Not Just Another Con Man

Donald J. Trump is clearly not just another con man. His persuasive skills easily surpass those of P.T. Barnum and Bernie Madoff. Throughout his entire life he has continuously boasted about his achievements (invariably embellishing them if not simply imagining them or taking credit for the acts of others). Thus, even though he was an abject failure as a businessman, he nevertheless managed to generate a reputation as a straight-talking, hard-nosed executive who could achieve what others had failed to accomplish.

That perception enabled him to persuade almost 63 million Americans that he alone could and would improve their lives, enabling him to win the 2016 presidential election. After becoming our nation’s 45th president he further transformed himself into a cult leader. Even though his campaign pledge that he would improve the lives of working-class Americans was never realized and he had been indicted by four separate grand juries and convicted in one such proceeding, he nevertheless managed to get himself re-elected. Now, he’s transforming himself again. This time, however, he’s utilizing the powers of the presidency to become an uninhibited extortionist.

Trump’s powers of persuasion have never been based upon his actual achievements, his breadth of knowledge or even his oratory skills. Instead, he has relied upon unwavering repetitions of his messages and the measures that he has taken to silence those who might contest them. Moreover, as he increased his personal power, his ability to prevent criticism and dissent has grown. The sad reality is that Trump has achieved very little, if anything, to improve our nation’s standing in the world or to enhance the living standards of our nation’s citizens. His political strength rests solely on his efforts to divide our nation’s citizens by fomenting hate and fear.

​ Trump’s persona was shaped by his childhood experiences and the guidance he received from three individuals: his father, Dr. Norman Vincent Peale and Roy Cohn. 

Trump grew up in a dysfunctional household headed by a hard-working and decidedly tyrannical father whose granddaughter has described him as being incapable of exhibiting love and affection. To avoid their father’s wrath, Donald and his four siblings adopted the habit of lying to him. Donald’s mother suffered from health problems and had little or no influence on him. Donald routinely ignored and disobeyed her while tormenting his little brother. Indeed, he was so out of control that, in desperation, his mother demanded that he be enrolled in a military school where he might experience some discipline.

​ Rather than shower his children with love, Fred Trump never commended them when they performed well, but was quick to criticize them when they faltered. Fred’s early attention, however, was focused on Donald’s older brother, Fred Jr. (referred to as “Freddy” within the family) whom Fred had initially intended would succeed him in managing the highly successful real estate empire he had built. Fred divided the world into winners (which he sometimes referred to as “killers”) and losers. Unfortunately, Freddy did not fit within Fred’s image of a successful businessman. Moreover, Fred’s efforts to mold Freddy into his concept of a winner proved highly counter-productive, driving Freddy to pursue his desire to become an airline pilot and later to dissolve into an alcoholic. 

While that drama was unfolding, young Donald was packed up and enrolled in the New York Military Academy which was more in the nature of a “reform school” than an educational institution. It was a brutal place filled with unruly kids, where fighting among the students was rampant. Simply stated, it was an environment in which Donald was preyed upon in his early years and where he later took advantage of his size to hone his skills in bullying and demeaning younger students. 

Following his graduation from the Academy, Donald enrolled in Fordham College where his oldest sister, Maryanne, helped with his homework. Donald’s niece, Mary Trump, has reported that Donald employed Joe Shapiro, one of his more accomplished friends, to take the SAT exams for him, enabling him to transfer to the Wharton School of Business within the University of Pennsylvania. We can only assume that Donald was not a particularly good student at Penn as he later threatened to sue the university if it disclosed his academic record. Following his college graduation in 1968, he joined the family business.

Fred Trump only had a high school education and strongly believed that success was more a function of character than education. He marveled at Donald’s ambition and his façade of self-assuredness. Even though he had no illusions about Donald’s undisciplined and often self-destructive nature, Donald’s willingness to disregard all restraints to get what he wanted made him his father’s choice to take over the family business. Fred wasn’t the first person to overlook Donald’s flawed character; nor would he be the last.

​ Dr. Norman Vincent Peale was the pastor at the Marble Collegiate Church, a position which he held for 52 years. Fred Trump was an admirer of Dr. Peale although there are conflicting reports as to how often he actually attended Dr. Peale’s church services. However, when he did attend, he took his entire family with him, including young Donald. Dr. Peale had an enormous following created through his weekly radio program (which lasted 54 years) and his 46 books, the best-known of which was entitled, “The Power of Positive Thinking.”

Dr. Peale’s Sunday morning sermons conveyed messages of optimism, courage, and faith in God’s love. These teachings were encapsulated in a 1944 song by Harold Arlen and Johnny Mercer, which counseled “accentuate the positive, eliminate the negative, and don’t mess with mister in-between.” Perhaps more than anything else, Dr. Peale’s philosophy gave birth to Donald’s propensity to fashion his own reality. It also seemingly prompted him to adopt his own corollary to Dr. Peale’s teaching; namely, truth is what you can convince other people to believe.

​ Roy Cohn was a well-known attorney who had successfully prosecuted Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. Donald met Cohn in 1973 when he and his father were facing a federal lawsuit for housing discrimination. It’s not clear how this meeting came about. Donald claims that he was looking for a “killer” attorney who was unwilling to accept defeat and that Cohn, who had achieved considerable notoriety, met that description. Cohn did not believe in abiding by the rules created by others which may well explain Donald’s attraction to him.

Cohn counseled Donald and his father not to admit anything and to fight the government’s charges which were well documented. He even counseled them to assert a $100 million counterclaim against the government. Ultimately, the government settled the case without requiring the Trumps to admit wrongdoing. This marked the beginning of a 13-year relationship during which Donald adopted Cohn’s aggressive legal tactics to fend off the claims of his vendors and subcontractors and to intimidate his enemies. Cohn also introduced Donald to members of two of New York City’s organized crime families which helped assure him of labor peace in his building projects.

​ Although Fred Trump had a reputation as “a man of his word”, he was hardly a “boy scout” and had no reservations about breaking the law when he deemed it necessary or simply desirable . This was duly reported in a 2018 New York Times article. His major sin was cheating on federal and state income and gift taxes to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. He also illegally jacked up rental prices on his properties by creating a family-owned company as a nominal purchasing agent for his properties and passing that company’s 20% markup on to his tenants. Fred also had a low regard for serving in the military and arranged for his family doctor to write a note saying Donald suffered from heel spurs to make him ineligible for the military draft that was in effect at the time.

​ The business built by Fred Trump was quite large, consisting of dozens of single-family homes as well as 27,000 government subsidized low-income housing units located in unattractive, six-story apartment buildings situated in New York City’s outer boroughs. The real estate holdings amassed by Fred, however, did not comport with Donald’s sense of success. He wanted people to take notice of his real estate developments. Specifically, he wanted to move the company’s operations to Manhattan and to build the highest and most ornate structures that comported with his image of grandeur. Rather than operate out of the palatial Long Island home built by his father, he rented an apartment in Manhattan where he could be seen when he frequented popular restaurants and nightclubs.

Unlike his father, Donald never bothered to ensure that his construction projects were built for a cost that would generation profits. Instead, he focused on creating eye-catching buildings, assuming that if they were big and richly decorated, they would generate sufficient revenues to operate profitably. While this was wholly antithetical to the way Fred had operated his business , he nevertheless marveled at Donald’s chutzpah and worked behind the scenes to do what he could to assure Donald’s success.

​ Donald’s first project was the renovation of the Commodore Hotel located alongside Grand Central Terminal. At the time, New York City was in a state of depression; and the City was in dire need of renewal. Fred used these circumstances to convince Mayor Beame, a personal friend, to grant a 40-year real estate tax abatement to the project which was undertaken in partnership with the Hyatt Corporation. Fred also used his contacts within the building trades to facilitate the successful completion of the project.

​ Donald next went on to build two other large buildings in the heart of Manhattan, one of which was Trump Tower, located on the site of Bonwit Teller’s building on the corner of Fifth Avenue and 56th Street. Contributing to the financial success of these construction projects was Donald’s modus operandi of reneging on his agreements. Unlike his father, Donald had no hesitation about disavowing his agreements with his suppliers and subcontractors. After they had completed their work and submitted their invoices, he would demand that their price be adjusted downward, claiming that the quality of their merchandise or work was not what he had agreed upon.

It should be appreciated that Donald never considers the ultimate impact of his actions, only their immediate effect. Drawing on what he had learned from Roy Cohn, he informed his suppliers and subcontractors that if they didn’t agree with what he was then offering, they would have to sue him. The result was that the Trump Organization became involved in 3,450 legal cases. In 1,900 of them it was the plaintiff; and in 1,450 of them, it was the defendant. Eventually, few suppliers or subcontractors would deal with Donald unless they received payment in advance.​

​ Donald was an avid publicity hound, driving around town in an expensive car and frequenting Manhattan’s “hot spots.” He even acted as his own PR agent, using the assumed name ofJohn Miller to gain publicity for his social activities. These efforts led to his first major commercial con. 

Each year, Forbes Magazine published a list of the world’s 400 wealthiest individuals. However, the list was more fiction than fact as most wealthy individuals were reluctant to call attention to themselves by submitting the magnitude of their wealth for publication. By contrast, Donald had no such inhibitions. He regularly advised the magazine’s editors that his wealth was in the hundreds of millions of dollars, confident that the magazine had no staff with which to verify the figures he was submitting. For the next 10 years, he was regularly included in the Forbes 400 and was usually placed between the 100th and 200th wealthiest individuals.

That publicity made it easier for Donald to obtain bank financing, something his father had religiously refrained from doing. Drawing upon Dr. Peale’s exhortations to think positively, he borrowed heavily to purchase several high-profile properties, including New York’s Plaza Hotel and the Eastern Airlines shuttle operations between New York City and Washington and New York City and Boston, which he renamed“The Trump Shuttle.” It’s important to note that the banks made little effort to ascertain the true extent of Donald’s financial resources or his skills in managing businesses which were very different from erecting buildings.

The problem was that Donald’s business acumen again was not commensurate with his visions of success (an early version of his “alternate reality”). Again, he invested far more in these projects to glamorize them than he could possibly recoup in profits. Consequently, both businesses incurred substantial losses. Although their losses were considerable, they were still well within the ability of the business built by his father to sustain.

Beginning in the mid-1980s, however, Donald invested in three hotel-casinos in Atlantic City, which he wanted to turn into an East Coast gambling Mecca rivaling Las Vegas. These ventures were largely funded by bank borrowings. Unfortunately, the nation’s economy descended into recession in the early 1990s making it impossible for his Atlantic City properties to generate sufficient revenues to cover their debt service obligations. The fact that his three hotels were competing against each other certainly didn’t help. The overly ambitious Atlantic City gambit caused the banks (and individual investors who were later brought in to help sustain the projects)to lose more than $3 billion.

Donald’s Atlantic City misadventures provided evidence of the wisdom of the  maxim that “If you owe your bank a million dollars, you are in deep trouble; but if you owe your bank a billion dollars, your bank is in deep trouble.”  Having no ability or inclination to manage three hotel-casinos, the banks found themselves having to continue to leave Donald in charge of his Atlantic City properties which were hemorrhaging money.  Donald, relying on the lessons he had learned from Roy Cohn, tied his remaining creditors up in the courts, a tactic (which combined with a rejuvenating national economy) enabled him ultimately extricate himself from any personal liability.

​ While Donald was assembling his Atlantic City empire, Si Newhouse of Random House asked him to write “Trump: The Art of the Deal”, which was published in November 1987. It included a recitation of Donald’s efforts in creating his expanding real estate empire along with an 11-step business success formula inspired by Dr. Peale’s “The Power of Positive Thinking.” A promotional campaign was undertaken with the book’s publication, including a release party at Trump Tower, hosted by Jackie Mason, and featuring a celebrity-filled guest list. Thereafter, Donald made a series of appearances on television talk shows and was pictured on several magazine covers. The book was both a literary and financial success, being listed on The New York Times best-seller list for 48 weeks and in 1st place for 13 of those weeks.

​ Although Donald had supplied the substance of the book, it was actually drafted by Tony Schwartz who was named as hisco-author. Schwartz (who, at Donald’s insistence, always referred to Donald as “Mister Trump”) later revealed that “lying is second nature to Trump,” and asserted that “more than anyone else I have ever met, Trump has the ability to convince himself that whatever he is saying at any given moment is true, or sort of true, or at least ought to be true.” Schwartz’s unflattering comments prompted Donald to conclude that his efforts to establish a reputation for success required him to suppress adverse comments by those with whom he dealt closely. This included the employees in his business and in the properties his company operated as well as his first wife, Ivana, whom he was in the process of divorcing.

​ Like a Phoenix arising out of its own ashes, Donald recovered from the near-total collapse of his real estate empire. This was largely because in 2003, he received an invitation from Mark Burnett, an NBC television producer, to star in The Apprentice, a “reality” TV series. In it, he would portray a successful business mogul recruiting ambitious individuals to join him in his various business ventures. Although Burnett must have been fully aware of Donald’s string of business failures, he nevertheless chose to cast Donald in the starring role. As it turned out, The Apprentice became an extremely popular program that lasted for 11 seasons, enabling Donald to earn a reported $ 427 million. More importantly, it resurrected his image as a successful business manager and a builder of first-class buildings. 

​ By this time, Donald had undoubtedly discovered that his most valuable assets were not the buildings and golf courses he had built or acquired, but rather his name and public perception. Rather than revert to building and owning high-end commercial properties, Donald utilized his reclaimed fame and fortune to license his name to dozens of hotels and apartment buildings and literally scores of commercial products.

In 2015, he decided to run for president of the United States and concluded his tenure on The Apprentice. He clearly enjoyed being a focal point of public attention; and running for president would expand his public visibility and give him a level of credibility far beyond that of a TV personality. A common reaction at the time was that he had no serious expectation that he could be elected and that he was simply seeking to further enhance his name recognition so he could more easily license his name and sell more merchandise (like his steaks, perfume and vodka). 

​ When he began his campaign, he boasted that he was so wealthy that he didn’t need to solicit campaign contributions. Although his finances had substantially recovered, presidential campaigns could cost two to four times his personal wealth, most of which was invested in real estate. Thus, his statement was probably just an excuse to obscure the fact that he had yet to assemble a campaign organization with which to raise contributions. To make up for his lack of a campaign organization and his limited economic resources, he drew upon his skills as a con man to generate notoriety, calling into variousTV talk shows and making outrageous statements designed to capture the public’s attention. 

Despite the many falsehoods he would utter, the networks welcomed his calls and never sought to correct his lies and exaggerations as his appearances were boosting their audiences and advertising revenues. In fact, on many occasions TV talk show producers would allow him to stay on the phone for as long as an hour. These efforts involved virtually no costs and allowed him to generate significant public support. In fact, his daily media appearances virtually eclipsed his opponent’s efforts to build public support. Thus, yet another group of public gatekeepers was giving him a “pass”  even though his truthfulness was highly questionable and his qualifications as a candidate were sorely lacking.

​ By the time the primary debates took place, Donald had achieved a commanding lead in the polls and was accorded center stage in the debates. He drew on his skill of demeaning his peers, which he had developed in high school, to assign unflattering names to his more significant opponents like “Lyin’Ted” (Cruz), “Little Marco” Rubio, “Low Energy Jeb” (Bush), “Sloppy Chris” (Christie) and “Birdbrain” (Nikki Haley). As he dominated television news, he also dominated the debates with his 17 opponents (all seasoned politicians) and easily won the Republican Party’s 2016 presidential nomination. 

​ Although the leaders of the Republican Party were not legally obligated to select Donald as their Party’s presidential nominee, he had effectively destroyed the ability of his opposition candidates to mount an effective campaign. Thus, they too chose to overlook his obvious flaws, including his lack of governmental experience and his lack of knowledge about the workings of the federal government, allowing him to become their party’s candidate in the 2016 presidential election.

With some help from Vladimir Putin and Russian propaganda and some overconfidence by Hilary Clinton, he was able to win the 2016 presidential election and become our nation’s 45th President. The simple fact was that the federal government for the preceding 40 years had done little to help middle-class Americans who were willing to overlook his business failures and believe his lies largely because he had never been associated with the federal government.

Donald’s first, and perhaps most important, accomplishment during his first term in office was the passage of the Tax Reduction and Jobs Act of 1917. That Act significantly reduced the federal income taxes of our nation’s wealthiest individuals while doing little if anything to increase the nation’s rate of job growth or enhance the economic well-being of average Americans. It did, however, fulfill a critical campaign pledge and cement his financial support from wealthy individuals.

To solidify his support among working-class Americans, he fed them a diet of exaggerations and lies about his achievements. If his opponents sought to contradict his assertions, he would label their opposition as “Fake News.” To prevent members of his staff from discussing his ineptitude, he required them to sign NDAs. Then, when the court’s began to refuse to enforce those NDAs, he simply fired the disloyal employees in a highly public manner, labeling them as “stupid” (or some other unflattering term) so they would have trouble finding their next job. This practice also sent a message to their co-workers that similar indiscretions would be treated similarly. 

He even used this same technique to quell public disclosures by his various political appointees. As a result, during his first six months in office he terminated no less than 40 of his senior political appointees. Even numerous Departmental Inspector Generals, whose very job was to disclose to the Congress questionable activity within the government, were accorded the same treatment. Similarly, if a Republican member of Congress opposed him, they would face a Trump-endorsed and well-funded opponent in their next primary election. He even demeaned news reporters and threatened libel suits against their employers to deter them from criticizing his statements or actions.

In short, as his power increased, his ability to perpetuate and expand his image of success also increased. Thus, these actions enabled him to solidify his voter base into a cult, a reality which had become apparent by the end of his first term in office. See, Trumpism.

Despite Trump’s strong hold on what we now refer to as MAGA Republicans, reality prevailed in the 2020 presidential election after Trump had totally mismanaged the nation’s efforts to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on the teachings of Roy Cohn, Trump never admitted defeat and kept repeating his “Big Lie” that the election had been stolen by a variety of nefarious actions. These allegations were soundly refuted by state election officials and by Trump’s own Director of Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security who was overseeing the election results. That, however, didn’t deter him from repeating them. In addition, the right-wing media echoed his claim. That resulted in Fox News having to pay a $785 million to settle libel litigation asserted against it by a voting machine manufacturer.

​ Shortly after leaving office in January 2017 our 45th president was indicted in four criminal actions. Again, drawing on the teaching of Roy Cohn, he turned these “lemons into lemonade” by claiming that he was the victim of a weaponized federal government This resulted in his support among Republican voters to grow even further. Trump easily won the Republican presidential nomination in 2024 because by then he possessed cult-like powers over Republican voters; and no Republican politician was willing to challenge him. Luck continued to be on his side when the U.S. Supreme Court, without even being asked to do so, reversed almost 250 years of judicial precedents by declaring that a president could not be held criminally liable for actions committed while performing his official duties. This decision essentially caused all of the criminal cases against Trump to disappear even though one of those cases grew out of actions taken by Trump after he had left office and two of them were based on violations of state law. So exonerated, Trump went on to defeat Vice President Harris in the 2024 presidential election.

​ Now, as our nation’s 47th president, there are virtually no limitations on his powers since (a) Republicans hold majorities in both house of Congress, (b) all but a mere handful of Republican legislators are universally unwilling to challenge him on any issue, and (c) the Supreme Court has become willing to condone any action he takes. Thus, he now has the ability to redirect funds appropriated by Congress, to coerce the Department of Justice to prosecute his political enemies and to intimidate news organizations not to air stories that depict him adversely. In short, he now acts like the crime bosses with whom he had allied himself when he started his career as a building contractor.

​ We are now faced with the reality that he is using the powers of the presidency to extort others to acquiesce in his wishes and thereby make a mockery out of our democratic system. It’s not just Americans and American institutions that he has been targeting. Having assumed the authority to impose tariffs on goods exported by other nations to the U.S., he is coercing those to act in a way that either benefits himself personally or in a way that will enable him to remain in control of our government, perhaps even after the completion of his current term in office.