The NY Times got hold of the new book by Trump’s nephew. It’s exactly what you would expect:
In 2020, a few months before the last election, former President Donald J. Trump’s niece, Mary Trump, published a book about her uncle and how awful and psychologically warped she found him to be. At the time, her brother, Fred C. Trump III, put out a statement slamming his sister for such treachery.
Now, he’s wielding the knife. Next week, he will publish “All in the Family: The Trumps and How We Got to Be This Way,” a tell-all that puts the former president in a harsh light. The New York Times obtained a copy.
Fred isn’t like his sister Mary. He was upset about her hostility and remained fairly close to his uncle even visiting from time to time at the White House where Trump would brag about how he killed terrorists.
But the relationship soured because of this:
Fred Trump’s son was born with a rare medical condition that led to developmental and intellectual disabilities. His care had been paid for in part with help from the family. After Mr. Trump was elected, Fred Trump wanted to use his connection to the White House for good. With the help of Ivanka Trump, his cousin, and Ben Carson, at the time the housing and urban development secretary, he was able to convene a group of advocates for a meeting with his uncle. The president “seemed engaged, especially when several people in our group spoke about the heart-wrenching and expensive efforts they’d made to care for their profoundly disabled family members,” he writes.
After the meeting, Fred Trump claims, his uncle pulled him aside and said, “maybe those kinds of people should just die,” given “the shape they’re in, all the expenses.”
The remark wasn’t a one-off, according to Fred Trump. A couple of years later, when he called his uncle for help because the medical fund that paid for his son’s care was running out of money, Fred Trump claims his uncle said: “I don’t know. He doesn’t recognize you. Maybe you should just let him die and move down to Florida.”
That’s the least surprising story about Trump I’ve ever heard. As is the fact that he used the “N” word. Of course that’s who he is.
This is important:
One thing the book makes clear is that, in the Trump family, score-settling and feuding is a way of life. “Blood went only so far in this family,” he writes, “as far as the dollar signs.”
Fred Trump’s account retreads the well-documented fight that occurred after his uncle teamed up with two of his siblings to cut him and his sister out of their grandfather’s will. The legal battle that ensued was vicious and public, chronicled in the pages of the city’s tabloids.
And yet, once it was all settled, Fred writes that his uncle invited him to go golfing. “We’re through, right?” he asked him. When his nephew said they were, the elder Mr. Trump gave him a hug. (Then, according to the book, he stepped away and added, “Your lawyer never should have said that thing about your grandfather’s toupee.”)
Fergawdsakes. Trump tried to steal the family fortune to pay for his massive business losses and largely succeeded. I guess Fred thought he could get something out of him in the end if he sucked up. But I guess he had his limits. Trump wanted him to let his son die. He is the most indecent man on the planet.
In one peculiar scene at the end of the book, he recounts going to see his uncle after he had left the White House, because he was having trouble finding work. (Fred worked in commercial real estate, but not for the Trump Organization.) He told his uncle that their family’s name was now too “toxic,” and the former president “gave a small jolt” at hearing that.
As he turned to walk out, he claims his uncle admonished him: “Don’t ever say that the Trump name is toxic. Never say that.”
The Trump name is toxic. There’s only one other name that I can think of that’s equally so and it starts with an H.