The Making of Donald Trump

Summary of The Making of Donald Trump

1. 1

   The Man Behind the Myth

   

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   What happens when a presidential candidate pays actors fifty dollars each to cheer at his campaign announcement? Most dismissed Donald Trump's 2015 candidacy as a publicity stunt, but investigative journalist David Cay Johnston-who'd been tracking Trump since 1988-recognized something darker. This wasn't vanity; it was strategy. Trump had been circling the presidency since 1985, testing the waters in 1988, 2000, and 2012. His 2016 run coincided suspiciously with declining ratings that threatened his reality show. What mainstream media missed was Trump's genius at exploiting journalistic conventions while concealing decades of entanglements with cocaine traffickers, mobsters, and con artists. Johnston's investigation reveals a modern P.T. Barnum who masterfully deflects scrutiny, threatens litigation, and bluffs rather than admitting ignorance-tactics that would define both his business empire and political career.

2. 2

   Blood, Business, and the Trump Name

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   The family story begins in seventeenth-century Germany as Drumpf, simplified to Trump in 1648-a name meaning both "a winning play" and "to deceive or cheat." Friedrich Trump, Donald's grandfather, fled Germany at sixteen to avoid military service, opening The Dairy Restaurant in Seattle with a likely curtained-off brothel. During the Klondike gold rush, he "mined the miners" with The Arctic, a bar offering hard liquor and prostitutes. After making his fortune, Friedrich returned to Germany but was expelled for draft dodging. Back in New York, he prospered until dying in the 1918 influenza pandemic. Fred Trump, only twelve when his father died, started a garage-building company with his mother at fourteen. His early history included a 1927 arrest during a Ku Klux Klan riot-an incident Donald would later deny despite documentation. Fred built 27,000+ subsidized apartments using cheap materials while mastering government financing programs. Contractors presented plain envelopes of cash before discussing contracts-illegal practices padding costs passed to taxpayers. While Donald was still in diapers, he and his siblings had trust funds worth roughly four times typical family income. Described as "maladjusted," Donald was sent to military school after behavioral problems, then avoided Vietnam through four student deferments and a medical exemption for bone spurs.

3. 3

   The Gospel According to Trump

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   At a Colorado hotel, Donald Trump delivered a profanity-laden rant attacking former wives and business associates. His core philosophy? "Be paranoid" and "Get even." His 2012 book devotes an entire chapter to revenge, proudly describing how he destroyed a former employee's career. This revenge doctrine directly contradicts the biblical teachings Trump claims to revere. While he told a radio host he values "an eye for an eye," he seems unaware Jesus explicitly rejected this in the Sermon on the Mount, instructing followers to "turn the other cheek." Trump's motto - "Always get even. When someone screws you, get them back in spades" - was demonstrated after his father died in 1999. When Fred Trump III and his sister discovered they'd been largely cut from Fred Sr.'s will, they filed a lawsuit. Donald's revenge was swift - he terminated all medical benefits for Fred III's newborn son William, who was suffering seizures requiring nearly $300,000 in care. When questioned, Donald remained unapologetic: "Why should we give him medical coverage?"

4. Chapter 4

   The Education of a Dealmaker

   In 1970, Donald Trump met Roy Cohn, the notorious attorney who'd served as chief lawyer for Senator Joseph McCarthy's communist witch hunts. Trump called Cohn "a business mentor and nearly a second father" who "would brutalize for you." Their relationship deepened when Cohn fought a 1973 federal housing discrimination lawsuit against Trump properties. Government tests revealed Trump staff steering minority applicants away while directing white applicants to preferred buildings. While most landlords settled quickly, Cohn advised: "Tell them to go to hell and fight the thing in court." Trump ultimately settled, agreeing to advertise for non-white tenants, yet spun this as victory, claiming "the government couldn't prove its case." Beginning in 1978, Trump built Trump Tower with ready-mix concrete rather than steel girders, despite other developers pleading with the FBI to escape a mob-run concrete cartel. Trump bought from S & A Concrete, secretly owned by Mafia chieftains Anthony "Fat Tony" Salerno and Paul Castellano - both Cohn's clients. When cement workers struck in 1982, concrete kept flowing at Trump Tower. Federal prosecutors eventually convicted eight mobsters for inflating concrete prices on Trump's buildings in what the prosecutor called "the largest and most vicious criminal business in the history of the United States."

   Chapter 5

   The Art of Self-Destruction

   Football, not buildings, brought Trump national fame. In 1983, he purchased the New Jersey Generals of the United States Football League for $5-9 million. The USFL showed promise, but Trump abandoned its patient strategy for showmanship. He staged media spectacles, violated salary caps to sign stars like Doug Flutie, and convinced owners to sue the NFL for antitrust violations, hiring Roy Cohn rather than an antitrust specialist. After a 48-day trial, the jury found the NFL guilty but awarded just one dollar in damages. The USFL folded. The appeals court noted that new sports leagues need investment of "time, effort and money" rather than seeking "entry into the NFL on the cheap." Among Trump's troubling associations was Joseph Weichselbaum, a three-time felon and cocaine trafficker who operated a helicopter service. Trump paid over $2 million annually for his services and rented him an apartment for $3,000 monthly in cash. When Weichselbaum faced sentencing in 1985, Trump wrote describing him as "a credit to the community." While others received up to twenty years, Weichselbaum served eighteen months. During the 2016 campaign, Trump claimed he "hardly knew" him - contradicting extensive documentation.

   Chapter 6

   The Billion-Dollar Illusion

   Trump's net worth claims fluctuated wildly over four decades, sometimes by billions within days. Under oath, he explained: "My net worth fluctuates, and it goes up and down with markets and with attitudes and with feelings, even my own feelings." Between 1986 and 1990, Trump earned at least $375.2 million-averaging $1.6 million weekly. Yet by spring 1990, he couldn't pay his bills. Despite claiming $3 billion in wealth, he missed a $73 million mortgage payment on Trump's Castle Casino. The Kenneth Leventhal accounting firm calculated his actual net worth at negative $295 million. The Casino Control Commission deemed him "too big to fail," threatening banks with license revocation if they foreclosed-allowing Trump to pay back less than owed while receiving $60 million in new loans. In 2004, Trump launched Trump University, falsely claiming professors would be "handpicked by me." The operation wasn't legally a university, the "faculty" were commissioned salespeople, and when deposed in 2012, Trump couldn't name a single instructor. Texas investigators found it taught outdated information "of little practical value" using high-pressure tactics to push the $35,000 "Gold Elite" package. Despite recommending a $5.4 million restitution demand, Attorney General Greg Abbott took no action-three years before Trump donated $35,000 to Abbott's gubernatorial campaign.

   Chapter 7

   The Architect of His Own Reality

   Trump invented "John Baron, a vice president of the Trump Organization" to plant stories with journalists, often claiming women were in awe of him. In 1991, reporter Sue Carswell received a call from "John Miller"-immediately recognizing Trump himself detailing his relationships with beautiful women. Trump aggressively marketed the Trump Ocean Resort in Baja, with Ivanka claiming she was personally buying a unit. After the 2007 crash, buyers discovered neither Trump nor his organization were developers-they had merely licensed the name. Similar deceptions occurred in Waikiki and Tampa, where Trump's non-involvement was buried in "micro-script that can barely be read without a magnifying glass." This pattern reveals Trump's obsession with wealth, objectification of women, and attacks on journalists. He files lawsuits not to win but to drain resources and discourage scrutiny. Johnston notes Trump is compelled by money-while others value honor, he sees wealth as the ultimate measure. What emerges is a portrait valuing revenge over reconciliation, appearance over substance, and personal loyalty over ethics.

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