Peril

by Bob Woodward

Sullivan, 42, was Yale Law School, a Rhodes Scholar, and a law clerk to Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer. Rail thin, he was cautious and serious. In meetings, Biden often asked, “Jake, what do you think?”

“Under the threat of nuclear Iran, Joe Biden helped negotiate the Iran deal,” the narrator said. Then the background music lightened up, like a cartoon track. “And under the threat of disappearing pets, Pete Buttigieg negotiated lighter licensing regulations on pet chip scanners.”

“I hate it,” Biden said, but agreed the video could be released. About six hours later, Biden called Donilon: “Take it off. Take it back. I don’t want it airing any longer. Take it down!”

If Clyburn were going to play savior, he wanted a political guarantee in exchange: Biden would make Black voters his priority, in the campaign and in the White House.

“There are three things I’d like for you to do that, I think, would really make this endorsement work,” Clyburn told Biden. “I’m listening,” Biden said. “The first thing is, you should really shorten your speeches and get more to the point.”

“My second point is about 10-20-30,” Clyburn said. Biden knew the reference. It was Clyburn’s signature antipoverty plan for federal spending, allocating “at least 10 percent of funding from any given federal program to counties where 20 percent of the population has lived below the poverty line for 30 years or more.”

“Finally, the third thing, is I’ve three daughters. “I’m very proud of my three daughters and it’s a little bit disconcerting for us to be at this particular juncture in our history and there has never been an African American woman on the Supreme Court.

“I played a role in having the first Latina on the Supreme Court and I look forward to doing that with an African American woman,” Biden said.

Clyburn cringed as he watched. Biden whiffed on numerous chances to bring up the Supreme Court pledge.

“Man, there have been a couple instances up there tonight where you could have mentioned having a Black woman on the Supreme Court,” Clyburn said. “You can’t leave the stage without doing that. You just got to do that.” Of course, Biden said, you got it. In his final answer, Biden hit the mark.

“The fact is what we should be doing—we talked about the Supreme Court. I’m looking forward to making sure there’s a Black woman on the Supreme Court, to make sure we in fact get every representation.”

“I know Joe,” Clyburn said. “We know Joe. “But most importantly,” he said, his voice raspy and his right index finger punctuating the air, “Joe knows us. “I know his heart. I know who he is. I know who he is!” Clyburn said. “I know where this country is.”

Biden was now the candidate positioned to fend off Sanders. The one who could rally Black Democrats. The one who could beat Trump.

A day later, February 29, Biden won 48.7 percent of the South Carolina vote, a colossal victory.

“My buddy, Jim Clyburn! You brought me back!” Biden told the crowd. “And we are very much alive.”

O’Rourke noted in a journal entry that evening that “Biden’s ability to understand that feeling his dad had is part of his genius.”

Super Tuesday brought 10 more states for Biden, picking up wins from the South to the Midwest to New England, and winning in Texas. Michigan’s March 10 primary was critical, and Biden won there, too. It was not just the brass making a statement. It was voters.

Biden faced a new world: He was now effectively the Democratic presidential nominee. But the pandemic upended his campaign’s plans.

The shift was strange, from busy marathon days with flights and rallies to a life of seclusion, working from his home in Delaware surrounded by Secret Service. He spoke with aides and supporters throughout the day, by phone and video, in lieu of events. He did TV interviews. Trump made fun of Biden, calling him “Basement Biden.”

“These internal relationships that you form when you’re so little, last forever,” he said. He then laughed. “And here we all are in our seventies. “But those things that tied us together as children, tie us together as human beings, even after death.”

“This is bad and we’re on the edge,” Biden told her. “And this guy,” Trump, “is trying to deny it.” Biden said he was desperate to do something. Something that would have an impact.

On April 27, 2020, Tony Fabrizio, a premier Republican pollster working for the president, sent an unvarnished and pointed three-page memo to Brad Parscale, then the Trump campaign manager. It was a document worthy of the political campaign hall of fame.

They were failing to define Biden and allowing him free rein over his own image.

The memo offered an ominous forecast to the Trump campaign: Trump was on the road to epic defeat. At the outset, Fabrizio wrote, “you are probably tired of me sounding alarmist, but I think what I’ve laid out below makes a compelling ...

Fabrizio summarized the campaign’s polling and research to date in 10 points. He warned that Trump’s leadership on the pandemic was a handicap: And while POTUS started off in a strong position on his handling of the [coronavirus], even though he continued to dominate the conversation and drew huge audiences with his daily briefings, the controversies and conflicts that came out of them were often the only take-aways for voters.

As we have seen many times before, it isn’t POTUS policies that cause the biggest problem, it is voters’ reactions to his temperament and behavior.

“Mr. President, every day this race is about you, we’re losing,” he said. “Every day the race is about Joe Biden, we’re winning. And right now, Joe Biden’s not doing anything, so the race is constantly about you.”

“You can’t save someone from themselves,” Christine told her husband. “This guy is set in his ways and he is what he is, and you’re not going to change that.” “I know,” Barr said. “I’m going to try.”

“I’ve been around long enough not to hold grudges, but I feel I and a lot of others went in there to help this guy, sort of acclimate him to the Washington system.” Guide Trump about its boundaries. The problem, he said, was Trump’s “own pigheadedness and his blindness.”

“Mr. President, on the current trajectory, we think you’re going to lose,” Barr said.

Their message was that he had to pay a lot more attention to domestic affairs and the economy. It turned out to be good advice. Bush lost in part because he failed to have a coordinated message on the economy.

But Barr would be the leadoff batter of the soft intervention because he might get a hit.

He steeled himself because Trump’s usual approach when the president detected someone coming with an unwelcome recommendation, or something he didn’t want to hear, was to filibuster. “No filibustering, Mr. President, please,” Barr said. “I really hope that you take to heart what I say, because it’s important for me that you listen.”

‘You know, we love the president, we love you. We want our selfie. You know, thank God. God bless you.’ ” But Barr said “these people whisper, ‘Would you please tell the president to dial it back? Would you please tell him not to tweet as much? He’s his own worst enemy.’

“They just think you’re a fucking asshole.”

“You know, you pride yourself in being a fighter and that worked in 2016 when they wanted a disruptor to go in there. And they still want a disruptor, but they don’t want someone who is a complete asshole. And so, you have to turn on the other thing you do very well, which is to woo people. And I think that’s what this election is about. And you know, my concern is that in some ways you become a captive of the Beltway in that you have all these self-anointed spokespeople for your base who come and tell you what they want. They are drowning you in their needs.”

“The other basic theme,” Barr said, “and I know this is self-serving because I know you’re impatient about the work we’re doing over at the department. But I actually think that the people, the mom and pops up in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania and Michigan, they don’t give a shit.” Don’t care about prosecuting former FBI director James Comey and others for their handling of the Russia investigation.

“Your base cares about seeing Comey and the rest of these guys held accountable, but these other people don’t. They don’t care about your fucking grievances. And it just seems that every time you’re out there, you’re talking about your goddamn grievances. They’re worried about their future. They’re worried about the economy now with Covid and stuff like that.

“You should be talking about what you did pre-Covid, how you’re the guy to bring the country back after Covid, that you have a demonstrated track record and then give them a vision of where you’re going to take the country. And that’s all you should be ta...

“Here’s my assessment, Mr. President,” Barr said. “I think you were able to pull it off at the last minute, after ‘grab them by the pussy’ last time, because that sobered you up and you realized you didn’t know everything, and you started actually listening to people like Kellyanne and others. And so, you behaved yourself for about one month. And that was just enough because the electorate was fluid. I’m afraid there are two things that are different this time, and this is why I’m talking to you now. “The electorate is not as fluid. Last time, they didn’t know you as a public figure and they were willing to give you a chance. Now, a lot of people have made up their minds about you. They think they know who you are. So, they’re not as fluid. And the other thing that’s different, and I think the thing that’s the main problem, is you think you’re a fucking genius, politically.

“You think you’re a genius and so you’re not going to listen to anybody. You think you know what they want. And I think you’re wrong. I have yet to meet one of your supporters who hasn’t said that to me. And these are people who do like you and they actually tolerate your bullshit. But it’s toleration. They don’t support you because you act that way. And I think unless you, you know, unless you sort of go on a charm offensive and start trying to patch up some of the damage that’s happened in some of these suburbs, I think you’re going to lose.” “I need to be a fighter,” Trump said. “I’ve gotten where I am because I’m willing to fight. They like that I’m willing to fight. I have to fight.” His advisers, he said, told him if he got 65 million votes, he would win.

“It’s not a static playing field,” Barr warned. “The other side is working, too.”

Obamacare had already survived two Supreme Court challenges. Trump wanted the federal government to join a case against Obamacare brought by Texas and 17 other attorneys general in GOP-led states. No, no, no, no, Barr said.

In 2017, the Republican-controlled Congress successfully nullified one of the ACA’s core provisions, the individual mandate, so there was no longer a tax penalty on individuals who failed to purchase it. “That’s the victory,” Barr argued. “Declare victory and say you’re going to put up a better bill next time. But why should we be doing this? We’re not going to win. It’s just political downside.”

“The attorney general of Texas is not the president of the United States,” Barr said. “He has his constituency. You have your constituency. I don’t see outsourcing our policy to the fucking state of Texas.” “Well, I’ll think about it,” Trump said. He again invoked his base.

As Barr predicted, the Supreme Court later rejected the Trump administration’s argument and upheld the law on a 7 to 2 vote on June 17, 2021.

“When are you going to get this order on birthright citizenship?” Trump asked Barr and Cipollone one day. It had become his constant refrain with them in the spring of 2020 as he slipped in the polls. Barr shook his head and didn’t smile. Trump never stopped. Barr called it “Groundhog Day,” his version of the 1993 Bill Murray movie about being trapped in an endless and torturous time loop of the same day.

Birthright citizenship is rooted in the 14th Amendment, adopted in 1868, designating that all persons born or naturalized in the United Stat...

Trump wanted an executive order that would deny citizenship to people born in the United States whose parents were in the country illegally. The U.S. would t...

“And what you’ll be doing in an election year is calling into question the citizenship of 10 million American people or more,” Barr said. “I won’t make it retroactive,” Trump said. The order would only apply to future children of illegal immigrants. “But you can’t say you won’t make it retroactive,” Barr said. “You’re basically saying that they’re not citizens. Okay? The premise would be that all these other people in the past are not citizens. So how are you going to give them comfort at that point?”