works against Hillary Clinton and general election. Carlos when you read the art of the deal, last summer what was your reaction . My reaction was that hes the deal, right its not his buildings or tv shows. Hes the pitch. Its all about the or what he presents dealing with politicians, construction crew. Hes his own deal. Its its really and this book, this book as michael said is sort of foundational document if it were were books of the bible this is genesis, the beginning of trump, and it was first tile i had read it and i read it because of that clip because he said we need a leader who can write the art of the deal so we have to sold me on that. Has he been king consistent e he wrote that . Consistent in his books . In his behavior, with in his ideas. I think theres a lot of him that we can see in this book. He says for instance sometimes you have to denigrate your opponents to succeed to win, to get ahead had and weve seen that in the campaign whether its the other republicans running into a primary and member of the press. And so i think, i think he has been far more consistent than inconsistent in terms of leving up to what he says in the book. 41 when it came out. I think of who you are at that age and i think thats who he was. Michael cruz also has a face to be a little wild so there are lines in this book now watching the last year of this campaign that just jump out at you. Youre watching him be what had he said he was in book. The context when this book comes out is pretty besting this isnt just a hand book, a way to understand him or try to understand him but set in a very particular point in the broader scope of his life. Trump tower openedded in 1983 it was his both sort of his opening salvo and crowning achievement. It made him a big deal in new york city and you can talk to this morn i can probably. In the big deal in new york city this made him a big deal beyond new york city and such a big deal that the following year he started making a series of deals that sort of put him in a tight spot. And hugely overleveraged he bought Eastern Airline schultz renailed it trump shuttle. Plaza hotel. He bought a third casino in Atlantic City. So much confidence coming out of the art of the deal in this success of the art of the deal how much it sold that i think we can learn as much from the deal as we can learn a lot from the deal we can also learn a lot from what happened in the year following the art of the deal what he did with that confidence and some would say overconfidence. Not to get away from art of the deal, but his second book is called surviving at the top that covers that more thoroughly in all of his books only one that sort of vaguely introspective that he is admitting to things that arent so easy in his business viewings and his personal life. You know he had he and ivana had separated. And then, of course, so it was to me that was interesting of the books and then the thished one art of the comeback he says dont pay anxious to surviving at the top my heart wasnt in that book and he wants you to forget that he ever wrote that. You know art of the dole and this third one what you need to know. Those three books taken together are surprisingly revealing it in large part because of surviving at the top comes out at 1990 it is called surviving at the top. The man who wrote survive at the tom when he was neither at the top or surviving barely surviving. But whats in there whats in surviving at the top is some of the most introspective stuff hes said or written. Hes sort of vulnerable which is not something he likes to be. And not not something he show is hardly at all. But art of the deal is sort of the beginning of that of the trilogy the trump trilogy initial trump trilogy. When hes out at rallies and ive got to many and been at his plane and office in trump tower, and the person hes at the rally is very bombastic all of the everybody sees daytoday. When hes in office or been in his penthouse melania, that kind of thing or on the plane hes more thoughtful, and hes more composed and what hes talking to other people and when ive spoken with him, and when you see video, i mean, he answers like a normal human being which a lot of people think he just cant be that. Hes not that person. But he can be that person. However, to get him to be introspective you say i did not read the second book to get him to the introspective is a little more difficult. And i have tried, you know, to do that. And i hes just kind of beyond that. He doesnt look back. Hes always looking forward. You know, where am i going to go and one of his statements in the art of the deal is, you know, i think big, and i push and i push and i push until i get there. And thats what hes doing right now. Well lets read that quote Monica Langley i like thinking big i always have to me it is simple if youre going to be thinking anyway you might as well think big. Most people think small because most people are afraid of success ace trade of making decisions afraid of winning and that gives people like me a great advantage. Uhhuh. And one of the first times that i met his daughter ivanka who is a star on the the campaign trail. Everyone thinks pretty much that his three Adult Children don junior, ivanka and eric, you know, are pretty good kids. You know, Adult Children and theyre running the Trump Organization in his place right now. And the first time that ivanka she said this quote to e me if youre before i had read the book she said, you know, my father never called that my father always taught me if youre going to be thinking anyway you might as well think big and i thought really thats what he told you as a little girl and then in his book and i talk to eric the other son he said yeah this is really how we grew up. And don junior said i would go up in the office this is what i heard. We with knew this book. Because he didnt take us out to play but took us in the office to play, and we had to listen to this day in and day out. And then the campaign staffon liz communication director read this three times his Campaign Manager before we went to his first meeting he read this book. So everybody is reading it. And then switch over to the campaign trail and you say people are are afraid of success even though hes so successful, i would go to a rally with him ride on the plane, get out of the plane they dubbed trump forest one because it is you know better than air force you know than obamas plane because it has 24 carat fixture, et cetera so lets get out and first people i would see been in line all day long with blue collar workers, and so i would go up to them and i said why are you so crazy about donald trump i just got off this gold plated leather seated plane . And they said he understands us. And fantasy hes going to make us better. He knows we need to be successful, and we have a chance with him. So hes playing into fantasy and think think im not a billion but make a hundred thousand this year. Somebody else who read the art of the deal was mark brunett who had done the survivor and then wanted to o put trump into a survivortype reality show, of course, turned into the apprentice which my opinion turned into this campaign. Without the apprentice he would not have been able to run nearly so successfully for president. Maybe you disagree. He became a household name. And everybody at the rallies almost without an exception had seen apprentice. Beyond a household name, he was on that show portrayed as what he wanted to be seen as which was the ultimate boss so you can trace back even the apprentice to the art of the deal if not for mark brunett having is read this book when he was down on his luck out in california trying to make it in tv. And then thinking about the art of the deal when hes trying to come up with his next survivor. Theres a theres a line between the art of the deal and apprentice in this campaign. In the book, though, you know you think youre going to pick this up and learn the great wisdom of the deal making. And you know, the gems theres apparently been out like you think big kind of thing. But every moment he almost contradicts himself and says you cant get too greedy home run every pitch you strike out a lot so seems that settles for triple, double, rare single. [laughter] and so he and in other after the trilogy of the memoirs, he read a lot of Business Advice books. And even in those its like you know pursue your dreams unless theyre never going to happen. Like that kind of that kind of advice for deal making. So its understandable. Its not always actionable. Carlos he writes in the art of the deal it irritates me that critics neither design nor built anything themselves are given to express their views in the pages of major publication whereas the target of criticism are almost never offered space. [inaudible] hes managed to carve out space to respond. In social media and in many different qais in the same way hes dismissive and focused on architecture critics he cultivates them. He is very cognizant of the power of the press. He was obsessed at the time of this bock, and you know, this campaign has seen a lot of tension between trump and the press. But this notion of you know him hating the press is to me is sort of overblown and kind of amiss. He is very smart about cultivating the press. And hes very clear about that in this book. He says look, you know, youd rather be wren about nicely but worst thing is to be ignored even bad stories are good for business. Do you both agree request that . So theres through line in this bock and throughout the literature over last three decades but in this book it pops up over and over again. He does not he has a belief that theres no such thing as bad publicity theres no thing such as bad press but rather get good over bad press but all attention is good attention. And to this point, an not just in this campaign, three year was his public life hes not been wrong really. 1990 in early 190, the business pages are reporting on his looming financial catastrophe. The tabloids are reporting on the breakup of his marriage and his infidelity, and it diminished him a little bit. But he emerged somehow stronger because of the attention his ability to leverage attention of any kind into an even larger public persona had so fast forward to the last year, all af these things that should have hilled him could have killed him but amplified donald trump now the candidate. I think in the art of the deal all of the chapters after one and two are going through different transactions or things that he has accomplished. To me the first one is that day in the life, and the second one to me it was called trump card element of the deal, and thats the the one that i went through point by point with him and i found even though elements of the deal the trump cards were about specific element it is that he practices. I found that they were splendidly in this campaign and to followup on you, the one to get the word out. He was like the outrageous, the controversial, and you will get attention. So the temporary been on muslim, Illegal Immigrants from mexico hyperbole. Well, they were controversial even attacking senator mccain as, you know, not worthy of being a war hero. Every time he said that people say hes dead in the water. No, the next week he got another 5,000 people at the rallies attracting 20, 30,000 people you know what i mean so he would do that and get the word out. And other thing he did in getting word out he mastered the use of twitter and bite him had more recently in times but he was the first of the candidates to really i think exploit twitter and weve seen hillary in recent weeks Hillary Clinton trying to use twitter herself. You know, so well see if shes going to try to answer him on that. I think use of twitter is the latest social Media Version of what hes been doing. Exactly. His life life when before page six of the New York Post in mid70s he used New York Times best Society Pages and then page 6 sort of ushered in tabloid era, and tabloid and trashy tv cools in in the 90s and internet, and now social media. Wherever he needs to be, however, he needs top exploit the media or the press, he has. Hes done that very, very ably. I think this is a little bit far field from the art of the dealer but i think what had were going to see here is whether whether hes reached a point where this level of scrutiny and level of seriousness is so high that this still works. His as i said his abiding belief that all publicity is good publicity not so sure it will play out that way over next, however, many months between now and november 8th then again a lot of us have been wrong a lot of time ofs along the way. Now before we get too far i want to show some video with Monica Langley of the wall street journal, and youll understand it and just explain what this is after we watch it. It seems to me your strategy has been hiding in plain sight. Lets look at the first page of your book what i highlighted if you just laicts that have. Dont to it for the money dealing are my art form most are surprised by the way i work. Ikier a brief case and try not o schedule too many meets. I leave my or doo open. You cant imagine entrepreneurialship et cetera you have to batch the structure. I prefer to come to work each day and just see what develops and what happens. Thats true. Do you think if you become president and youre doing so quell to this point, do you think you could still leave your door open, be so loose . Or do you think thats going to have to change . It wont change had as much as people think. Teals are deals and theres levels of sophistication but it wont change quite as much as people think. When was that . That was at the end of february in virginia in southern virginia. And i sat down with him before a rally in like a little library, and the interesting thing is i gave him the book and i highlighted i had very version i think i handed him, and so i gave it to him and picked see out of the corner of my eye his staff was like what the heck is she doing . Like afterwards they told me if we would handed him a book he would say what what the heck . You cant dont give me something to read. But he did read it and he agreed with it. Do you know what i mean and he still is very much like that why i wanted him to fess up that hes still very much that way. Because be ive been observing it about him. And we all know hes loosey goosy out there and likes to see and go with the flow and he became a master of that out on campaign trail sometimes to his detriment most to his benefit when he would read the crowd. Do you know and react to the crowd. He was always doing that seeing what they were doing and one of the elements of the deal in his book is know your market. And a the market that he knew better than any other republican candidate was this market was angry, antiestablishment tired of being believed around the world at home of being weak. And he knew that market. And he struck that cord. Theres a lot of inviting into his management style when youre bringing up that is evident in the art of the deal. You know, he brags about how you can just get to hill directly. Right, that that looking a lot of big businesses you have to go through seven layer of executives all unnecessary that i. Trump organization is always Trump Organization and Trump Organization you can come to me. You can answer immediately. The flip side of that is that it is micromanaging. But he the sort of looseys goy way the campaign has been run, here he says look i dont like a lot of number crunchers, eggheads, a lot of fancy market surveys. You know i go from the gut. Committees and consultants no committee tees hell listen to people to a point but ultimately his decision thats the way it should be. It is the Trump Organization. But i think if were fast forwarding to next january when he moves into the west wing, not sure how well with that open door will work and that is a phrase that comes up often. Over the last few decades. You heard him say it wont change that much if he were to become president. Sometimes you need an open but sometimes need a closed door at the oval office otherwise too much stuff coming at you i think is going to be the problem and his business has sort of sprawling as it is and has become, its something he to some extent has been able to corral and hilt with his capabilities and i think the oval office is going to be a little different than the 26th floor of trump tower. But he has run the campaign that way with, you, you know, jt the way hes run the Trump Organization he makes his own decisions if i were on the plane with him, ten minutes when they said were going to land, says were about to land thats when everybody buckle back up, you would write down six words. Points he wants to make and never had a speech. He never had a briefing book. Nothing. He would come up with six words. One time i got my iphone and copied it and, i mean, i said im going to copy it. I copied it and i attached to to a story and he did it that way and Campaign Manager that took him almost want to end until he hired paul at the end that had got rid of ted cruz his Campaign Manager, the slogan in Husband Office on his white board was let trump be trump. And thats what he did. Thats what trump wanted. Three long time working reporters yall are familiar with the white house and management of the white house, and the press management and heres or message of the day heres our message tomorrow. Et cetera,est how much attention to that do you pay . Does trump pay . You pay as a working reporter looking at the management, loosey goosy style versus managing a candidate, managing a president. Something ive actually been thinking about and working on of late, the president is the president. Theres no question who is in charge of the west wing of the white house. Saiment theres such a volume that is coming out and volume of importance and things that play so loosey goosy to go see as he has done, in many cases many many years i think is dangerous and for previous president s who have been more inclined with side of the spectrum it hasnt worked well and theyve had to adjusting this blints could bill clinton n and preferred open door an sort of loosey goosy in his own way and had a chief of staff somebody he brought from home essentially, and at some point needed to say, okay. Im the president and this is this is serious business. And i need to make some adjustments, and did. And i think should he be president , i think thats something that that a lot of us should be watching for, how this management style which has worked is to some extent with mixed results for 30 years in trump tower how that would translate or not translate to the oval office. How to work in the campaign too is it is going to be has had i think for him to say look, this is working. Right people have been making a pivot right after the primary to general theres only pivoting leaning into same direction right. I think that its going to be he has teleprompter a few times. Yes. It will continue . I think it will continue when he gives the socalled policy speeches a little bit. I was in his office a month ago right before he was about to use it. And it was set up in Conference Room and he was practicing okay, so hes trying to like think that way. His people were new people he brought in wanted him to practice a time or two and hes done it what maybe three times or something. Said we interrupted you. Thats all right. I think its going to be hard to persuade him and hard for him to think that he needs to change. Right, because look no one thought when he came into the race he was 9th in polls right you know it seemed like this side show. And he won. You know, he beat the little supposed to be the most depth and most serious, and you know, republican field in a long time. And so you know not only have we not seen a pivot, i just dont know who will persuade him that he needs to change until hes actually there. And so i dont know. I think that thats going to be hard sell. He talks near the deal about listening to his own advisors and sort of small collection of executive Vice President s but also how he talks to cab drivers and that workers about on the the streets and people he runs into and gets sort of a Critical Mass of voices that then allow him to make sort of a gut how he makes decision. Now, i dont think a president trurp would walk outside and Start Talking to people and then make a expition. It just wont it cant work. There are a bureaucracy, congress service. All of these things that a president needs to sort of navigate in a complicated way than anything hes done. One of the things ive said four years after trump tower came out. Trump tower is is a shining example of trumps management style opening it up. The project manager was a 30something woman at time but interesting collection of people who made trump tower work. You seeless of that i think as trump goes on. Sort of transitions from a guy who builds things. He built trump tower from the grouped up to instead a guy who puts his name on thing hads and is clearly a gene level and less discipline manager and thats the trend line of his 30plus years as a as the character hes created. He in his business and perhaps to become president but its been true in his campaign, he does go outside the box and hires and does not bring consultant to people. But a social media guru has expands afl his twitter, his facebook to gazillion people he started a trump golf caddie his home picks. His press secretary, she was a ralph lauren model that ivanka brought to work in her line and to do other things theyre markets for that line and now press secretary and i think Motion People think shes a fairly honest broker through all of this campaign. And then from the guy who runs Las Vegas Hotel used to drive them to school so he does think outside of the box because he used to grow up on construction site and he dealt had had to work at the construction site eric and don junior told me that they had to work at construction sites since they were 11 or 12 years old so he does look at people in other things and isnt afraid to put them in the mix. So i dont know if Health Care Care he can do that at a president ial level but he has done that. Traditionally throughout High Expectations on people who are by the book underqualified. Totally. It looks great and if they dont byebye and youre fired youre fired one thing he said many this book is he prides his loyalty over integrity. Stood by corey lewandowski. Also why hes so loyal to family. Theres nobody hes more loyal to most of the time than family. Brother robert, at least as question see him in the art of the deal is a key component. And now his three first children that he and made are important in the Trump Organization. I have a simple rule mr. Trump writes when it cools to management hire best people from your competitors pay them more than they were earning and give them bonuses and incentive based on their performance. Thats how you build a first class operation and goes on to say in my life there are two things i found im very good at. Overall coming obstacles and most vatting good people to do their best work. One of the challenges ahead is how to use those as successfully in service ive done up to now on my own behalf. So theres the Trump Organization into broadest strokes and then there are other subsidiary ares some very large like Atlantic City, and i dont know that he overcame obstacles superwell in Atlantic City, i mean, he writes in the art of the teal requests i love casino, i love the glamor, cash flow, its vrgdz very Good Business in the house. Yes, it should be and almost is for everybody except it wasnt for trump. Kind of. It was good for trump individually but for foam who work for him Atlantic City overall or newscast tore and share sharehos decidedly less good over course of the time more corporate bankruptcies so before we sort of talk about the management gems that are in the art of the deal there needs to be a corrective and again this was written in 1987, you know, he had not experienced really failure at that point. Starts happening in the late 80s into early 90s and then there are portions of his Business Record that have been the opposite of success other the course of time. Carlos was out pat he writes in here i fight when i feel im getting screwed. Even if its costly and difficult and highly risky. There seems to be a sense of right and wrong in this book that, quote, plus the fact that he write about helping that woman who was losing her family farm. And he held a fundraiser for her. Because she worked hard had all of my life here she is losing her farm it is just not fair. What does he do . He describes that in first chapter of art of the deal he kaws the bank and says he wants to like pay off her mortgage and do something he said look it is too late. , who knows how that transpired but thats how he describes it. He threatened a lawsuit hes like im going to, you know slap a huge lawsuit on you, from murder buzz you drove this poor womans, you know, husband to suicide. And he believe it is getting so much attention and first chapter of the book as well. But he, you know, he immediately lashes out with his most sort of standard weapon which is the lawsuit. And that first chapter he both threatened a lawsuit and deposed in another one in describing his weak. You know thats how it goes. So that that combativeness that were seeing in the campaign and that threat of the litigation were seeing are very evident here. U how hes handled critics if you want to call them that over the course of the last year and this campaign, the playbook for that is in the art of the deal that is one of the things with all of his sort of inconsistencies that is not that is ab absolute consistency if somebody does something that he doesnt leak look or says something he doesnt like he goes after them. Or the Trump University litigation hes hammered, hammered hammered on that. To a fault i would say. If he had settled this, before doesnt settle this, and you know question i think is pending as we move into sort of the summer and the they thick of the general election whether that was the right move in this situation and wouldnt be talking about this or wouldnt be talking about it nearly as much and he cant accept that he might have been wrong this many this case and so it is full assault on the judge and on down, and anybody who is critical of how up Trump University how he handled that entire episode. When he admits mistake it is in his failure to see how stupid other people were. You know, that kind of thing or i every in realized it that, you know, he was a owner in the shortlived u. S. L, alternative profootball league, and his biggest mistake he didnt realize how weak other owners were, and chocks up loss of court in the nfl versus usfl antitrust seethe suit to the fact that jurors almost took pity on the underdog nfl. [inaudible] laughable looking back, i mean, most objective observers would say if theres one person who ruined the chances of the us of l to be a secondary professional league it is drump and hes the run it didnt work. It might not have worked nfl is just an absolutely and more since then, but donald trump is the reason that u. S. Of l didnt work the way it didnt work. When you read the art of the deal did you find his subscription accurate . Selectively truthful i think as people are selectively truthful . In character with the person that ive come to know. I didnt know him back then. But totally in character with his, you know, truthful exaggeration he calls it is. He loves to be the best, show that hes the best afl that. And i will say because i write about ceo and billionaire for the wall street journal and i think all of the ceo and billionaires that i cover have some of donald trump and donald trump has some of them. They all occupy a rare, rarefied error full of themselves to be to that point and knocked away competitor and had to think differently and so one reason when i first met him in august, when everyone else thought he was like crazy, and had no chance. And i went in his office and introduced myself and he knew who i was because he had read some of my profile of others, so we got along and i said look, im gong to treat you legitimately because youre a ceo and billionaire, and so from that point on, i knew that i could work on a level Playing Field with him in a way differently because i kind of knew the ground he backed. And hes different. Hes much more maybe much more ego, much more, you know, a little craziness. But theyre all. I think all ceo and billionaires to some extent have these tendency when you when you look at a book like this, it should be fact check and people should look at that. But, i mean, i think like a lot of books certainly this is he was not he was political aatown and engage and he within the a politician when he wrote this. But also with just a lot of political memoir and books like this of major public figures theyre propaganda right theyre not meant to be a very detail honest careering of a life so i would i wouldnt limit that to art of the deal but really any kind of especially Campaign Time book theyre really not god and they tell selective truth as you put it. This one is actually entertaining. Like, id rather read this than, you know, whatever tim campaign was. This is interesting. Earlier in primaries when i was reading a lot of these sorts of books, i enjoyed with the art of the deal to other candidates which was dreadful. At least this one is fairly entertaining. Did you all pick up in this book why its the Trump Organization and not trump inc. . It started when it was donald trump. I think that is a key thing just himself but he needs to be the Trump Organization to start very early business deals when he had nothing to sell. It is all about the aura. Some kind of like business formality to call it one thing over the other. Market Trump Organization corporate or inc. People he says people consider you to be sort of more worth dealing with i think to my point about this being selectively truth what he doesnt write in this book is that huge part of his ability to talk with these people to start making some of his earliest deals in 70s is his father. And his fathers political connections and his fathers Business Records if he were just donald trump and fred trump had not been fred trump and not done what he had done in queens brook brooklyn middleclass home it is no way donald trump would have gotten the years of some of the people he was able to talk to start some of those early deals. But at the same time he distances himself from his father quite graphically in this book. For good reason. I mean, this is a weve seen this in the campaign. I am a selfmade man and this is not the campaign thing. This has been something hes sorts of overprotested in my opinion throughout his public life. Down playing a role that his father had specifically, politically and financially with especially his early success. That he could not have the started doing some of the work he did on the grand hyatt and even into sort of the early portions of the putting together of the partial for trump tower it could have been much, much harder wot his fathers influence and his fathers exceptionally important. Including with money. Is most of it tied up in brooklyn and queens. Is that accurate . Is that a full statement . I havent researched that to know if it is true. When he graduated college, we should pause and acknowledge most people. I did not have 200,000 when i graduated college. That is a lot of money. That was the 1960s. To say the defense, my father had so much to do with my success, my net worth, tied up in billions in brooklyn in queens, built by fred c trump, to say that as a defense, selfmade persona is sort of rich. He learned a great amount from his father, everything he did in queens but clearly he trumped his father by what he ultimately did but he learned a lot from his dad, got a great start from his dad no matter what the amount is. I never looked to find out what the amount is, and got some amount. His closeness to personal my father influenced me, how much he learned from him. He doesnt want to distad in a family sense but does want to create a business and professional sense and in the book and in the campaign he talked about my dad said never go to manhattan, you will never make it. The queens in brooklyn. I wanted to be big, my dad thought me so much. His parents, fred and mary trump, not his children. The money he made in the middle of the 20th century using government subsidies to build middleclass homes, take advantage of that, by the time donald came around, what did he do but go to manhattan to take advantage of a down economy in the 70s which is what locked us in. There is an aspect of luck, timing and any sort of skill, there are undeniable skills in his skill set and he has a fool toolbox, and the earlier stages, stability, and the public, what they want. He actually, when he went through the trump hotel in the post office in washington dc, making it into a luxury hotel on pennsylvania avenue, i was recently with him and that is crooked. Did you follow up . Showing you . Is that crooked . He said not really if you look at it like this. He was feeling chastised. He went to another room, didnt like the way this turned out but seemed like a change and the manager said it is too late to change. He does Pay Attention to detail. He goes through the things that go out on the campaign which is one of his elements of the detail, he ran the primary campaign for 4 million which is unheard of. Jeb bush had 150 million in super pac or whatever and every single expenditure that went out of the campaign, whether it is paying attention to the details of expenditures that go out, he does do that now. His big argument to the public is i am a great is this man, read at the 12, i will manage the country like i managed business. One of the early details talks about how he had been in charge of the declaration, the hollywood declaration at trump tower. I wrote in the margins also explained why. Died of people who walk by it is a manhattan landmark right next to tiffanys, that is part of it. Is a big deal. He does get involved, he does get involved in that level. In other books and in real life, between i cant be bothered big picture and the smallest micromanaging like the reef. Typically in my read and reporting, he micromanage is the most when it comes to things that are very aesthetic. Sometimes, not often but sometimes less is more. He tells us he likes earth tones more than primary colors. He is at that level detail. When he talks about how he managed or who he might pick for Vice President , he said he needs someone who knows how to do stuff in washington. He sees himself more as the chairman of the board. He sees the presidency as being the chairman of the board rather than the ceo or chief operating officer getting his hands dirty. That is a fascinating transformation. Vote for me because i am a potential business leader, see how that would work as president would sometimes you can be chairman of the board. I know how to work with the deal, i can make deals with congress. Of the question is when he make deals it is usually with another person who wants to get the job done and dealing with congress when there are so many people with so many agendas it is a horse of a different color. Talking about how he doesnt like negotiating with the japanese, it is because you always bring in a group of people, eight or 12 people in the room, sometimes two or three people but it is hard to convince 20. You have to convince a lot of people. Congress is more. And it is greater then 1on1. The job he will face as president. Cut them all in one by one. Monica langley, are you worried about the crossing him and getting kicked off the campaign trail, the list of access . No. I am not. If he decides to do that, the tape you showed is at the same rally, the secret service did a chokehold on the photographer, that was supposed to get back on the trail, the cover shot for time. I actually because i had been with him we actually had the pin with all the reporters so we had video of it. The campaign asked us for a video so they could decide what statement to make. Everyone was like your campaign, secret service, that guy was on a threat and they asked me for the video and you can get it on the website. Do you know what i mean. He didnt like he didnt like several things i have said and done. When i called, when i was the one who got an exclusive when he put self funding the campaign and the general election and all the staff were saying he is still weighing the decision about whether to do the other candidates have done. I called him on the phone and i said donald, are you going to put self funding to he was on speakerphone and i could hear him saying we are still deciding. I said i am talking to you. Are you going to quit self funding q or are you going to sell a building . It will cost 1 billion potentially . He goes i am going to quit self funding but i will put a lot of money in it myself and i will help the are in c. It wasnt like he was ready to say that or wanted to say that. I needed to get that because it was the next stage and it ran against his brand but a big part of his brand in the primaries come all these other people sucking up to special interests and i am not. I wanted to get that stay away, stay away, i called him directly and asked. Leave me alone, i am not going to talk about it, whatever. My first responsibility is the wall street journal and our readers, not donald trump. If he does otherwise he would not restrict me. The whole time, you think you are weak and he will nick you and things like that, you are dead. Two quotes from the 12 the art of the deal, part is denigrating the competition. I dont go out of my way to be cordial. He wrote it then and has proven it during the campaign. It is not limited to the press. Insults to his primary opponents. Denigrating is a pretty good word for what we have seen. Lying ted, crooked hillary. Never got rid of that from when he started with that. Little marco. Some of them, talk about art. He does manage to capture something with very juvenile nicknames or throwaway lines. It is always a mess with hillary. There is always a lot going on. I always wonder what the donald trump putdown nickname would be for donald trump. He is very good at that. He just repeats it incessantly, low energy was this thing from the very beginning from day one, talking about jenna. He cant be president , very low energy. Low energy jeb. Kind of a macho thing. He has done it with the press. What is his current relationship with the Washington Post . He has severed the relationship with the Washington Post in the sense he is revoking Washington Post access to his events. That doesnt mean he cant cover him, we will continue to cover him aggressively or an editor who has gone toe to toe with the Catholic Church and the nsa. I am feeling good about this or mark baron, a short direct statement, or an independent practice. We will continue covering him aggressively like we have done throughout the campaign. Could you have predicted in doing that, giving Washington Post coverage . He really cultivates the press, talk about how he cultivates the press in the art of the deal. He is bragging about crowd size all the time. In the art of the deal he bragged about how many porters come to his press events. We had 200 reported local and national. This book i might have guessed he would find ways to cultivate particular journalists and organizations rather than shut them off. Politico experienced this as well. How aggressively he goes after enemies, slightly surprising to have a symbiotic relationship with the press and cutting it off hasnt been a strategy he has employed. In the art of the deal he said he doesnt take critics too seriously. You are seeing that with the press. Usa today has done things like this. They are his enemies, they are literally in the way of him becoming president because there are months more. The amount of resources that have been put to the donald trump scene, is unprecedented. What changed is the context in which the man in the story, for a generation has been famous. He has been famous for a long time. He has never been important. Maybe you disagree. He has never been important. Now he is very important. He is hugely consequential. He is a man of global importance. And because of that i think he is being covered in a way he has never been covered. Not even close and starting to make him uncomfortable because he judges accurately this is problematic, coverage continues this way which it will it will eventually put him in a position of weakness which is a position he hates heading into november. As much as he did twitter in 1987, there was no way to directly address the crowds you wanted. Going around the clock, dominating cable, they were all he can call into any show, cable is desperate to have him on. Hillary clinton is trying to play that game. Time he goes on she goes on, going on to twitter when he said something bad about her she responded recently delete this account. The most read tweet by her ever when she responded directly to him. We will see if she can go toe to toe with him and if it is the right thing to do. From the art of the deal one thing i learned about the press is they are always hungry for a big story and the more sensational the better. It is the nature of their job and i understand that. The point is if you are a little different or little outrageous or if you do things that are bold or controversial the press is going to write about it. 1987. The question we have been discussing, in the media and beyond, from months, did we create donald trump . If we are talking donald trump the Presumptive Republican nominee, republican primary voters created donald trump. Republican lawmakers, did not create donald trump. If we talk about the medias role, the practice role, the successful candidate donald trump has been. Did not start in june 2015, has to start in 1976. You can talk about twitter very effectively and how often, in fox and nbc, and page 6 of the New York Post. A certain omnipresence. And the last 30 years, there is less of a distinction between that is page 6 of the business page of the New York Times. And two separate Donald Trumps. And lifestyles of the rich and famous, donald trump, trump tower being covered on the inside of the New York Times, it is all just stuff, content, that reality to create confusion. People already confusing and taking advantage of that. May have been on the first show, as a business leader, longer than bill gates. Think of any living business leader, his run of fame has extended as long or longer than any of them. It is the whole trump persona. That is a smart way to look at this, does the media create trump trope, if that is the case it goes back longer. As a young kid in the midwest learning about donald trump through history. Something again and again in the art of the deal, does that make a National Reputation . I had a daughter. My daughter was born in new york city. I lived there for many years, i am from tennessee originally. This is a perfect example for him to show success. It was a nightmare. It never worked and he took it over and made it a success in months, not years. It was my daughters favorite place to go. It Shows Government gridlock which is fighting today. Low dollars ahead of schedule. It is a classic success and no wonder, it is tiny but no wonder he brings it up all the time. In the art of the deal, he writes it in every book he writes. My daughter will say it was her favorite part. It is a simple story with a simple story line. It was a success, but it is so small potatoes compared to the other things trump has done and so many other people have done. A very straightforward detail of the success of private enterprise and and since 1986 for all it is worth and then some. When i see him talking about that story, in so many books, i would remember when mitt romney would talk about the olympics that was a big deal. A bigger deal than you cant hang so much, doesnt prove to me you would be terrific at all these other things and theres a larger record, but people love the olympics, people love ice skating rinks. It is like a morality tale. He showed him up. He loves writing about it. He also writes in the art of the deal about television. What is Television City . Television city, what it would have been is a plot of land on the upper west side. You can speak to this. He had options on it not once but twice, never really did close to what he wanted to do, one of the first plots of land he had, he was trying to get nbc to stay in manhattan, trying to get it to move from newtown out to his gargantuan trump branded city within a city, never really amounted to the variety of plans he laid out over the course of decades. They go to new jersey and kept saying and if you didnt get what you wanted, new york would cease to be the Media Capital of the world which is not last i checked occurred. In the second grade donald trump writes, i gave the teacher a black eye. I punched my music teacher because i didnt think he knew anything about music and i almost got expelled. Has he ever talked about this . Hyperbole. As i understand that this is not a thing that actually occurred. Was he a difficult child . Absolutely. He discusses something other people have confirmed, building a big tower out of blocks when they were boys, donald and robert and using roberts blocks and gluing them together so all the blocks would be donalds blocks in the form of the building, admits the reality that he was a difficult, confrontational child and as a teenager, sent up state to a military academy by his father, i am not sure we were ever able to confirm punching his second grade teacher in the face story. What is interesting, that is a story, he is proud of it. It shows from very early age, like it is. And the controversy over ben carsons memoir, to staff someone. With trump in a huge deal, if it was true, what kind of sick person brags about this. It is odd in a situation that you wouldnt be proud of, become points of pride, because you are unconventional. It is memorable detail, highly accurate. 1987, a lot of superlatives, like listening to a donald trump speech. Also losers. The worlds losers are the people who are jealous of him. The only drawback to fame and success is all the people who are jealous of your success. I call them the worlds losers. A lot of the same rhetoric. It hasnt changed all that much. There has been consistency. More later, later in the trump literature this becomes more of a theme, this idea that the world is a 0sum place for me to be a winner and the other guy must necessarily be a loser, you can certainly see the groundwork for that worldview in the art of the deal. Certainly he has taken that into the campaign to win systematically, almost chronologically these other people have to lose, target jeb and he is going to be a loser and ben carson and marco rubio and on and on. For me to win you must lose. There is more of a sense of competition than there is collaboration. In the art of the deal you can tell he is an avid competitor. He does use the word loser in the art of the deal. When carson rose up to be almost number one, surpassing him for a week, he decided on his plane i am taking him down today, tonight, he went on stage to talk about the belt. How could carson as a child as he said in his autobiography, have stabbed someone and the belt buckle stopped it from penetrating the other child . Carson never revealed who it was. He said that could never happen. The first night trump, come on up here with a knife. Does someone have a knife . I want you to try to stab, it wont prevent it. It will go in my stomach. It was like this. Then he said either he is lying about it or has these tendencies that should make him incompetent to be president but he would just as you said, i am taking this person down next. Anytime they got too close to him i am taking him down. In the primaries we see over the next three month it is a 1on1 situation now whereas before the primaries it was a collection of people splitting up support, easier targets than Hillary Clinton. Monica langley come you call his personal phone. Are you still given to do that given how close we are to the convention, the general election . His schedule is much more precise now than at the beginning when most reporters didnt care to get close to him. I was doing a profile of him early on but if i need to i could still get him. When i call him, when he was in washington, last week, i toured the post Office Building becoming a luxury hotel, still tried to keep in touch. I am not one of the reporters who are embedded with him. The wall street journal has other teams the cover him on a daily basis, page 1 feature story so i dont try to follow him every day, i jump in occasionally. We tried to do tough stories, we did a story about what he says, we looked through his financials and get a big piece, this is what his income really is and he couldnt self fund if he even wanted to all the way through. We did stories about how he could not pay all his bills are kept extracting confessions from people that he didnt want to pay full amount for and we will continue to do that. I agree the press is going to get more vigilant about what has been his practice, not just what he says but what he does. As worrisome as it is, no pen intended a bit trumped up. A little phony. As we discussed, incredibly longterm symbiotic relationship between the press and trump in the case with politico, he is going to credential these places if for no other reason the story turned a little bit to the extent he is thinking of this as an ongoing narrative which i think he does. At some point you are going to say okay, come on back in as a benevolent monarch. If you were Hillary Clinton would you read this book . Yes, absolutely. Or get someone to tell me what is in it. I think so. It reveals a lot more so than any subsequent books do. It is the same with Hillary Clinton actually. The best books you read about her, the one, not her memoirs, this is the one that clearly lays out her political vision. When she became the Presumptive Democratic nominee she said it still takes a village. The way he keeps citing the art of the deal she keeps citing it takes a village. They cling to their original people who want to know the heart of these candidates, could read their original work and find out a lot about them. People should read not just Hillary Clinton and her staff but all people should read the art of the deal with every voter should read the art of the deal. If they have time keep reading and do it chronologically. Not just books he has written but books written about him. There are six very good worthwhile biographies. There are rules of good incisive profiles of donald trump starting with Wayne Barretts book in 1979, mary brenner in 1980 and vanity fair in 1990 and buzz feed in 2014. It is not the trump is not known. All of this is known. He has been a public figure and people have been reporting on him, not just in celebrity ways, for decades. Put it into google. Start reading. The way i see it is your homework as an engaged citizen between now and november 8th. Going to a lot of these rallies, one of the elements of the deal in chapter 2 is the last element of the deal is have fun. When i have seen donald trump have fun, he has fun at the rally getting people excited. Sometimes he spends 30 minutes where people stand and talk to him. His favorite people to talk to other People Holding the art of the deal. There are so many people, he signed every book that is out there. More than a sign. The art of the deal the number one bestselling book out there. Is that true . He did that. The Tampa Bay Times found it was the fifth or sixth which is pretty good. Had to make friends and influence people by joe carnegie, the bestselling business book, but i like what you are saying about that. The system most fun he is going to have process, he says in this book come in the art of the deal or one of the other two books what he is really about is the chase. The same assets that excite me in the chase require leaving me bored. The important thing is getting, not having. I think does he want to win . Absolutely. Wants to rub it in your face. And Amazing Campaign book, we will learn about that age notion of having to run this thing day today as president , a lot less exciting to him than winning which a couple months ago. A colleague of mine at politico, a longtime Political Consultants for trump, glenn asked roger stone does he want to be president . Interesting how roger stone answered, he wants to win. I never understood how jimmy carter became president , donald trump right in the art of the deal was the answer is as poorly qualified as he was for the job jimmy carter had the nerve to ask for something extraordinary, the ability above all got him elected president. Donald trump is exactly the same way. It is all about having the balls to do anything. If any reporter shows weakness to him, we all have to do that. I have seen Network Anchors or correspondence say spit it out or he moves on. He has no tolerance for being nice if you are not strong. He is all about being confident and moving on and he comes from a position of strength, you have to show strength. His children when they come to the office a we need to do this, this and this, they dont say what about this . I have seen the kids say i need you to meet with so and so about the deal, telling this and this. They are not saying what about this, what about that . Mccarter after his presidency from the Carter Library he asked donald for a donation and that is what impressed trump, that he would have the guts to ask for a large amount of money. The bottom of the page in which he tells that jimmy carter story get into Ronald Reagan who at the time was the president and he says about Ronald Reagan i think americans are starting to catch on, smiling pretty face, not much going on. I am paraphrasing but he is not kind to Ronald Reagan, sitting president , in 1987 in the art of the deal which should be pointeded out in the context of what he said about jimmy carter. This was not a great time in the Reagan Administration and in subsequent books he gets religion and talks about how terrific reagan was but the foundational document, he is an empty suit. It comes out right before around the same time he kind of talks about running for president for the first time in late 1987, he went to New Hampshire and gave a speech at a rotary club, at a restaurant and was asked by a guy in New Hampshire who wanted him to run for president , going through lowlevel form of process to draft donald trump and i dont know he ever thought seriously about running for president at that time, even in late 1987 but he had a book coming out so he went and gave a speech and no doubt it helped move some product ads in september of that year and in the New York Times and the boston globe and the post as well criticizing American Foreign policy and basically a lot of things he said in this campaign. All of this injected it into the political bloodstream in 1987 which alerted people to this forthcoming book called the art of the deal. He flirted with running and there was something to pitch at the time whether it was a book or a show. He was having his dalliance with the reform party and tripled america, and unique to donald trump. When he wasnt actually running for president. Six days after mitt romney lost in the last election, the trademark make America Great again, he was so convinced he could have done better. Romney is out there talking and so convinced he could be better than trump. Speaking of people he praised in addition to jimmy carter in the art of the deal, praised Sylvester Stallone in the art of the deal for creating characters. What did he create . Rocky and rambo. The alltime characters. I am predicting at the Republican Convention Sylvester Stallone will make an appearance. I dont know. He wants to bring some pizzazz, showbiz, the reality star aspect, he wanted to be more fun. And other celebrities, the pictures in this book as well as every other book that came out filled with pictures of donald trump with other celebrities. The resort, second home or whatever number of homes in florida that trump has and other books everyone he has down there is Michael Jackson and lisa marie presley, talks about having dinner with sinatra. He claims he doesnt like going to parties but clearly loves being in the party scene, being seen with famous people because that is his stick. Not just a successful business executive, and not just a politician. Is all those things, he is everything and he has been this exaggerated version of every fake thing in america for the last several decades. In a 70s he was partying in the new york club. In the 80s he was becoming really rich. In the 90s he had financial struggles, everyone having affairs, 2000 suddenly hes a reality tv star. Now like a twitter feed. Is every obsession in america he has captured it. Recently in the Washington Post, you had a piece recommending two books that could be today. The thing you are seeing a lot, journalists, how i missed the rise of trump. A very on brand way that proves they were writing another way but you are seeing people referring to movies, fiction, here is the movie that foreshadowed the rise of trump. Two that struck me were people referring to sinclair lewiss it cant happen here from 1930s and the plot against america which showed oddly charismatic strong men coming to power in the united states. Of course it is horrifying, very oppressive, dictatorial state so i wanted to see what there was particularly in those books. You have to watch this really weird movie idiotic with the you see glimmers. The appeal, there was a famous moment i cant remember which primary, arizona after arizona. I love the poorly educated because he had done so well in that demographic. In those books the leaders that become totalitarian figures had strong appeal among what we now call low information voters. You see