50 years ago to today, that is the only politician that has ever threatened to sue me for writing what he didnt like. I said, donald, you are a public figure. That would mean you have to prove that i deliberately lied into it. He said, i know im a public figure and i will see you anyway. I think this is indicative of his character and authoritarian approach, you do it the way i wanted or i will make life go for you. Brian what was your reaction when he said that . David people have threatened to sue me a lot of times. It goes with the job. Brian 1988 in Atlantic City usage you met up for the first time. David i have left the Los Angeles Times where i had spent 12 years to go to Atlantic City. I believed we were going to see casino gaming spread across america which we did and i wanted to examine whether government could really clean up his business that was traditionally run by crooks. In a couple days, i met donald. I immediately recognized he was pt barnum, selling tickets to the amazing twoheaded woman. Then i started, because he was a dominant force, i started asking about him and his competitors included steve when and people who work for him in some big gamblers also to me, and all the casino business. Come on, how could he not know anything about the casino business . He only knows how to extract money. Donald and i had a cup of coffee not long after that and i asked him a question about craps and i literally made a false statement and he immediately incorporated my falsity into his answer. That is what calling a artists do. That is what psychics who advertise on daytime tv do. So, i had a couple questions. He immediately embraced my full statements. I realize what i was being told was true, donald does not know anything. It is all bluster, appearance. He is quick. He is smart, but he is not at all studious or deep, and in the book, i quote testimony where he gives answers to questions. One of them, my students were thirdyear law and business students answering a question like this, anyone who is been to the Wharton Business School will answer like this, donalds answer is gibberish. He does not understand the most basic issues. Listen to how he answers questions. You ask them, what is your favorite bible verse and he says, no one reads the bible more than donald trump. There are so many, so many, there are just so many. Brian he appeared on the oprah show in 1968. David in 1988. [laughter] brian that shows you my age. Back in 88, all right. Here is a clip of donald trump on that show in 1988. [video clip] oprah i know people have talked about whether you would want to run. Would you ever . Mr. Trump probably not. Oprah why would you not . Mr. Trump i do not think i have the inclination to do it. I love what im doing. I really like it. I just probably would not do it. Oprah the oval office does not pay as well. [laughter] mr. Trump i just probably would not do it, oprah. I do get tired to see what is happening with this country. I really am tired of seeing what is happening with this country. How we are really making other people live like kings and we are not. Oprah you said if you did run for president , you believe you would win. Mr. Trump i think i would win. I would say i would have a hell of a chance of winning. [end video clip] brian that was 20 years ago. David that was the year george he asked george w. Bush to make him his running mate. The m quayle got the job instead. Dan quayle got the job instead. Donald has been talking about running for president since 1985 and 12 years later he ran and he said im going to be the first person to run for president and make a profit. This is indicative of donald. Donald will tell you whatever he thinks is an is interest at the moment. That is what con artists you. They tell you whatever they think you want to hear to get whatever they want. Brian what are your own politics . David i am a registered republican. I am not a political person. I have voted for people on every line that is ever appeared on the ballot for different offices. I do not like politics. This is one of only two campaigns i have covered, the governors race in 1976 in nevada and i hated covering it. I am a policy got. I am someone who believes that we should be using the government for the purposes, the six nobel purposes six noble purposes in the preamble, to establish justice, promote general welfare, and in fact, i am developing a new course to teach at syracuse, which is how we got the constitution and its context. Ryan you say the donald trump family has not really been voters. David yes. Two of his children did not get to vote for him because they were not registered. They then complained about the rules. They should have known them. They are the ones that are responsible for giving this. Donald has not voted in a bunch of elections. And by the way, donald until recently was basically a democrat. One of the things he believes in is universal health care. We should get health care off of the backs of business and it should be a public good, as he says, provided to everybody. That is not a Republican Party position. Brian give us some background on yourself. David i was born in San Francisco and consider home to be santa cruz, california. My father was a 100 disabled veteran for world war ii. My mother was a disowned baronets, and i had the awesome my mother was a disowned heiress, and i had the awesome experience of growing up in a house over the beach that my parents rented for maybe 400 a month. My mother testified against her father in a lawsuit in 1941 and his only child, my mother was disowned and he was a very wealthy man. I went to work when i was 10 years old. I went to work fulltime at 13. I became a reporter for some weekly papers and 17. My work immediately got noticed because i did some simple things. If this will board said the average 34,340 house in santa cruz next year will pay 40. 11 more in property taxes, i thought that was useless so i said, you will pay so much more per 1000 for your house. Someone recruited me in the 19 hours writing front page stories as a staff writer. I went to the university of chicago at the graduate school for economics, New York Times, Philadelphia Inquirer and just short of 40 years of doing reporting i left and since then i have been a columnist and teacher at syracuse university. I live in rochester and my wife runs the Successful Community foundation in rochester, new york, we have the best childcare and all of the United States, canada and western europe in a cost this much more. This much more they are warehousing kids. Very smart program. Brian a couple weeks ago, donald trump went to tampa to give a speech and when he got there this video, which was not done by him of course, done by the folks against him. It is about 30 seconds. [video clip] something stinks about the pam bondidonald trump scandal. But dont take our word for it. When i call, they kiss my ass. When i call, they kiss my ass. When i call, they kiss my ass. Announcer join thousands of floridians and join an investigation into the bondi scandal. Mr. Trump they kiss my asked. They kiss my ass. [end video clip] brian so, what is that all about . David well, donald trump had someone come to him which was a Good Business idea. The man was in the business of running continued education, lawyers, accountants and courses to make sure they are up on the law and he went and said, why do we not do one for donald trump real estate . Donald trump said, that is such a good idea i am taking it away from you and give the guy a tiny steak in the business. They decided to turn it into Trump University. You cannot call it a University Without a license. This was not a university in even the dictionary meaning of the word. Trump university quickly became under investigation after a as a scam. People paid 1500 and what they got for the word highpressure sales tactics were the faculty would stand over them and show them how to get more money and credit cards so they can pay 35,000 to get the full Trump University package. Donald made a promotional video, Trump University is all about success and you will have success. We are going to have the best faculty and adjunct faculty. They will be handpicked by me, the best of the very best and will get a better education from the best Business School because i went to the best. He did not, by the way. He went to the undergraduate program at wharton, not the graduate program. It turned out that the faculty knew nothing about real estate. They included the manager of a fast food joint, two people in personal bankruptcy and a lot of people with experience in highpressure sales tactics as getting people to run other debt. By the way, if you run up your debt and borrow as much as the banks will possibly give you two paper Trump University, how do you have any borrow status for real estate . The new York State Attorney general brought a lawsuit on this. He was told to stop using the Word University and he ignored it for some readers. The Texas AttorneyGeneral Office is under investigation and pam bondi the attorney general florida said publicly, she was thinking about joining the new york investigation. She and donald had some kind of communication. The Donald Trump Charitable foundation made a Campaign Contribution to pam bondi. Now, charitable foundations cannot be involved in political activities. This should cause the revocation of their status. Before the newspapers reported they were perfectly comfortable with the gift from the donald trump foundation, which is astonishing. Pam bondi is a lawyer and she knows better than this. She also decided not to participate in the new York Attorney generals investigation. And this ad, which is pretty brutal, is about fundamentally pam bondi, the attorney general that accepted this guest. By the way, the donald trump people tried to cover this up. They argue, and i explained in my book, it was money to teach people how to protest against our current abortion laws. They did not get any money. Then they said it was this outfit in california. They did not get any money. Then they said, it was a mistake. Well, if it is a mistake, pam bondi should give it back and it should go to other organizations. It goes to a core issue about donald. Donald has no regard for whatever the law is. He does whatever he wants to do. Brian has he ever been sued . David he has been sued more than 4500 times by workers he would not pay and there is a chapter in my book about that. He has been sued by vendors, investors who say they have been swindled. Right now, right after i finished the book, a paint dealer was not paid the last 34,000. For the country club donald owns. And that is a big hunk of their years profit. He sued and spent more than 300,000 on legal fees trying to collect the 34,000 and the judge finally granted it with the power to foreclose after Donald Trumps witness testified about, why did you not pay the 34,000, your contract that you had to pay. Mr. Trump says he feels the man was paid enough. He will use the work and then he will say, i am not going to pay you for this crap. They will tell you, are you going to spend 300,000 on lawyers fees to fight trump . This happens again and again and again. Brian this book was published at by which outfit . David this was published by noble house press in london that do something, but i did with my first book which you interviewed me about back in 1992, i complained back then the publisher was doing everything on paper and they were slow and i said somebody needs to make this modern and quick. These folks did it. Brian wikipedia says it is a liberal publishing house. David liberal, conservative, i do not care. I mean, i dont pay any attention to the politics of the people i work with. When i was with the l. A. Times they ran editorials that they would say, dont read what that guy wrote. I tell people im writing for what im going to write even when i was a reporter. They never tell me, unless it is breaking news. I would do that. I told him what im going to do and i have always done it. If you do a first, you eventually wear out your welcome wherever you work. Brian where did you get the idea to do this book and when . David i think all but one chapter has a reference to trump in it. Because he was so dominant in Atlantic City. When he announced on june 16, 2015 he was running, i got a hold of my literary agent right away and said, we should do a book. She called around and everyone said, he is not going to get the nomination and i said, yes, he may get the nomination. I was particularly charged up by the fact that here is giving a speech talking about murderers and rapists for mexico and all of these young people applauding these lines. I thought, midtown manhattan is not a place known for racism and xenophobia. What did he do . Are these employees or did he bus people in . Later, the Hollywood Reporter revealed they were actors paid 50 each to show up and applaud which shows you what a fraud donald trump is. Anyhow, nobody wanted to do a book. At the time it became clear he would get the nomination, for traditional publishers you need about a year and it would be too late. I wrote about 25 pieces about donald for usa today, newsweek, national memo, and some other places. Many of them aimed at reporters, this is what you should be asking, questioning. And then noble house calls out of the blue and says, can we do the book in three weeks . I said, no. But i said, i can do it by a later date. I wrote the book in 27 days. It was hell. And i am frankly not sure i am physically recovered from doing it. I will never do it again. Ryan in 27 days it was finished. What day was that . David my closing note is dated fourth of july. I finished the book the fifth of july and finished editing the 10th of july and there is a picture on my Facebook Page of me sitting in my garden reading the book on the 19th of july, two weeks later and it went on sale two weeks after that. And the german language edition went on sale august 30. They had to translate another version into german. Brian by the way, you call him a con man and a fraud. How concerned was the publisher, do they fill the lawyers in on this . David yes, sir. This was vetted by a lawyer. One thing i do not do in the book is i do not break ground in it. Because i knew we had to get it lawyered quickly. What i have done is connected the dots and pull together my words, one of the best reporters in new york city, pieces elsewhere, and i have this enormous collection of trump documents. I used to have to rent to Storage Units to have all of my files on donald trump, jack welch, and some other people. But now they have been digitalized. So i have these files and one of my grown children would sit in the other room creating files chronologically for me and after i was done, she would put everything back so we can get back to it when we needed it. The lawyer, i do not think the lawyer on this book changed more than 10 words. I know that several times when he got to a paragraph, yes, wrong verb, fix that right now. Brian do you have any worry . Do you have to have an assurance insurance policy to protect you . As donald is going to sue me, he will sue me. I was surprised he said that to me. He has tried to intimidate me in the past. I am a guy that hunted down and especially vicious murderer. I have run into a burning building. Brian when was that . Why did you do that . David it was in california. I did it to get a better picture. I also ran towards to buildings people were and that they got out before i got there, think goodness. You do what you need to do in your job and my job is to tell people fax it would not know but for my work. I have been tailed by the lapd, the government in taiwan, people connected with it. I have had a lot of people threaten me. It is my job. You do what you need to do when you do the work that i do. The lawyer changed very little so anyway, in the book. On contrast, i wrote a piece for Politico Magazine that simply pointed out a number, not all of them, connections to criminals, his business dealings and his gratuitous connections with them. That was the most heavily lawyered piece of my career with maybe one exception. I have written stories accusing people of murder, people giving up retirement and if its over a story i wrote. Jack welch. And that lawyer said they know he cannot win but they can cost him a lot of money. Brian the former ceo did what that he gave up his retirement . Jack welsh, of ge. David jack welsh had a retirement package that was described to investors that he would continue to receive while serving the company and then he left his wife and she, a litigator, put into the Public Record enough information that i was going to show that he was going to get 70 million of the use of a ge jet apartment, parking tickets whether he used them or not. I laid out the economics of the Corporate Jet and wrote an article in the wall street and welch then wrote an article in the wall street journal relinquishing all of this saying, those who do not respect their contracts, but that the investor should know what they were paying jack welsh. I was told by another journalist that he is furious at the mention of my name and he is entitled. I cost him a lot of money. Brian in the book you talk about the academy of hospitality. Academy of hospitality sciences, i think. David this is an organization run by a particular mob associate. Joe we joey two socks. It hands out what is the most procedures award in the world, not the most procedures travel award but the most procedures, the five diamond award and the sixtime in the war. At least 19 Donald Trump Properties have these awards which huge plaques on the wall and they are signed by him. They are also signs of the chairman of the board of the academy, donald j. Trump. Donald trump gives awards to himself. There are videos