by Alec Baldwin
One of the servants, a steward, was at the door with my Ovaltine and Sunday breakfast fries and Jared’s carrots and tea. “Hey, Rodrigo, come on in, what’s shaking?” Rodrigo is my favorite White House servant, not one of the navy “sailors” who I feel like are being punished doing this kind of work. Rodrigo is cheerful, very respectful, like I’m the king. The other day he told me a Philippines proverb, “Bagong hari, bagong ugali,” which at first I thought was some kind of dirty joke, but he told me it means “New king, new character,” meaning I’m the new king and I’ll do it my way. I choked up when he showed me the picture on his phone of his cousin giving the finger in front of the new seventy-five-story Trump Tower Manila, tallest building in the Philippines.
“Jared, try a fry, they actually make a very decent fry here.” He passed, of course. “Rodrigo, did I tell you the final Miss Universe I owned was Miss Philippines?”
A quick working lunch in the Oval, assisted by my great Filipino senior steward Rodrigo.
“Yes, Mr. President, you did.”
“Actually, I owned her as Miss Philippines, but by the time she became Miss Universe I’d sold the business for an incredible amount of money to Rahm Emanuel’s brother. You were here when Rahm was chief of staff?”
“Yes, Mr. President.”
“How do you think Reince is doing, Rodrigo?”
“Excuse me, Mr. President?”
“As chief of staff—is he doing it okay? The way he scurries around doesn’t strike you as . . . whatever?”
“Mr. Priebus seems on the ball, sir.”
“Okay. Anyhow, at that 2015 pageant, the first one I didn’t own, remember how they completely screwed it up and gave the crown to the wrong girl, Miss Colombia, before they realized your girl won?” He said he’d heard about it and also told me Joe Scarborough and Mika Brezhnev were here for lunch downstairs in the Blue Room.
“Right. You know,” I said, “she was the third Miss Philippines to become Miss Universe. Very light, German dad, but still counted as a minority.”
I always compliment Joe on his hair, which truly is excellent hair, very impressive hair, like mine, and I also commented very favorably on his height, because he’s as tall as I am, great height. But when I asked how he thought my first week as president had gone, he goes “Not so well.” He’s eating with me and my family in the White House on Day . . . Seven or . . . Day Ten, I tell him his hair is beautiful, and he has to be rude? Unbelievable. But instead of telling him “Fuck you, Joe, get the fuck out of here,” pardon my French, I was very presidential and took it as a joke, reminding everybody he was busting my balls to pretend like he was an independent “journalist.” And in fact, when he told us he and Mika were getting married, and Jared offered to do the ceremony for them with his fake license he used for Eric’s wedding at Mar-a-Lago, I was so presidential, I said, “You, Jared? Why you? When they could have the president of the United States do it?”
I’M THE PRESIDENT
Wow: That was a whole chapter but I only got through one long weekend. Important weekend for sure, America already becoming great again. But I realize I have to pick up the pace if this book isn’t going to turn into one of those crazy thousand-page Bill Clinton cinder blocks. New rule: At least one whole week per chapter, unless I start a war in Syria or North Korea.
Kidding! Nobody can take a joke anymore.
I expected the so-called federal judges to rule in favor of allowing evil into America. I expected a fight. I love a fight. Ask the guys on Midland Parkway in Queens if I didn’t make them regret calling me Ronald Richie Rich Rump—one kid with very permanent regrets. Ask certain people in the gaming and banking industries if I’m not a tough, tough fighter when I need to be. I love the fight, but I didn’t have an attorney general yet, which tied one hand behind my back and was also very unfair to my little pixie Jeffy Sessions. But at least I have my White House counsel, Don McGahn, a very tough Irishman whose uncle Paddy was my Atlantic City casino lawyer for years.
And unlike the attorney general, McGahn is my lawyer, which is beautiful—he’s right upstairs in the West Wing, I get the attorney-client privilege, and I don’t pay his bills, which would be like a million bucks a year. Like this fantastic financial guy Anthony Scaramucci I’m trying to hire, he reminds me a little of myself, great education and good-looking and has some money but a regular guy, plus really great hair. And since McGahn’s name is Don, talking to him is kind of like I’m talking to myself, which is good. He came into the Oval Office to tell me that, so far, they’d sued us in New York City, San Francisco, and Seattle.
“Not San Diego yet, Don? I hope San Diego, I really do. You know why, Don? Because that judge who extorted me for twenty-five million in the Trump University case, the Mexican, is in San Diego. If he ruled against us on the terrorist immigrants, it’d prove he was unfair to us because the Wall will keep out his cousins.”
“We’ve got a problem with the acting attorney general,” Don told me. “She won’t defend us in court.”
“The same Obama lady who came over here last week trying to get me to fire Mike Flynn? Wow, power’s really gone to her head after ten days on the job.”
“Actually, Yates has been at Justice for twenty-seven years, Mr. President.”
“Oh, so she’s civil service, phoning it in, timeserver, happy earning 200K. I’ll call and fire her personally. By the way, Don, isn’t insubordination a crime when we’re talking national security? I think it is.” Trump delegates, but Trump is also hands-on when it counts. And if I called her, I’d get to say “You’re fired!” for the first time as president. People around the world are literally holding their breaths waiting for that moment. I had my cell phone recorder on, as I do a lot now, and put the landline on speaker because I definitely wanted this on tape. Exciting! “Okay, tell the girl out there to phone Justice.”
He said I really shouldn’t call her. Okay, fine. But then I had the idea of farming out the firing to our little White House HR guy, whose name I don’t even remember, which I knew would be a perfect you-know-what to the you-know-what on her way out, pardon my French. But also, I said, make it a letter, hand-delivered right away—cold but classy, also a great scene when she reads it and then chokes up, maybe drops the letter to the floor and stumbles a little as she puts her hands to her face and starts to cry.
I also personally quarterbacked the press release. I dictated while Hope Hicks, my great and very beautiful young director of strategic communications, did the writing with a pen by hand, which I love. “Okay,” I said, “‘the, quote, acting, unquote, quote, attorney general, unquote, who is very, very weak on borders and also very, very weak on illegal immigration, has betrayed her employers, President Trump and the American people, in a totally disloyal way.’” I agreed with Don and Hope that we could take out “disloyal” because it means the same as “betray,” but that we definitely had to keep “weak” and at least one “very.” So we did. I’m the president.
I must tell you, at that moment, coming off such a tough weekend, the protests and the legal fighting, the no golf, I was finally feeling great again. Which is better for America than if the president doesn’t feel great. I was on a roll. After I hit somebody who hit me, I like to be nice to somebody who was nice to me, so I decided to call Judge Gorsuch and tell him he won the Supreme Court seat, even though I didn’t have my little sheet about him. Trump can wing it. Leadership 101.
“Hey, Judge Gorsuch. Whoops, I mean, Justice Gorsuch of the United States Supreme Court—you’re hired!” He lives out in the Rocky Mountains, so I sang the first line of “Rocky Mountain High.”
He chuckled. “Thank you so much, Mr. President. I’m deeply grateful and honored.”
“Hey, look, I see your area code is 303—here it’s 202. Spooky, right?”
Reince ran into the Oval, looking even more nervous than usual.
“Hey, Neil,” I sai
d, “you beat out twenty great guys for this job! And I’m including the women, too, three or four of them in there. And several minorities, which people say actually made it harder for a guy like you. The same way I beat out seventeen people to get the nomination, you know, all these governors and senators, and Dr. Ben Carson, I beat all of them. And the twenty running against you weren’t buying ads saying these horrible, horrible, untrue, unfair things about you on TV, right? And then I beat eighteen, counting Hillary. I won’t ask you who you voted for, Judge.”
“I appreciate that, Mr. President.”
“But me, right, Neil?”
He chuckled.
“Just kidding,” I said. “The sarcasm.”
He chuckled again. I was building a relationship with a guy I needed to be on my side for the full four or eight years—because it turns out not even a president can fire these guys, even the ones they hired.
“Ha ha ha,” I laughed. “Although I do know you’re a good conservative Republican, so, seriously, I’m assuming you were one of my Colorado voters, even though we supposedly lost Colorado, and we’ll leave it there. Because Hillary—I don’t think so, am I right? Not a guy who supports the Constitution as strongly as you do and hates abortion so much. And she gives lawyers such a bad name. Funny story: The First Lady, she’s Slovenian, when she was my fiancée and I told her my lawyer needed her to sign a prenup, she got confused—she didn’t get the difference between the words ‘lawyer’ and ‘liar.’ And I know Mrs. Gorsuch is from, um . . . ?”
Don McGahn lifted a book with what looked to me like a Confederate flag on the cover.
“—from the South. I was married to a girl from the South, didn’t work out, but great people. I did so well in the South last November, so amazingly well all over the South, as you probably know, fifty-point margins.”
Don was now shaking his head and pointing to my bust of Churchill.
“Although I know Mrs. Gorsuch is English, of course, the South of England, right, where London is, which, over there, they do call ‘the South.’ My mother was Scottish. People say I’m against foreigners, but three of my four grandparents were foreigners and two of my wives! By the way, I knew Princess Di, dated her briefly, beautiful girl, fantastic skin, so sad. And Mrs. Gorsuch is also, I understand, a very accomplished . . . you know . . .”
Now Reince was sitting up very straight in his chair with his hands on his lap, bouncing his head and upper body.
“—lady, a really attractive lady, where it counts, at night, making you feel like a man. Which is so important.” Now Reince looked like he was going to cry; I found out later she was a big equestrian. But I’m telling you this because it’s a fantastic example of one of the reasons I’ve been so successful—I’m very quick, improvise, keep the ball in the air, don’t let things throw me.
“But you know, Neil—can I call you Neil, Neil?—in addition to being so conservative and so smart, Columbia, Harvard . . . we love the Ivy League, don’t we? I’m Wharton, University of Pennsylvania. I also like that you’ve been a Catholic and a Protestant, and then went with Protestant. I’m Protestant, too. Because, no offense to anybody, confession? I don’t think so. Not without my lawyer present. Kidding. But it’s also great that you’re a young man, Neil, almost the youngest on my list, which is so important for the Supreme Court. And quite frankly you look great, too, not just the white hair, distinguished, like Mike Pence, but Neil, you’re a very good-looking guy, much more than any of the others. Central casting! Also, I must tell you, great voice—like an old-fashioned announcer.”
“I appreciate that, sir.”
“You could be a broadcaster, I’m serious, it’s one of the best voices in our whole Administration. And Gorsuch, that’s German, which I also love—I’m German, love the Germans.”
“Actually, Mr. President, as I disappointed you before, when we met, Gorsuch is actually the English side of my family.”
“Nope, sorry, that’s definitely German. One last thing, Neil, on these so-called judges in Seattle and wherever ruling against us on the Middle East travel rules—you probably know the guys? And as of tomorrow you’ll be the ultimate superstar to them, right? Well, maybe you could make a few calls, tell these guys it would be very, very meaningful to you personally if they made the correct decisions on this deal—probably just say ‘correct,’ and leave it at that.”
But traditions, protocols, rule of law, he said, blah-blah-blah. “Right, I totally understand,” I said. “I respect your answer very much.” I realized he probably figured we were taping him. Smart.
I SAW BANNON AND KELLYANNE AND JARED STANDING NEAR BEN CARSON: “HEY, LOOK—IT’S SPANKY AND DARLA AND ALFALFA AND BUCKWHEAT!”
An hour later, I was upstairs in the main house, out of the suit, bare feet, Coke, Doritos, “Hannity and chill,” as Ivanka says, wondering if it’d be okay to ask Rodrigo to clip the big toenails—and I suddenly see the gossip all over Twitter: Gorsuch, Gorsuch, Gorsuch. I had Reince and Hope come back. Then Bannon and Kellyanne showed up, and before long Jared was also there. It’s amazing the way they do that: You order one, you get the whole set. It’s like Our Gang. (That’s what I said at a meeting last week when I saw Bannon and Kellyanne and Jared standing near Ben Carson: “Hey, look—it’s Spanky and Darla and Alfalfa and Buckwheat!” Everyone laughed, especially Ben.)
“We’re losing control of the Supreme Court finale,” I told them when they all got to the Oval. “If everyone knows ahead of time Gorsuch is the winner, it’ll kill our ratings tomorrow. Trust me.”
Nobody had any idea what to do. It was up to me.
“So, the runner-up, the one we dinged because he was a little too nice to the Central American illegals . . . ?”
“Judge Hardiman,” Don said.
“Right, Hardiman. By the way? I felt sorry for him—that name, you know they busted his balls growing up, Hardy Boy, Har-Har-Har-Man, Hard-On. But he’s in Pittsburgh, right, that’s like a five-hour drive?”
Working with Rodrigo, my senior steward and special liaison for East Asian labor issues, at Mar-a-Lago, the Southern White House, which I own.
“Mr. President,” Don McGahn said, “you want Judge Hardiman to drive to Washington to find out he’s not being nominated?”
“No! Not all the way. Kellyanne and Sean will let the reporters all think he’s still in the running, they set up outside his house tomorrow morning, he comes out and drives east for like an hour, has lunch, whatever, as a favor to me. But the media thinks he’s on his way to D.C. for a final meeting with me and a showdown with Gorsuch. They think, ‘Oh my God, Trump is turning this into Celebrity Apprentice.’ Like in Season 7, where it came down to Piers Morgan and Trace Adkins and Piers won. By the way, it was so great when Trace came back in Season 13 and did win. So maybe when the old lady finally gives up the ghost, Ginsburg, we give hers to Judge Hard-On.”
A VERY RELIABLE SOURCE told me NBC still holds a tremendous grudge against Trump for ruining their profits after I pulled out of The Apprentice, so in retaliation they ordered Joe Scarborough to betray and attack me. I phoned Joe this morning to give him another chance to do the right thing, to be a real conservative, like Hannity. But he was very rude—rude not just to Donald Trump but to the president and the presidency. By the way, back when they started MSNBC I thought that name was so weird, but recently somebody explained to me that’s how you know they always planned to flip it totally into Democrat fake news—Ms. NBC. Amazing.
THE CEREMONY where I announced Gorsuch was fantastic, here in the White House in the double-height room with the columns and chandeliers—Rodrigo says a lot of the staff has already started calling it Trump Hall. “Wow,” I told him, “that’s amazing, because at the Southern White House, we have the official Donald J. Trump Ballroom, completely gold.” I was great, literally everyone said so, and I heard some people say Gorsuch and I standing together almost lo
oked like twins, except for his white hair, now that I’m back to my fighting weight, lost the pounds I put on during the campaign. A lot of people said Gorsuch did very well, too.
Right after the ceremony I was headed upstairs when my chief of staff and chief strategist pulled me aside—Reince looked upset but Bannon was smiling.
“Public transit guard in Denver just got shot and killed,” Reince said. “By a Muslim extremist.”
“Sad. But a total birdie or eagle travel-ban-wise, right?” Bannon was nodding. “Reince, have you called Kellyanne and Sean? It’s like when San Bernardino happened a month before the first primaries. That’s when my political brand really got hot. Where’s he from, the terrorist?”
“American,” Reince said, “native born, Texas.”
“Yeah,” Bannon said, “but ‘Joshua Cummings’? I guess he might be a white guy.”
I definitely didn’t chuckle. “But all his Muslim friends,” I said, “were aware he was bad news but didn’t say anything, right?” These Muslims are like teamsters. It’s sad.
Reince was reading off his phone. “Actually, his mosque had reported him to Homeland Security. And here’s a photo—the guy’s white. It won’t get any coverage.”
“You win some, you lose some,” I said. By which I meant that, while I was deeply saddened by the murder of an American in uniform by a radical Islamic terrorist, the commander in chief must always play through the pain. At least it was only one victim, not like under Obama, when practically every terrorist killed a hundred innocent people.
Reince held up his phone to show us the CNN headline about my Gorsuch ceremony—“Trump puts on a flawless show.” Flawless. CNN said flawless. In other words, it occurred to me when I thought about it later, I was impeccable, unblemished, unimpaired, unsullied, faultless, irreproachable, and perfect. On Day Nine or Day Twelve or whatever, everyone was already admitting the Trump Administration was perfect.
