The almost unimaginably painful narcissistic injury that Trump sustained on his last humiliating day as president included a typical Trumpian outburst of rage in which his hurried threat once again led to a situation that Trump was only forced to walk back days later.
On his last day as president, Trump told RNC chairman: “I’m done.” Ronna McDaniel.
Trump is going to start his own third party, convinced that the GOP cannot survive without him, backed by Don Jr. ‘s conviction that the party was insufficiently loyal to Trump, according to ABC New’s Jonathan Karl’s new book Betrayal.
“He got right to the point. He told her he was leaving the Republican Party and was going to create his own political party. The president’s son, Donald Trump jr., Was also on the phone. The younger Trump relentlessly denounced the RNC for being insufficiently loyal to Trump. In fact, at the January 6 rally before the Capitol riot, the younger Trump almost declared that the old Republican Party no longer existed.
Ironically, Trump made his furious announcement during a call McDaniel made to simply greet Trump. Trump does not fare well when he feels like the ultimate loser. It sounds like McDaniel also suddenly felt like a loser:
“You can not do that,” McDaniel told Trump. “If you do, we will lose forever.”
“Exactly. You lose forever without me, “Trump replied. “I do not care.”
As one might expect, Karl writes that Trump wanted to punish the people he believes put him in such a situation, one in which they did not fight “hard enough” (despite the unprecedented lawsuits, objections and revolt) around the election results. He hurt, he wanted to hurt them.
Karl writes that Trump, despite the haste of the decision, actually decided he was going to do it, despite the fact that McDaniel told him that he would not only ruin the GOP, but his own legacy. “I do not care,” Trump replied.
He learned days to care deeply when the party decided it should fight back just as hard and be prepared to hurt Trump:
McDaniel and her leadership team have made it clear that if Trump leaves, the party will immediately stop paying legal bills incurred during post-election challenges.“
Ag. Trump faced an avalanche of legal bills and he needed to know that the lawsuits were just beginning.
The party then lowered an even larger hammer. Trump would lose access to the RNC’s 40 million donor list, a $ 100 million asset. Not only would Trump lose access to a crucial component of his ability to raise his own campaign money, but Trump has made significant money by “renting out the list” to other candidates in need of donations.
Five days later, Trump announced that he would remain within the party.
In the end, McDaniel turned out to be right in the middle of Trump’s tirade. Despite Trump’s anger and despite the fact that Trump really wanted to start his own party (he may still preferred to start his own party), the move would eventually ruin both Trump and the GOP.
By all accounts, Trump absolutely wanted the IDP destroyed. As always, however, his own needs came first and he refused to hurt himself while taking revenge. Typical Trumpian. Emotional, angry, hurt, looking for revenge, looking to hurt anyone around him, until it amounted to money and an assessment of the financial cost. It all changed. With Trump, money always does.
Jason Miciak is a political writer, with writer, writer and lawyer. He is originally from Canada, but grew up in the Pacific Northwest as a dual Canadian-American citizen, for which he is becoming increasingly grateful every day. He now enjoys life as a single dad, writing from the shores of the Gulf Coast, getting advice from his beloved daughter and teammate. He is very much the dreamy mystic who cannot add and loves dogs more than most people. He also enjoys studying cooking, theoretical physics, cosmology and quantum mechanics. He likes pizza.
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