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(DRAMATIC ORCHESTRAL MUSIC) (BIRDSONG)

MICHAEL WOLFF: I've written three books about Donald Trump.

It's an incredible story...

Whether we want it to be or not, it is the story of our time.

And, um, if you're a writer,

I hate to say it, but he's a God send.

He's full of mystery.

How does this guy not be brought down by all the things

that always seem about to bring him down?

My last book Landslide finishing with the impeachment

that followed January 6th should've been the end of the story.

Are you ready?

(READING ALOUD)

"The age of modern bureaucracy demands, at the very least,

being able to sit through a meeting without barking like a dog."

TRUMP: This is a major fraud in our nation.

We were getting ready to win this election.

Frankly, we did win this election.

(CHEERING) We did win this election.

"From the careening and calamitous last stage

of his re-election campaign,

through the preposterous election challenge

and the deadly mayhem of January 6th..."

We're going to walk down and I'll be there with you

because you'll never take back our country with weakness.

You have to show strength, and you have to be strong.

(INDISTINCT YELLING)

"..there emerges a much different picture from the one

much of the media has painted of a corrupt, cynical,

despotic effort to hold on to power and to subvert democracy.

Here, instead, is a far more complicated human

and political tale of desperation and delusion.

It is one that should by any logic have ended on January 6th."

We love you.

We will be back in some form.

Have a good life.

We will see you soon.

"But the most striking and determinative fact

of the political age is that the Trump story continues,

even in defeat, to be inspirational to so many,

and why all Republican roads now lead to Mar-a-Lago."

This book came about after a long sit-down interview with him.

Trump was in effective exile in Mar-A-Lago.

I mean he's been banished.

The Republican party has turned against him.

He hardly has a friend in the world.

I think, yes.I don't know how you feel about that.

I mean, I feel... I'll put it this way.

What I'm interested in is the excitement of the story,

the fight. Which is still going on.

Yes, and what I like about that period is that you... fought.

'How do you get anything out of Donald Trump?

You know, there's a journalistic pose here in which

you might challenge him.

Or you can take the approach which I took here,

which is just to egg him on.'

(OVER RECORDING) "This is a big thing that's happened.

I mean, it's a very complicated thing.

Somebody must have been coordinating this.

If we find that...

I mean, we have so much evidence of voter fraud."

'At that point in time, so the spring of 2021,

it immediately started to seem possible that he could run again.

I saw a group of people beginning to form around him,

something was coming together.

I felt a sense of story that this was a tale to tell.'

I thought "OK, I should...

..put my boots back on."

(DRAMATIC ORCHESTRAL MUSIC CONTINUES)

January 2024.

(READING ALOUD)

Trump was irritated by the cold.

And he was irritated by the hotel,

invaluably expressing his irritation to most everyone on his call list.

He berated his entourage, "Why are we staying here?

This place is no good.

Who picked this place? Who put us here?"

Trump was always unhappy when he wasn't in his own bed,

between his own sheets.

(READS ALOUD)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

If you have a right ear, that would be great.

Your... So, this one? Or right? OK.

Right-Right ear.

REPORTER: The filing centre is already buzzing with activity.

There are people here from all across the world.

All of them looking to see who Iowa Republicans

will pick as their first choice for president,

and we'll actually get a little insight into what those results...

Well, Trump liked it yesterday.

'Here we are again.' I'm feeling pretty optimistic.

'I am now in the midst of a fourth book

because this story continues to go on.

No one as surprised as I am.'

Great and what's... How long?

It'll be about three, four minutes. Great.

'I've covered campaigns before,

that's a fairly tried and true path.'

I'm just going to bring in our US election expert Michael Wolff,

a journalist and author of three books on Donald Trump,

including the worldwide bestseller Fire and Fury. Michael...

'But this is different because there are these trials.'

Trump is fighting two different battles.

One is an... is an easy battle for him.

It's-It's... He's going to get the votes.

He is getting the votes.

The other, a much more uncertain battle, which is in the courts.

'And this isn't one trial.

This is multiple trials.

And it is possible that they will all come to trial

before Election Day a year from now.'

There have been four indictments, and, um...

and all they've done so far for the Trump campaign

is given them a boost in the polls

and a boost in the amount of money that they've... that they've raised.

'The stakes here for Donald Trump could not be higher.

It is very possible that he will be convicted,

he will lose, and he will go to jail for the rest of his life.'

I do think that he surrounds himself in chaos

and we can't be a country in disarray

and have a world on fire, and be in chaos.

I do think that these court cases are distracting.

'Nikki Haley is certainly hoping it presents an opportunity.'

He's trying to bully me and anyone who supports me.

'She has come to represent that isolated

outer edge of the Republican Party,

who sees Donald Trump as morally unacceptable.'

Well, I've dealt with bullies my entire life.

They don't intimidate me.

They only motivate me further.

And I never met a bully I couldn't take on.

How close would Nikki Haley have to get for you to think

that she does have a whisper of a chance in this race?

You know, I don't think that there is.

I mean unless she... unless there was...

there was an upset which everyone would find unimaginable.

I don't think that she has-has a chance. Um...

'I don't think anybody has quite come to grips with the fact that

Donald Trump is a fait accompli.

You know, anybody could win.

Who knows what's gonna happen?'

When it's very, very clear what's gonna happen.

There's only one thing.

There has only been one person...

..since the Republican party, since 2016.

(PHONE CHIMES)

I just had a push.

ANNOUNCER: CNN projects that Donald Trump

will win the Iowa caucuses.

CNN can make this projection based on his overwhelming...

(CHUCKLES)

And they get paid for that?

'Everybody has misunderstood this Trump phenomenon.

They haven't been able to explain it, certainly.

And I'm not saying that I have any better explanation,

but what I'm saying is that you can, I think,

begin to understand more about what he is by the people who enable him.'

(APPLAUSE)

TRUMP: I want to thank Susie, I have to say, and Chris.

Chris, they want no accolades. They just want a victory,

and they want to make America great again.

That's all they want, actually. They don't wanna be speaking.

They don't wanna have pictures.

They just want to do their job, right?

I want to thank you very much, Jason, everybody.

You're really fantastic.

'You have no idea what kind of life this is.

I mean, it's just the worst possible life to do what they do...

..tending to someone who basically doesn't listen to you.

Remember, the job is if you're good at this, the job is just to win.

Just think of it as anyone in the marketing business.'

When you have to sell the product,

you seem to believe in the product, and you say all the right things

that you have to about the product, and then you leave the office

or go out and you go, "Oh, my God, what a piece of shit."

MAN: To someone like you?

To someone like me. Yes.

(LIGHT MUSIC)

'The people around Donald Trump,

I don't think that they have any illusions.

They believe that Joe Biden can do very little to win this race.'

That is not the fight that Joe Biden has.

'But they believe that Donald Trump can do

an awful lot to lose this race.

They're not worried about Joe Biden,

they're worried about their candidate.'

(CHEERING)

'The interesting thing about this time around is that

there is a core group of

reasonable professionals running this campaign.

And there are three principal players.

There's Chris LaCivita.'

I have a T-shirt that says "I'm probably lying".

(CHUCKLES) I wear that occasionally

to meetings with the press. (LAUGHS)

'And the only measure of their success is to win.

If that means embracing something they don't believe in,

well, they'll do that.'

TRUMP:

The president wants the best. You know, who's the best?

Well, I am.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

There's another, a man by the name Jason Miller.

I think we saw tonight

was someone who's ready to go back to the Oval Office.

Who's ready to get this country turned around.

Who's ready to save America once again.

'In 2016, he got a campaign staffer pregnant

awkwardly at the same time that his wife was pregnant.

This resulted in a barely contained scandal,

and the only person who didn't seem to mind this was Donald Trump.'

I will always accept the results of an honest election.

'And so he went back to work for the campaign.'

This one's different. This one's much more personal.

This is very much a sense of unfinished business.

If we don't save the US now,

we don't know if the country's ever gonna look the same.

'And the third person is a woman by the name of Susie Wiles.

She's run campaigns, and she's from a political family in Florida.'

We complement each other in a lot of different ways.

I'm the gas, she's the brakes.

Let's go, everybody.

'Their skill set is tactical.

Whatever is the path to victory.'

(TRAFFIC HUMMING)

(DOOR RATTLING, SLIDING)

(DISTANT SIREN BLARING)

MAN: (OVER RECORDING)

'Hardly a day passes without somebody from Trump world calling me

with a phone call that will invariably start:

"you won't believe it".

'People do like their say.

They do like to represent their experience without fear

that it will show up in the paper the next day.

What I say shows up quite a number of months later,

and I've been very trustworthy to these people.

I don't reveal who my sources are.

And the benefit is I'm telling you things that

you would not know otherwise.'

All I do is cook and write.

That's it. That's it.

And shop for the food that he's gonna cook.

I gotta shop, too. Gotta shop.

Nothing else.

I would say it's very satisfying to cook and feed my family,

but my children hate my food, so.

Eat.

What are the headlines?

Mm... Not exactly any headlines.

Can you believe that we're going to the Rockettes tomorrow?

Well, I have a 9:40 Jitney.

We're gonna... Yeah, we're gonna say goodbye.

Yep.

The camera guy's coming with you?

Yes, cos I'm posing as a... as a writer.

Who needs to take a break from his family.

In a country house. The writer has to go and...

for seclusion. He wants to be alone.

Yes. Which is not...

..in fact, true.

I don't like to be alone.

But... for the cinema.

You're not gonna make it- You're gonna be like,

"Don't have enough paper towels."

You don't? No, I don't know. I sure I do.

But I'm coming back on Sunday.

(BIRDS SQUAWKING) (GENTLE MUSIC)

'Trump made three trips to New Hampshire,

growing more and more irritated with the other woman, Nikki Haley,

who is gaining attention

and preparing to make money off of his name.

She was in this not to win, but just to be the last person against him.

How did I walked into Donald Trump's world?

In a sense, I guess, we all ask ourselves that question.

As it happened, I knew Donald Trump from New York.

For a long period of time, I wrote a column about the media

for New York magazine.

I became one of the people at the magazine who he would call up

to complain about what was written about him,

or more often than not, complain when we did not write about him.'

You're going to have to start pushing these people now

a little bit cos it's getting a little ridiculous

as far as I'm concerned. So, just start pushing,

and start pushing as hard as possible.

'So, I got along fairly well with Donald Trump.'

(LAUGHS) You love me, you love me. Yes! Yes!

That's nice, I love you too. Oh, my God, thank you.

'Years forward, you know, he becomes this...

this extraordinary television star,

um, and then he starts to run for president.'

Let's get inside. I gotta go back to work.

I still gotta work. Bye everybody.

One more, one more. But then, in February or March

of 2016, I was writing a column for The Hollywood Reporter,

and the editor had called me and said,

do you want to interview Trump?

Um...

Um... And I was like, well, you know,

that-that could be amusing.

'It was not a hate story, but it was...

it was a critical story, I was making fun of him.

And his response was "great cover".

I have no idea if he ever even read the article.

It didn't make any difference. He liked the cover.

That then provided me with the entree to keep going on this,

because from that point on,

the story really kept getting bigger and bigger and bigger.

And I kept putting off doing everything else,

like taking my family on vacation. because the end was coming.

Election Day would be the end.

There would be no more Donald Trump.'

And then 8:30 on election night...

CNN can report that Hillary Clinton

has called Donald Trump to concede the race.

And that's when I made the proposal, I said,

"Why don't I come into the White House

and write about the first...

the first hundred days?"

REPORTER: It's flying out of bookstores

and into the national consciousness.

It's number one on both the New York Times and Amazon bestseller list.

'I think when my book Fire and Fury came out,

a lot of people thought this was bad for him,

that actually, my book could contribute to bringing him down.'

I consider it a work of fiction, and I think it's a disgrace that

somebody is able to have something... do something like that.

'Obviously, that didn't happen.

So, you might then reasonably ask, did this book help him?

It somehow turned the chaos into something recognisable.'

I mean, he doesn't look like up close like anyone

you have ever seen before. (LAUGHTER)

'And then when chaos is recognisable,

you can make the argument that it's no longer chaos.

And, um...

I don't know how I feel about that.'

(UPBEAT STRING MUSIC)

REPORTER: Michael Wolff's first book on the Trump White House was an international sensation

that garnered plenty of controversy. His follow up book is also being

criticized largely about sourcing.

You have, frankly, frauds like Michael Wolff

publishing without making any efforts to fact check,

um, fiction under the banner of non-fiction.

I find that I'm a fairly polarizing figure among many journalists,

and I try to sometimes make the distinction I'm not

principally a journalist, I'm principally a writer.

Pardon me.

'My function is to describe what I see.'

REPORTER:: This idea that as a reporter you have your one source,

and you believe them credible enough when you not even going to give

the other side the luxury of hearing what you're about to publish.

What strikes me as odd about Wolff is that he says

because he doesn't work for, say, The Washington Post,

or The Atlantic, or The Daily Beast, he doesn't have to do that,

as though reporters are only calling for comment

because of the dictates of the institution they work for,

as opposed to it just being ethically sound thing to do.

Usually, after a book comes out everybody says,

"Well, who are your sources?" Um...

And I say, "Well, I can't tell you who my sources are,"

and there's a kind of jostling about that.

And it's usually from other journalists,

I mean, I don't find readers saying, "Who's your sources?"

(APPLAUSE)

INTERVIEWER: You frequently depend on single source accounts.

How do you gauge the trust worthiness of some of

these folks that you're talking to, especially when the environment

that they are working in so "back stab-y"?

You-You know, I know these people.

I mean, you know the people who are...

who are reliable.

And there have been some people, um, in some instances that prove

not to be reliable, but you get rid of them, um...

And, um, and-and you...

you continue on with, at this point, the people who-who brought you.

(APPLAUSE) 'I have no agenda.

I have no point. I have no political axe to grind here.

I am just looking for this incredible story to unfold.'

Let me have the prosciutto cotto and Swiss cheese.

Um, I want a, um...

A skimmed milk cappuccino.

Everything is to go?

Everything... Um, no, no, here. OK.

Yeah, here is great.

Uh, that will be...

'Recently, Nikki Haley ended her campaign.'

HALEY: The time has now come to suspend my campaign.

And although I will no longer be a candidate,

I will not stop using my voice for the things I believe in.

Donald Trump will be the Republican nominee, I congratulate him.

'So, there is now nothing standing in a way of Trump's nomination.'

You've had two things that have gone on for the past year.

You've had this campaign for the Republican nomination,

and then you've had this...

this legal battle, this legal onslaught

um, and the...

the race for the Republican nomination has been

hands down successful. I mean... I mean, over...

I don't think that there's ever been an example in which

a candidate has been as successful

as quickly as Donald Trump has been.

And at the same time, flip the coin around,

and you have one indictment, two indictments,

three indictments, four indictments.

There're so many cases, they all roll together as one.

Um, you could barely find a man on the street,

you can barely find people in the campaign

to, kind of, make the distinctions, you know,

"This is the, um..."

You know, "This is the Hush Money case,

this is the Boxes Document case,

this is The January 6th case, this is The Atlanta case."

Which is... Nobody knows what's going on there.

'And of course, his central legal strategy has been delay,

and it's worked out very well.'

It turns out if you have enough lawyers,

they'll just keep making motions after motions after motions

to push these cases and keep pushing them,

um, except that now one has fallen through the cracks and it is here.

It's a little disruptive, you know.

I mean, it's...

(GENTLE ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

REPORTER: Happening today, former President Trump's historic

New York Hush Money trial begins, making him the first ever

former president to stand for a criminal trial.

'Because all the other trials Trump has managed

to push beyond the election.

This trial kind of comes to stand in for all of them.

And the campaign teams worry about this.

You know, to be convicted of a felony might have

psychic implications for many, many, many voters that are unanticipated.

It's all part of an elaborate effort not to face him

on the ballot box in November.

And look, it won't be over.

Even when he wins,

it's not going to be over till he takes the oath of office.

At this point in the campaign, we're not in a battle run state,

we're not in Michigan, we're not in Pennsylvania,

we're not in Wisconsin, we're in New York.

Why are we in New York? Because President Trump is on trial.

Much rather be on the campaign trail, but we're stuck here.

This sham prosecution, this insanity,

this abomination has to stop now.

If this case happened four years ago,

you'd have had The Rock, you'd have had Cardi B.

Instead, they have Robert De Niro in a mask, limping his way to a stage,

getting shouted down by New Yorkers in his own town.

I mean, this is really...

Even these people over here are kinda...

(INDISTINCT DISTANT SHOUTS)

It's kind of crazy.

They lost the pop culture that the Democrats had because

the situation they've created over the last four years is so bad.

It's so palpable.

MAN: We love you, Trump! We love you!

We're for you, Trump!

'Many Democrats have felt that this would seriously

handicap his ability to campaign.

But with these trials, essentially, he brings the campaign to himself.

Nobody else is gonna be interested in anything

but what is happening in these courtrooms.

It will be all about Donald Trump.'

And does the system destroy Donald Trump,

or does Donald Trump destroy the system?

(SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC)

REPORTER: Stormy on the stand.

The next witness in the Trump trial will be Stormy Daniels.

She is expected to testify, of course,

about getting paid off by Michael Cohen to keep

her alleged affair with the former president secret.

(READING ALOUD)

(GAVEL BANGS) STORMY: As much as I didn't want

to get up there and face that, the only thing that

I could think of being worse is if the prosecution didn't call me.

Public perception of that would have been they didn't trust her.

She's not credible.

And that's just something that I wasn't willing.

I'd rather get shot at than have everybody think,

"Oh, wow, she's the star witness and they decided not to call her."

But nothing can really prepare you. It's intense.

The trial was about campaign finance violations,

you know, paperwork, boring stuff.

Um, but the press, the media,

the public continued, and would not stop calling it

the Stormy Daniels Hush Money Trial, which is not what it was.

The problem with that is that lead everyone to attack me.

She's a little off this woman.

And to subject this jury to the testimony that

they had to listen to that is totally irrelevant, not probative,

and prejudicial in this case.

And she acts like what she is. They were like, "Why did you have

to talk about his penis?" Now, we all know that

if I was lying, he would have dropped his pants a long time ago

or gotten a doctor's note.

Or has Melania been like, "She's wrong.

I know what my husband's genitals look like, and that's not it"?

Nope, not a peep. Cos she knows I'm telling the truth.

Susan Necheles sought to shame Stormy Daniels,

not just to her face, but in front of the jurors

to say, "This porn star slut isn't telling the truth."

His attorney came up, and she was a fucking bitch.

She tried to, like, slut shame me.

I mean, read the testimony.

Like it is next level. But then I was like, "Game on".

I don't start fights, but I do finish them.

REPORTER: Stormy Daniels kept her cool today.

I actually thought she performed better on cross-examination

than she did on direct examination.

She answered the questions. She was careful. She was listening.

She was thoughtful. So, I don't think it will work.

She said, "Well, you're used to making up stories

because you write porn."

I mean, it is so offensive. And then she was like,

"You are just making money off of this.

Like you signed autographs." I'm like, "So does he!"

At least I'm signing autographs of the books I wrote.

This motherfucker is signing copies of the Bible.

I looked right at him.

He just...

You know. He just muttered.

He spoke, maybe... I could hear him muttering,

but I don't know what it was, but he doesn't intimidate me.

REPORTER: It's almost as if Trump

and the lawyers who he is directing to a certain extent,

and we've seen that, are mad at her

for trying to, kind of, take back her power.

If I could barely handle this,

I don't think there's another person in the entire world that could have.

I was the perfect storm, pun intended,

because I don't have a family that could have been threatened.

I don't have a mainstream job that I could have lost.

You know what I mean? Like what...

How are you going to shame me after doing porn for so long?

Somebody else could have been hurt

so much more seriously than I could have.

There could've been so much more collateral damage.

You can't imagine this has been easy for her,

but she yet withstood this under fire.

A lot of fire.

It was all about trying to undermine her credibility.

And I would say they didn't succeed, and they may have failed miserably.

Yes, how are you?

No, I can't. I need...

I need one of those. I just...

So, it's as I explained, you know,

I'm just having dinner with somebody, and I can't...

We can't be spotted.

OK. So, I have to...

OK. I'll have to find some other place then. Um...

OK, bye.

Oh, damn.

Yeah. Hi, it's Michael Wolff,

and I wonder if I can get a reservation for 8:45?

But the catch is, I need that...

the table, the hidden table at the back.

OK. Thanks a lot. Bye-bye.

I am sneaking out to have dinner with...

..a-a close... someone in the close Trump circle...

..who will tell me what is...

what has been going on for the last several days.

Thanks. You're welcome.

(DISTANT SIREN BLARING)

'This story that I'm trying to tell really depends upon people

willing to tell you all kinds of stuff

that they should not tell you in any way.'

(TRAFFIC HUMMING)

The message was that Trump is really beating up his lawyers.

I guess this gets to the point of just borders on abuse.

"You're drawing her out and keeping her on the stand.

She's a lying scumbag, and I never had sex with her,

and you keep letting her say I did."

(READING ALOUD)

"You're losing it completely.

You're making her look sympathetic.

She's a scumbag, and you're making her look good.

Do you know that's what you're doing? Do you see that?

Everybody else sees that.

How can you not see that?"

(DRAMATIC ORCHESTRAL MUSIC)

(GENTLE MUSIC)

REPORTER: The jury in the Donald Trump

criminal hush money trial has reached a verdict.

Count one, guilty.

Count two, guilty.

Count three, guilty.

REPORTER 2: We're hearing guilty on one through five.

One through 12 we have now, 13, 14, guilty.

Guilty on all 34 felony counts.

That is the verdict here in this case.

I was sitting on the sofa with my daughter

and I was just sobbing.

TRUMP: 'This was a rigged, disgraceful trial.

And the real verdict is going to be November 5th by the people.'

And we'll keep fighting. We'll fight till the end

and we'll win because our country's gone to hell.

We don't have the same country anymore.

We have a divided mess.

(INDISTINCT ARGUING)

And we will fight for our Constitution.

This is long from over. Thank you very much.

(REPORTER SHOUTING INDISTINCTLY)

These people are all scumbags. They're all the scum of the earth.

And what we are doing now is we created a brand new wave.

I can't wait for November 5th

cos now you're gonna see a guaranteed win.

(BIRDS CHIRPING)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

Is that awkward? (INDISTINCT CHATTER)

OK.

Three things going on.

First, it's really a question for him and for the people around him

how he converts this loss,

catastrophic loss, into victory.

So, he's just been convicted after six weeks in court,

he's lost resoundingly, but he went from court to a fundraiser,

and then there was a Daily Mail pole,

which put him up six points.

You see the boom that came from that.

You know, he-he got convicted on 34 counts and his popularity goes up.

He raises $400 million in less than a week.

And he had a $100 million from big tech Silicon Valley.

You know, these are people who in 2020 would have

lined up behind Joe Biden. (CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

I'm thrilled to be back in the city I grew up in,

the city I spent my life in, the city I helped build,

and the city that we all love, New York City.

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE) He's just a fighter.

Once he's in the game, he doesn't stop. He's an animal.

(SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC)

This is the first of two debates,

the first direct match up, Joe Biden versus Donald Trump.

This is being billed as make or break.

Trump's still slightly ahead in...

in several key swing states, but slightly.

This is a big moment.

The Trump campaign has defined Joe Biden as senile.

So, a moment of bewildered equivocation

could be devastating to him.

But in Trump's mind it's,

"We can't go too hard on Joe Biden,

because if we do, that will encourage the Democrats

to replace him, and Joe Biden

is the weakest person he could run against."

ANNOUNCER: (ON VIDEO) Donald Trump for President, again.

I'm Donald Trump and I approve this message.

Chili dog?

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

Can I get a plain hot dog, um,

a seltzer, sparkling water, and French fries?

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

Is this the look we're going for?

'All of these debates, there is really very little point to them.'

We invented this as a media form.

Essentially, you have these people going, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

We discuss tonight domestic issues.

And it's largely without meaning, largely without detail.

There is no question but that this nation cannot stand still.

Incredibly boring.

I think we can save money through this whole

very sophisticated concept, Andrea, that I know you do understand,

of competitive strategies.

And then a guy comes along who does this for a living.

He's a reality television star and producer.

You've called women you don't like fat pigs,

dogs, slobs, and disgusting animals.

Your Twitter account- Only Rosie O'Donnell.

(LAUGHTER)

No, it wasn't.

I mean, that is actually the moment when everybody should have known

that something profound had changed in American political life.

I don't, frankly, have time for total political correctness.

INTERVIEWER:

You know, I mean, on...

You know, on one hand, let me...

let me confess, I am grateful for there

to be something worth looking at

and listening to, and something to wake me up.

Um, I mean, the fact that this is a...

..a monster. I mean, monsters are, you know, reliable...

um, reliable showstoppers. Um...

Donald Trump walking into this suddenly brings life

back to something that was completely dead.

Um, now, if it's a...

if that's, you know, a weird life and a, um...

..um, and a kind of a sick life, and, you know...

Yeah, but it's at least life.

(DRAMATIC MUSIC)

Hey. How are you? I just want to introduce myself.

Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you.

Um, are you writing another book or...

No I... Who knows? It's always like...

There's something. Yeah.There's always something,

Well, good to see you. Just wanted to say hi.

Very nice meeting you.

WOMAN: Governor, why is Donald Trump doing so well in the polls then?

I mean, he's doing... I guess he's doing fine.

We have a divided country.

Donald Trump believes that if Joe Biden falls on his face tonight,

that the likelihood is that he would be replaced by Governor Newsom.

So, the possibilities of that are giving Newsom

the biggest crowds so far.

So, I'm not... I'm just not of that mindset.

I mean, nobody really believes that Joe Biden

can be replaced at this point, even if disaster strikes.

(SUSPENSEFUL MUSIC)

LACIVITA: We felt that the White House would ensure that

Biden would have whatever was medically available

to get him through an hour and a half of standing up

and going toe to toe with President Trump.

We actually said that there should be a drug test,

um, and you throw out things like that

to draw attention, "Oh, what are they going to give him?

ANNOUNCER: We want to welcome our viewers in the United States

and around the world to our studios in Atlanta.

This is the CNN presidential debate.

Now, please welcome the 46th

president of the United States, Joe Biden.

(DIALOGUE MUTED)

'Joe Biden crept unsteadily,

his balance gravely in doubt up to the lectern.

The immediate signal could hardly be misread.

Whoever had conceived of this debate as a viable platform

had made a woeful gamble.

More than 50 million people were tuned in,

and there were few who could not see the trouble ahead.

Except for Trump.

From where he was entering, he couldn't see it.

Sauntering in with his usual ready for bare face,

he had yet no idea that the game was already in radical transition.'

Gentlemen, thanks so much for being here. Let's begin the debate.

And let's start with the issue that voters consistently say

is their top concern, the economy.

We're going to take a look at what I was left when I became president.

'He was concentrating on his own opening

and hardly listening to Biden's first catastrophic responses.

He thought he had heard Biden claim

that he had created 15,000 new jobs...

..15,000 new jobs...

..instead of 15 million, but assumed he'd heard wrong.

Within minutes of the start, no one was listening

to what Joe Biden was saying, or trying to say.

It was all just unremitting

an excruciating spectacle, and riveting.

Making sure they were able to make every single solitary person...

(STAMMERS) ..eligible for what I've been able to do

with the Covid... (STAMMERS)

..excuse me, with, um, dealing with everything we have to do with, uh...

Look, if...

We finally beat Medicare.

Thank you, President Biden. President Trump?

Well, he's right. He did beat Medicare. He beat it to death.

'Trump, concentrating on his own remarks,

was only slowly understanding that Biden was performing weakly.'

Now, you're in a situation where there are 40% fewer people

coming across the border illegally.

That's better than when he left office.

And I'm going to continue to move until we get the total ban

on the... the total initiative relative to what

we're going to do with more border patrol

and more asylum officers. President Trump?

I really don't know what he said at the end of that sentence.

I don't think he knows what he said either. Look...

we had the safest border in the history of our country.

The border... All he had to do was leave it.

'It was at least 20 minutes in, those crucial first 20 minutes...

..before he understood what was certainly clear

to most of the vast audience.

This might be the most bewildering moment that had ever occurred

to a presidential debater.

This wasn't a mess up.

This was human pathos.

Joe Biden was sundowning before 50 million people.'

We are failing nation, but it's not gonna be failing anymore.

We're gonna make it great again.

WOMAN: Thank you, former President Trump, President Biden.

Stay with us because we have full analysis of this debate.

Yikes.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

LACIVITA: Look, there's gonna be a lot of talk

because there are so many political experts on Twitter, right?

My God, it's just filled...

What you have here are people waiting for, um...

waiting for someone to come out and defend Joe Biden.

And no one is coming out and defending Joe Biden.

Uh, so, this is now entirely a Republican spin room.

I think at the end of this, we're gonna have to, like,

identify Joe Biden by his dental records he was bludgeoned so badly.

He was drooling on himself,

half the time he had his mouth open, catching flies.

I don't envy my Democratic friends here who've had to stand here

and try to defend Joe Biden's debate performance, which was disastrous.

Here's the problem...

My God. Um...

Well, let's go...

'I don't know what happens now.

I mean, I'm shocked by the whole thing.'

Right now, as we speak, there is a deep,

a wide, and a very aggressive panic in the Democratic Party.

It started minutes into the debate, and it continues right now.

And they're having conversations about the president's performance,

which they think was dismal, and they're having conversations

about what they should do about it.

REPORTER: Would you prefer Joe Biden to stay on the ticket,

or is there somebody else?

Joe Biden is not... Joe Biden is not going anywhere.

The only way Joe Biden is dumped off the ticket

is if he voluntarily decides he's not going to do it,

and he's not going to make that decision.

Thank you. Thanks, guys.

You know, I think, OK, you know, this is...

how does this... how does this disrupt the narrative?

My narrative.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

(SOMBRE MUSIC)

REPORTER: That was painful. He didn't do well at all.

Uh, he...

He did not do well at all. REPORTER 2: You cannot tell me

democracy is on the line and then give that performance.

Based on that, in 18 weeks,

Donald Trump will be the president elect.

REPORTER 3: President Biden is facing calls

to drop his bid for re-election.

That's after his debate performance against Donald Trump.

REPORTER 4: The next few days will be critical

if he's to salvage his imploding campaign and convince America...

'This becomes the story.

Biden and the Democrats have occupied the media now

for a steady two weeks.

And for the Trump campaign, this is their greatest fear,

when someone else becomes the story.

They don't know what to do.'

During the campaign, one of Trump's people said to me, um,

"Our only matrix is attention.

Good, bad doesn't make any difference.

The more attention we get, the more the numbers go up."

He is the mover. By dominating the media,

he dominates the election.

And suddenly he's lost all that.

Who wants to hear about Donald Trump

when you have this Shakespearean drama being worked out

in the Democratic Party?

Everybody's looking at their news feed.

Has Biden resigned? Is it over?

(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)

REPORTER: Hi, Shannon. A very hot day here in

the swing state of Pennsylvania, but that didn't stop

these massive crowds behind us from showing up here

to try and catch a glimpse of the former president on that stage

here in Butler, Pennsylvania,

before he heads to Milwaukee for the RNC.

(CROWD CHANTING "USA!")

If you wanna really see something that's sad,

take a look at what happened- (GUNSHOTS)

(WOMAN SHRIEKS) MAN: Get down! Get down!

(GUNFIRE) (CROWD SCREAMING)

Hold, hold. When you're ready. On you.

(INDISTINCT SHOUTING) Move! Move!

(GUNSHOT) (WOMAN SCREAMS)

Sir, we've gotta move. WOMAN: Oh, my God. Oh, my God!

Let me get my shoes! How many shots was that?

Shield! Watch out.

Wait, wait, wait, wait.

(TENSE MUSIC) (CROWD CHEERING)

REPORTER: The FBI is investigating the shooting at

Saturday's Trump rally as an assassination attempt.

The former president appeared to be hit but is OK.

Three men in the crowd were shot... REPORTER 2: These are not only

the images that are seared into the minds of Americans.

These are the images that are now going to fuel

Donald Trump's campaign. An image of the former president,

the presumptive Republican nominee,

bloodied with his fist up in the air,

surrounded by Secret Service agents

as he's rushed down those stairs and into that armoured vehicle

where he went to a local hospital for treatment.

The former president moving forward full steam ahead with plans

to attend the Republican National Convention tonight.

And President Biden promised every single resource

necessary to ensure the safety of former President Donald Trump.

(CROWD CHANTING "Trump!")

(CROWD CHANTING "USA!")

(CHEERING) (HEROIC MUSIC)

Has anyone ever in the history of American politics

been as lucky as this guy?

You know, he gets shot at, actually hit in the ear. Um...

Um, so, I mean, take a moment to appreciate that

it's-it's in the...

probably the safest place on a human body

to be shot at is the ear.

Um, so, um...

You know, he gets shot, and then he...

and then he gets-gets up again.

I mean, literally in front.

So, producing probably the most

iconic picture since...

I don't know, um...

Iwo Jima.

Um, but even that, that's a, kind of, a group shot.

This is really a singular shot.

Um, and then he has the presence of mind to, um...

uh, to-to mug for the camera, to pump his fist.

This is extraordinary.

(GENTLE MUSIC)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

(METAL DETECTOR SQUEAKING)

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

For Donald Trump, this convention becomes

a hero's welcome, a coronation.

I mean, all of the things you could have only dreamed

that you might want it to be.

Hey. How are you?

Extraordinary.

You know, it's-it's, um...

Well, I mean, I guess Donald Trump is gonna be the next

president of the United States.

Um, I mean, these guys think...

I mean, the Republicans think they are gonna sweep every swing state,

plus Maine, plus Virginia and-and...

Um, um...

Yes. New Hampshire possible.

I mean, they really think Maine, Virginia, and all the swing states,

but everything is breaking their way.

I mean, they're-they're seeing landslide.

It is therefore my honour to nominate Ohio Senator JD Vance

for the office of vice president of the United States of America.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

Choosing Vance was very... full of ambivalence.

You know, he really didn't want to do it.

Because of all the terrible things Vance has said about him.

You know, because Don Jr was supporting him,

and he thinks Don Jr is a dummy.

And then the fact that he's 39, which, you know,

obviously Trump understands, that's going to make him look...

look old.

Up until days ago, he was still seriously debating this.

Right, I mean, Vance has very clearly positioned himself

or repositioned himself

as the MAGA next generation.

Who would have believed, Jesus?

I mean, he was always the story, but now... My God.

Anyway, I'll speak to you next week.

See you. Bye.

YASMINE: What are your plans for this evening?

You know, to go to the convention floor and to smell the crowd.

(APPLAUSE)

We love Trump!

(CHEERING)

(CROWD CHANTING "We got this!")

Hey guys. No worries. Good to meet you, hey!

How are you?

RNC SPEAKER: Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome former governor

of South Carolina and ambassador to the United Nations,

Nikki Hayley.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

To me, Hayley, look like prisoners of war

fighting for their survival.

And so, you have to do what you have to do.

I'll start by making one thing perfectly clear.

Donald Trump has my strong endorsement, period.

Nikki Haley cannot have been pleased with this.

This is just falling into line.

The art of politics is the art of humiliation.

My fellow Americans, it is my honour to introduce

the 45th and soon-to-be 47th President of the United States,

Donald J Trump.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

Let me begin this evening by expressing my gratitude

to the American people

for your outpouring of love and support

following the assassination attempt at my rally on Saturday.

He had had the kind of experience

that necessarily changes a man, even Donald Trump.

And it seems like it could be a great speech.

A genius one.

Together we will launch a new era of safety, prosperity and freedom

for citizens of every race, religion, colour and creed.

The discord and division in our society must be healed.

We must heal it quickly.

For minutes there, it was clear to all, perhaps truly everyone,

that another Trump presidency was inevitable,

even deserved to be.

I'm running to be president for all of America,

not half of America,

because there is no victory in winning for half of America.

But then, he relaxed.

The greatest invasion in history is taking place right now

in our country from Africa, Asia, the Middle East,

they're coming from everywhere, they're coming...

We will drill, baby, drill.

..every week they got another subpoena

from the Democrats crazy Nancy Pelosi,

the whole thing just bum, bum, bum.

A jarring, and even embarrassing juxtaposition between minutes ago,

the man humbled before God, and now the same old, same old.

We've become a dumping ground for the rest of the world,

which is laughing at us, they think we're stupid

and they can't believe that they're getting away

with what they're getting away with,

but they not gonna be getting away with it for long,

that's what I can tell.

OK. We've got huge breaking news right now on Twitter.

Apparently, President Biden is saying that he will step aside

as a candidate.

This is just coming across on social media right now. Breaking news.

The Trump people had become so comfortable or complacent

in their incredible success

that they really hadn't come to terms with the fact

that their success was going to force Biden out of the race.

The Democratic Party appears to have completely

rallied around Kamala Harris...

She experienced, she's tough. She's capable.

..which is curious,

because if the issue was finding the best candidate

to oppose Donald Trump,

you know, essentially,

they've the Democratic Party has now rallied around, you know,

only the second worst candidate.

She has not been a very good politician,

has not been very popular, presents pretty badly.

The opportunity here was to take this story from Donald Trump.

A new face is the only thing that could make Donald Trump old news.

But instead, we have the somewhat old face

and everybody else kind of shying away from this.

DNC SPEAKER: Are you ready for Kamala Harris to win?!

(CHEERING)

Good, because when Kamala wins, America wins.

Having said that, you know, the race does change at this point.

She gets to make a case for herself,

and she has certain built-in advantages.

Trump has been making serious inroads

in the Democratic African American base, Hispanic base, even women.

So now she can reclaim that Democratic advantage.

And it's not impossible that we can return to a race

that hangs in the balance.

This election is not only

the most important of our lives,

it is one of the most important in the life of our nation.

Donald Trump is an unserious man,

but the consequences of putting Donald Trump

back in the White House are extremely serious.

The speed in which he dropped

and then backed her, I think, did surprise us a bit.

We knew her numbers would bounce up,

there'd be a bit of a halo effect, but I'm not sure

we necessarily expected that there would be such the halo effect

of the media who, just two months prior,

were saying all these nasty negative things about her

to then saying she's the one person who could beat Trump

so we have to rally around her.

Very sad time for this country, in many ways.

You had a candidate.

I was no fan of Joe Biden, but the way he was taken out was a coup.

He got 14 million votes and the person running now got none.

She was disgraced.

She was figured out by the Democrat voters.

Now she's running against us.

Thank you, everybody.

(TRAIN HORN TOOTING)

We're on our way to Philadelphia

for the second debate in this 2024 election.

This will be the first time you can compare them side by side.

And I'm not sure and I think a lot of people are afraid of that,

that she's up to that.

I don't want to look at my involvement with this story

as a political involvement.

Some writers are highly political,

and that's what they're interested in.

I'm interested in how a person moves across the room.

What does this person say to that person?

What is the nature of their language?

The tone of their language?

It is very personal. I'm the writer here.

Every word I write is through my eyes.

I can't think of how that could be more personal.

You have to look at this as a kind of farce, as a kind of comedy.

The fact that it has real world implications,

the farce, I think, confuses people

and leads them to say, well, it can't be farce.

And I'm saying, well, I don't know. Let's look at this.

The woman there is Alina Habba, one of the Trump lawyers.

You want to get her.

Trump once said that he may not have the best legal team

or the smartest legal team,

but he has the hottest legal team.

And then he would always show a picture of Alina Habba.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

RFK Jr.

There is no freedom of speech in Europe anymore,

there is no freedom of speech in Brazil,

and this is spreading across, of course,

China and these other countries that don't exist.

So interesting that he's a somebody. ARTHUR: Why?

Why? Because he's, you know, a crazy person.

60% of our kids now have chronic disease

compared to 3.4% when my uncle was president.

He said that Trump's main concern was the children,

which anyone who knows Donald Trump

knows that never once in his life

has he been concerned about the children.

We need to be again the exemplary democracy in the world.

Yep.

If this is about hair, and Donald Trump has clearly made it

about hair, I think Newsom would be a very strong contender.

I assume that there are Democrats here.

I just don't know the Democrats as well.

It's not my beat.

OK. Four minutes to go. Let's go.

ABC ANCHOR: Good evening. We are looking forward

to a spirited and thoughtful debate.

ANCHOR 2: So, let's get started.

They've destroyed the fabric of our country.

Crime in this country is through the roof.

Well, I think this is so rich

coming from someone who has been prosecuted.

When you look at his economic plan

it's all about tax breaks for the richest people.

She doesn't have a plan.

Take a look at her plan, she doesn't have a plan.

She's a Marxist, everybody know she's a Marxist.

In over 20 states there are Trump abortion bans.

Trump abortion bans that make no exception even for rape and incest.

They have done by allowing these millions of people

to come into our country...

In Springfield they're eating the dogs.

The people that came in, they're eating the cats. They're eating...

They're eating the pets of the people that live there,

and this is what's happening in our country.

And it's a shame.

(CHUCKLES) Talk about extreme.

Tonight we saw a someone that has empathy,

who cares about ordinary Americans,

who talks about kitchen sink issues.

(APPLAUSE) Fair, that's very fair.

But what about the pets that are being eaten in Springfield, Ohio?

(AUDIENCE LAUGHS)

They documented video after video where people have said... Cats and dogs?

Yes, people have said that they have pets that are missing,

they have seen animals being decapitated,

people have reported... Cats and dogs?Yes.

You should preserve that law, you shouldn't just allow

that baby to die,

the indifference to a baby born alive is in essence...

At times Donald Trump seemed riled and angry.

MICHAEL: She probably comes out ahead.

She can stand up against this guy.

He got destroyed in this debate. Destroyed.

The reaction that she got was totally flabbergasting,

she went from someone widely disliked

to someone beloved overnight.

The new national Reuters IPSOS poll has Haris ahead by five points.

Let's take a look at that right now.

For both sides, their winning issue, each believes, is the other side.

Donald Trump and the deep aversion to him

on the part of so many Americans is the Democrats winning hand.

In Kamala Harris and the visceral dislike

and deep suspicion of her in MAGA land

is the Trumper's Ace.

A tight race, as tight as any in modern history

could default to the enemy you know.

Are you guys staying here all winter?

We're here.

Do you live in Montauk? I do now.

Oh, nice.

Wow! Oh, nice.

Nice catch.

That is huge!

That's a big male. (INDISTINCT)

In many ways, I've become a kind of court reporter.

I'm often accused of reporting gossip or being a gossip.

That is that kind of quintessential position of the guy

in Louis' court or, you know, of the diarists in London

of a particular time.

You're telling the things that other people,

nicer people, I suppose, would not say.

But I'm telling this story in a way that is true, or I think.

The real question is, does it need to be told?

You know,

we believe we need to be told but maybe politics is just

this illusion that we all support

and perhaps it's completely meaningless.

I have no politics.

I'm a writer. I have a stake in what I'm writing.

I have a stake in being able to take what is in front of me

and put it on the page.

The problem with farm stands is that the people who work here

are bloody incompetent.

Do I have a rooting interest? I have no rooting interest.

I just have a descriptive interest.

ARTHUR: But as a father and a husband,

do you have a different sort of interest?

I... (CHUCKLES)

I think I just answered that question.

I can be more precise here. I don't vote.

I don't want to vote.

That's not what I do.

My job is a different job.

I don't see any reason to add that complication

or that perspective on what I do.

How's the book coming along?

You mean...

Does that mean... Will I finish the book? I will.

I will finish the book. Will I finish the book on time?

I always finish on time.

TV ANCHOR: Now, a judge in New York

throws former President Donald Trump's felony convictions

into some question, delaying his sentencing.

That move comes following Monday's US Supreme Court ruling

granting presidents some immunity for official acts.

The most surprising thing of this campaign is that he survived.

Each of these cases appear to be

each on their own a mortal threat.

That was a key of the Democratic campaign.

At some point it began to be clear

that he was going to circumvent this.

He is...

I think the term would be 'scot-free'.

TV ANCHOR: Tonight, a tape the Kamala Harris campaign

will want Americans to hear.

JOHN KELLY:

So yesterday we learned that Donald Trump's former chief of staff,

John Kelly, a retired four star general,

confirmed that, while Donald Trump was president,

he said he wanted generals like Adolf Hitler had.

Kamala Harris has been groping

for a way to label him and describe him.

So, this immediately became an element of this campaign.

It is clear from John Kelly's words that Donald Trump is someone

who, I quote, "certainly falls into the general definition of fascist."

I mean, fascism implies a fairly structured programme

to realise those kind of corporate populist and authoritarian goals.

Does Donald Trump have that?

Oh... Jeez.

I doubt that he has thought that through in any way.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

Thank you.Thank you. Have some before you lose them.

Was the ice cream machine working?

You want ice cream? I'll get you some ice cream.

But on the other hand, you know,

there are pieces of that which he certainly displays.

So, what is that? What does that add up to?

In a sense to say it is fascism is dignifying it.

I was a spooky one. A spooky one?

OK. But you have to be quiet now because we're making a movie.

And so began what was perhaps the worst week of the campaign.

Having been exiled from New York City,

indeed, convicted by it,

the concurring anti-hero was back at the very centre of it.

20,000 people were at Madison Square Garden

to celebrate him.

Trump is actually re-enacting

the Madison Square Garden rally in 1939.

Neo-Nazis, fascists in America

were lining up to pledge their support for the kind of government

that they were seeing in Germany.

So I don't think we can ignore it.

What do they mean by fascism?

By wanting to have your country be able to survive,

by not wanting to constantly be in other people's wars.

Like, he could cure cancer just by doing this

and they'd totally find something to say 'fascism!'

'Homophobic!' And it's like, we need to stop with these things.

Nobody cares who you sleep with.

Nobody cares what colour you are.

Who is the greatest president in American history?

ALL: Trump!

As Trump backstage railed against his speech writers

for finding nothing new to say,

word started to filter back that Tony Hinchcliffe

whom few have ever heard of

was on stage throwing a bomb into Latino voters

whose margin may well provide the Trump victory.

There's a lot going on, I don't know if you guys know this,

but there's literally a floating island of garbage

in the middle of the ocean right now. Yeah.

I think it's called Puerto Rico.

(CROWD BOOING)

OK... Alright. (CHUCKLES) OK.

WOMAN: You're my female hero

because you said to that man

what every woman in this world wants to say to him.

Frankly, there are way too many men in this world, big, small,

who have little microgram of power over women.

And you showed those women,

"Guess what? My voice means something."

Make sure you vote. Yep.

There is no doubt about voting.

I want to make sure everybody's voting.

While Trump may be holding a rally at Madison Square Garden

purely for his own ego, New York's not gonna to flip, right?

The rest of us are trying to survive on a planet

that is really suffering from climate change.

We're trying to build a world where the next generation

has access to, I don't know, health care and education.

So, it's really wild to be an American right now.

We really are living in two different countries.

(INDISTINCT CHATTER)

Oh, hi Stormy! Hello!

(INDISTINCT) Thank you!

I think we should all worry about Trump.

I worry not just because I'm an actual figure

in this fucked up horror movie,

but also just as an American citizen, as a woman,

as a mother to a daughter,

as a friend to so many gay and trans people.

And yeah, I think that we should all be very afraid.

(CHEERS AND APPLAUSE)

This is so much more than a political movement.

This is the greatest family in the world.

We are fighting for a country we love.

Are you guys ready to take your country back?

(CHEERING)

America is for Americans and Americans only.

If you're outside of the Trump bubble,

it's very hard to appreciate what's going on here.

I mean, it's sort of one moron after another.

Our message to gay Americans tonight, is this.

You're free to marry who you want, if you want,

without the government standing in your way.

But that doesn't mean that boys get to compete with girls

in girls' sports.

Or you do genital mutilation and chemical castration on our children.

You could not literally sit through this

unless you were in the bubble, you've drunk the Kool-Aid.

MAGA, baby, it's time.

Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest capitalist

in the history of the Unites States of America, Elon Musk.

Elon!

Elon!Elon!

(UNCLEAR)

(CHEERING ON TV)

Didn't he used to hate Trump?

Oh!

I wonder how his Tesla sales are doing now.

Because all liberals that buy those, right?

It's like mass possession.

What the fuck is happening?

I talked to a priest about it,

"Is it possible for a mass possession

or like a virus? It's like the Walking Dead.

Cos, I mean, there's people that I would never expect

just go full, full fucking cult.

On day one, I will launch the largest deportation programme

in American history.

(CHEERING DROWNS SPEECH)

If he gets away with not getting sentenced,

he gets it thrown out when I gave up everything

and I lost a contract for a big podcast,

I should have been making $1 million.

I gave up everything to testify.

But most importantly, all that time without my daughter,

then it was all for nothing.

And I'm hereby calling for the death penalty for any migrant

that kills an American citizen or law enforcement officer.

(CHEERING ON TV)

At this very moment I think he's going to win.

Because people have gotten complacent,

and these people are crazy and rabid,

and they will walk in the snow uphill both ways to vote for him.

(CHEERING)

Meanwhile, Harris' closing speech before a crowd of as many as 75,000

at the ellipts in Washington DC,

exactly where Trump urged on similarly sized crowed

to march on the capital on January 6th 2021,

was as powerful and cogent in argument

for the dire future of a government return to Donald Trump's hands

as she had made in the campaign.

Donald Trump has spent a decade

trying to keep the American people divided and afraid of each other,

that is who he is,

but, America, I am here tonight to say

that is not who WE are.

That is not who WE are. (CHEERING)

In this final week,

I mean, there's a, you know, sudden death feeling.

Many people have suddenly felt the urgency to be witnesses

to who Donal Trump really is.

And it occurred to me, I could add to the story.

Good morning, Michael. James.

So... the end. Days to go.

I know you've spent Sunday with 10,000 of your closest friends

in Madison Square Garden, but we'll set that aside for now,

cos there's something I'd like to talk to you about.

Something we talked privately about before,

but I don't think you have ever talked about this publicly.

You had a particularly secret source when you wrote Fire and Fury.

Quite particular.

It was Trump's old friend,

Jeffrey Epstein.

Well, this past week, the Epstein-Trump connection

surfaced again when a well-known model of the 90s,

Stacey Williams,

gave an interview saying that while she was dating Epstein

he introduced her to Trump,

and Trump, virtually, upon their introduction,

well, let me quote from the story...

"Mr Trump pulled miss Williams toward him and touched her breasts,

waist and buttocks,"

she said, as The New York Times reporter did.

So how much do you know about Jeffrey and Donald?

Quite a bit.

I probably have 100 hours of Epstein

talking about the inner workings of the Trump White House.

Having this conversation, Epstein, on more than one occasion,

would bring out these photographs that he had.

They were from the late 90s

and they were Trump at Jeffrey Epstein's Palm Beach house

sitting around the pool with these young women,

topless, and in some of the pictures they're sitting in his lap,

and there's one I especially remember

where there's a stain, a telltale stain

on the front of Trump's pants,

and the women are pointing at him and laughing.

This is getting creepy.

The creepiest framing of this is, you know,

here are these two guys, both driven by a need to do anything they wanted

with women.

Dominance and submission and entertainment.

And one of them end up in the darkest prison in the country

and the other in the White House.

Yes. Explain that.

Let's have a discussion about, you know, if we wanna push this out.

Yeah, yeah, for sure.

I have tried countless times to do something with this material,

I have discussed this with almost every media organization,

but no-one has wanted to let Epstein be a witness.

From my point of view, to really point out that Jeffrey Epstein

was Donald's Trump close friend for a very long time

is damming information, telling information

and important information.

It does feel like there are secrets here.

We've just got 100 hours of Jeffrey Epstein

saying him and Trump are BFFs.

I didn't even get no alert about it on my phone...

But nothing happened.

That's the thing about the news cycle, it passes very quickly.

..interviews Epstein did with the writer Michael Wolff,

who took his sweet time releasing this information.

I cannot explain why Donald Trump has gotten a pass on this.

Donald Trump has said repeatedly, "Oh, I barely knew the guy'"

when in fact he was his best friend for ten years.

One of the interesting aspect of this is that the Trump campaign

released the statement calling this election interference,

which is, um...

which is puzzling, which sort of goes like

anything you would say against us before the election

is election interference.

The story has happened.

I'm just waiting now to find out how it ends.

As we sit here and I start to think, well, he could, he could win.

Donald Trump could very well win.

Disregarding what that means for the country,

the world and the future of my children.

The idea for me that I might have to go on writing about him

is... almost unimaginable.

So were it to come to pass

that he was to be defeated,

I guess I would feel... liberated.

SAM NUNBERG: 'Hi!'

Sam, I want your up-to-the-minute.

'I think she has Pennsylvania,

but that doesn't stop Trump from being able to win

cos he can still go through Michigan and Wisconsin

assuming he wins the sunbelt.

The problem in North Carolina is this fucking asshole

who didn't drop out.

Trump has never mentioned that guy, I forget his name.'

Right, right yeah. 'The porno guy.'

Yeah. 'The porno Nazi guy.'

So you think at this moment... 'Listen, listen,

what I'm telling you is, I think she's gonna win.'

Yep, got it.

'But I'm saying, like, if somebody's paying me,

"I want your analysis", I'm like, look,

I don't have a high confidence on this and I'm not hedging to you.'

I mean, you're actually somewhat more optimistic on her side

than I am at the moment.

Call me tonight. See ya. 'Are you pissed...

Did you hear anymore about the Epstein stuff?'

Oh God, Jeez. All I do is hear now about is Epstein, Epstein, Epstein.

'I'll call you or text you when I hear about Pennsylvania.'

Thanks.

So that was one of my all-time favourite Trump orbit people,

who is often thought to be,

even among Trump people,

to be the guy who knows Trump best.

Writing about Donald Trump

and Donald Trump becoming one's antagonist is an interesting,

in a way, confounding situation.

My first book, Fire and Fury, he denounced it,

threatened to sue me, the whole litany of things.

And that actually redounded to the success of the book.

You enter into this weird symbiotic relationship,

The more he vilifies you,

the more you become a public figure.

You enter into his news cycle world

and likely benefit from it.

It's 5:06 on Election Day

and the majority of quality polls are now showing

Harris with an Electoral College victory.

(TV CHATTER IN THE BACKGROUND)

Democrats with 32 seats, Republicans with 42...

She's going to do better in certain areas like Philadelphia,

which is a city. So that looks like she's doing well.

Looks like she's winning the state.

But there will be other votes coming in from rural Pennsylvania,

for instance, where Donald Trump will do much better.

Donald Trump. Donald Trump, you say it.

Donald Trump wins.

(UNCLEAR)

If he wins,

then the likelihood is that I am committed

for another four years, that I am not sure

that I could easily extricate myself

from being the chronicler of the Donald Trump era.

But I would like to go on to other things before my time is over.

The action, such as it is, shifts to the Grand Ballroom...

The rumour starting to build up is that Trump's the winner...

..but in a way it seems more of a club event than an historic event.

It's blue hairs and men in sports jackets.

An easy victory, and that's what it increasingly seems to be,

might seem to deprive everyone of the sense of battle.

Victory seems to lack the energy and passion

of believing that victory has been stolen.

At 2:25 am he comes out on stage.

He seems less than himself.

Thank you very much.

Winning the popular vote was very nice.

Very nice, I will tell you.

This turn of events is certainly not evidently filling him with joy.

Not yet anyway. Where is the dancing?

He is, you might read the weary body language,

in a kind of stoic mood.

It's a flat affect.

Control of the Senate. Wow, that's good.

(CHEERING)

Almost, in fact, the manner of a conventional politician in defeat.

How to get through this?

He proceeds to deliver his standard rally speech.

A subdued Donald Trump is not Donald Trump.

Has victory robbed him of his reason for being?

The fact that he will take every swing state

that in his third try he will easily win the popular vote...

We've been through so much together

and today you showed up in record numbers.

..that he will significantly reconfigure many safe assumptions

about an otherwise predictable electorate,

that somehow at this moment he might seem to be

the most successful figure in American politics

since Franklin Roosevelt,

was a new and bewildering reality,

even for those who were part of it,

even for him, perhaps, most of all.

..you the people, we will make America safe, strong,

prosperous, powerful and free again.

(GENTLE PIANO MUSIC)

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