Unhinged: An Insider's Account of the Trump White House

by Omarosa Manigault Newman

I’d had one foot out the door since the mishandling of the Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, in August 2017. And, in October, there was Trump’s insensitive condolence call with the widow of an Army Special Forces soldier killed in Niger, followed by Trump and Kelly’s racially charged attack on Representative Frederica Wilson who heard the call and told the press about it. Trump’s endorsement of Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore, a man who’d been accused of sexual misconduct by multiple women, only added insult to injury. The N-word tape would be

This White House has a problem with the truth. But at least they are consistent—and only too predictable—with the lies they tell.

The Donald Trump of 2018 is not the same man he was in 2003. When I met him, many of our beliefs were aligned. He identified with Democrats and supported commonsense gun control, like banning assault weapons; legalizing marijuana; universal health care; and even a tax hike on the wealthy. He thought Hillary Clinton was a “great” senator and donated money to her campaigns and at least $100,000 to the Clinton Foundation.

When a man is confident and stands up for himself, he’s called tough and strong. He’s a good businessman. When a woman plays to win, she’s labeled a villain or worse. I was playing to win.

He loved conflict, chaos, and confusion; he loved seeing people argue or fight.

Trump demanded respect and deference, but if you showed fear, he couldn’t return that respect. My calmness helped me in the boardroom.

Shrinking from conflict, in his eyes, was worse than a poor performance on the task.

“I’m a big wrestling fan, and you have to remember that there is always a hero and a heel—and the heel is the most popular and sells the most merchandise. The heel also gets the biggest ratings and all the attention.”

I’d seen him at events that Melania did not attend—his birthday parties, fund-raisers at Mar-a-Lago, golf tournaments—and he behaved like a dog off the leash.

He prized loyalty over experience; Don Jr. and Ivanka were nothing if not devoted to their father. His children would never challenge his judgment or overshadow him as the show’s star.

you can grab them by the you-know-what. Gene’s decades of rock-star fame, and Trump’s decades as America’s gold-plated dealmaker, had normalized their sexist treatment to all women. Including Trump’s own daughter. For as long as I’d known Trump,

In my opinion, based on my observations, their relationship goes up to the line of appropriate father/daughter behavior and jumps right over it. I believe he covets his daughter.

We never talked politics at work or otherwise, so I had no notion of his party affiliation changing from Democrat until he started talking about Obama’s birth certificate.

You can’t just let those people do whatever the f**k they want! What’s the matter with them? They have no

I hadn’t even been at the pool while that scene was shot. He should have unleashed his anger to the production team or the network. Screaming about “those people” and showing him the proper respect might have come off badly to the black TV execs.

Barack Obama’s presidency incensed Donald Trump. In his mind, Obama wasn’t just black, he was foreign, with a father from Kenya. He was suspicious of Obama’s otherness, which is an actual term in the study of “whiteness.”

If Trump could, against every odd there was, become president, the only item on his to-do list would be to erase the legacy of Barack Obama by undoing his policies. And it sounds shallow, it sounds stupid, it sounds harmful, but that’s just the reality from my perspective, and I had a very unique view as this unfolded.

Donald went back to Pecker and negotiated a deal for me. In exchange for a settlement with American Media, Inc., the parent company of the National Enquirer, they would give me the high-profile job and title of West Coast Editor. This was

passed with flying colors. It was the greatest moment thus far in my ministry.

Not helping people. somethung she did

sat down on our couch, still in shock that his life and our future were gone, along with our baby, and my brother, and my father.

One part of me knew that Donald only did things that served his own agenda. He wanted me on his show, and he would exploit my grief to do it. On the other hand, he was right about my needing to get out of the house and think about anything besides fighting to stay out of the ever-widening, ever-deepening hole of grief.

Burnett had been in the British military, where he’d learned tactics like creating conflict to divide the enemy and conquer them.

diplomat to North Korea, and his addiction. Trump didn’t have the same compassion for Khloé Kardashian. He fired her on season eight in 2009 because she’d been arrested for a DUI in the past.I The DUI hadn’t happened during the course of taping, but years before. Dennis Rodman’s drinking was forgiven, but Khloé was taken to task on national television about her arrest and fired. I believe sexism played a part, but I also think Donald was a little jealous of the Kardashians’ fame. Their reality TV franchise was on a meteoric rise, while

It’s easy to see his pettiness now so clearly. I see the little man behind the curtain. But for all those years, I forgave him his insecurities.

Donald and I had a symbiotic relationship, as I’ve said. I gave him ratings, and he gave me, a woman of color, opportunities, again and again, which, in turn, gave him someone to point to and say, “I’m not a racist misogynist! Look at all I’ve done for Omarosa!” At no point during our mutually profitable, loyal connection did I stop to think, “Is he using me?” We’d both gained tremendously by being in each other’s lives, personally and professionally, for a long time. I couldn’t imagine that ever changing.

the author quoted from Ivana Trump’s sealed 1990 divorce deposition, accusing her ex-husband of a violent sexual assault, a violation that she referred to “as a rape.” In

Trump had sussed out that Michael would work ten times harder to earn praise if it were rarely given.

Rubio supporters had high hopes coming into this debate because their candidate had taken some low blows at Trump. I suppose their new strategy was “let Rubio be Trump.”

Rubio couldn’t pull off the crassness like Donald. The media pounced on it, though, almost begging for a debate confrontation.

All we had was Trump’s bluster, the MAGA slogan, and Hillary’s emails. The night of the Chicago

He’s addicted to it because he’s a narcissist, and he revels in his many million followers. The likes and retweets feed his ego.

A little more strangely, a select Trump campaign mailing list received daily emails directly from a producer at Fox News that summarized the news of the day, broke down talking points and spin suggestions, and offered resources. For example, a typical @foxnews.com email would have a complete transcript of a recent Hillary Clinton speech, a second-by-second breakdown and analysis, with specific suggestions for how to respond to her, line by line. People suspected

The back-and-forth of daily communications between individuals at Fox and the Trump White House continues to this day. People joke that Trump gets his talking points by watching Fox News, and that is certainly true. But individuals at Fox News are also speaking directly to his team of advisers every single day. The channel’s channels are wide-open. The first marquee

she suggested Donald Jr. Trump was against it. She asked why, and he said, “What if he’s a loser?”

He grabbed my wrist and said, “You can’t leave me with these people.” The look in his eyes was like a lost child.

We’d only gotten through the devotional part of what would be a two-hour service when he leaned toward me and said, “This is the longest I’ve been in church in my life.” A bit later: “When is this going to end?” And again: “God, how much longer do I have to sit here?”

This was widely mocked as well. Did the president-elect have time for even more ego stroking when he was supposed to be forming a government and leading the country? Of course not! Did that stop Team Trump? Nope! I was invited to

no. He explained, “The same way you are a proud African American woman, I am a proud white man. What’s the difference between my pride and your pride?” he asked. I said, “Hate defines white supremacy.”

He asked me, “Omarosa, what do you think about me getting sworn in on The Art of the Deal?” I said, “Instead of the Bible?” “Yeah. The Art of the Deal is a bestseller! It’s the greatest business book of all time. It’s how I’m going to make great deals for the country. Just think how many copies I’d sell—maybe a commemorative inauguration copy?!” “I know you’re not going to be a traditional president, but that’s just too crazy. Whatever you do, don’t repeat that idea to anybody else,” I said. We laughed. He wanted me to believe he was kidding. Two things to discuss here.

But I could not stop myself from contemplating whether her position as his spiritual advisor had ever been missionary. It was of course totally credible from his

As soon as I took a seat at my desk, I forgot about the crocheted hats and was filled with awe at the magnitude of the responsibility of running the government.

Trump, Pence, and their posse were undoing any hope of connecting with women and minorities. He’d surrounded himself only with elite, wealthy, white, conservative men.

The directive came down from Reince that our default position was to back up whatever the president said or tweeted, regardless of its accuracy. In fact, much of my days—from the first to the last—were spent strategizing and defending Trump tweets and statements to constituency groups that he may have offended on that particular day.

In Trumpworld, the only defense for most situations was “whataboutism,” mostly about Obama and Clinton.

“Frederick Douglass is an example of someone who has done an amazing job and is being recognized more and more, I notice.” It was terrible. He didn’t know who Frederick Douglass was, and the press mocked him relentlessly for it. This was the first of many incidents where I’d

“Why did you choose that shitty country as your first foreign trip? You should have waited until the confirmations were done and gone to Scotland and played golf at [his course] Turnberry.”

suspected that Pence was just biding his time, looking the part of the perfect VP, until Trump resigned, was impeached, or served his term.

I’d attended two HBCUs, Central State University and Howard University. I also attended Payne Theological Seminary before the death of my fiancé Michael Clarke Duncan. That executive order was my top policy priority within the first forty days of the administration.

While working with him side by side on my own briefings, I’d come to understand that he read at an eighth- or ninth-grade level.

The Donald Trump of 2017 just went with his gut, based on a predawn call or on something he saw on TV or read online.