Speaking Into the Void

What Happens When a Narcissist Loses His Microphone

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[Transcript edited for clarity, flow and length]

Hi, I'm Mary Trump and I've known Donald my entire life. I can examine his behavior through the prism of not just being his niece, but also as a clinical psychologist. For example, if you did something every single day for six decades and continued to fail at it, wouldn't you stop? Well, I can tell you why Donald keeps playing golf, even though he's terrible at it.

Wajahat Ali: Everyone, I’m speaking with Mary Trump and we just went live. Mary is the good one. Mary and her daughter are the good Trumps. Mary has tried as a dutiful servant and soldier for democracy, and as a tireless advocate against fascism, to warn America about her racist, deranged uncle and some of the troubling members of her family. It was not just Donald, but also Donald’s father and mother. Yet America said, “Mary, you’re so silly. We’re not going to listen to you. Let’s vote for Donald not just once, but twice.”

For years we waited. When would it start to finally crater? When would the face-eating leopards continue to consume all faces, particularly the faces of their own base? Well, folks, things are happening now. I understand that people are dejected and cynical, resistant to any hope. But as we have said all along, it is a matter of drip, drip, drip, drip, and then flood.

We are witnessing a point of acceleration in the decline of the U.S. government, of our infrastructure, of our public healthcare system. It is like the game of Jenga. Once you remove enough blocks, the entire structure starts to topple. Mary, you are seeing it now. Gas prices, record high. Diesel prices, record high. Donald doubles down on the war in Iran. Food shortages. Helium shortages. The FBI website is down because of hackers. Elon Musk is brought on to give the final financing for a merger. California Democrats cave. The Ellisons will now control and destroy two of the five major Hollywood studios. CBS gone, CNN gone. Public healthcare infrastructure is about to collapse. Permanent tax cuts for the rich, which people are not even prepared for, will arrive in roughly a month and a half and extract one trillion dollars from Medicaid. The polling shows Donald at twenty-nine percent. Democrats are up by double digits.

Byron Donalds, who is running in Florida, has taken Donald off his website. A new study reveals that in the past month, conservative radio has stopped talking about Donald seventy percent of the time. The damage, however, is already done. On top of all of this, Donald has attacked the press. For the first time in ten years, the press has done something they should have done a decade ago. They have grown a spine. They said they are going to turn away from him. All of this is happening simultaneously. You are also a psychologist. You have written a book. How will Donald respond to the collapse of his administration and the collapse of the GOP?

Mary Trump: First of all, it is fun to be on with you, Wajahat.

Wajahat Ali: That was just off the top of my head, by the way.

Mary Trump: I know. I was going to say there are so many things not on that list, like the anti-vax agenda.

Wajahat Ali: Yes, the anti-vax push.

Mary Trump: Getting rid of all qualified people who are women and people of color from the military and from the FBI. Getting rid of science, getting rid of people, getting rid of arts and institutions. All of it. Before I get to that, I think we need to be very mindful that we take nothing for granted. Democrats always need to run as if they are five or ten points behind. That should be obvious.

But if we win in November, which by rights we should, what is going to be left? We need to be very clear-eyed about that because there is going to be an enormous amount of work to do. Democrats should have been planning for this already, but if they have not been, they need to start planning now in every category. What about accountability? What about the economy? What about civil liberties? They need answers to all of it. Yes, they need to stop the bleeding. But how are they going to be transformative?

Now, to your other question about how Donald is going to handle this. He is not going to handle it. Let us be honest here. He is more dangerous now than he has ever been. People might be saying, well, how is that possible? He is so obviously in cognitive, psychological, emotional, and physical decline. He is weak. He is pathetic. He has painted himself into a corner. Sure. He still has the nuclear codes. He is still engaged in this horrific war of choice against Iran, which we have already lost. He is at the United Nations threatening to annihilate an entire country, which is not good rhetoric to hear from anybody.

Wajahat Ali: That is exactly right.

Mary Trump: The reason he is dangerous, besides obviously the power, is that nobody who can stop him is stopping him. I used to call them enablers. Now I call them co-conspirators. Because Donald, as you have been saying for a long time, is not going to prison. Never. I do not know what accountability, if anything, looks like for him. Accountability may just be, and this is deeply unsatisfying, that he continues to worsen and fade away and lose power. Maybe that is what accountability looks like for him. But there are hundreds if not thousands of people who have been in this with him, helping him commit his crimes, commit his treason, and destroy the planet who we can and should hold accountable. They are some of the reasons he continues to be so dangerous.

Nobody is reigning him in. Nobody is stopping him. Nobody is even trying to slow him down. This includes the Republican Congress, which used to be a third branch of government. This includes the Department of Justice, which used to be a pretty independent agency depending on the presidency, but it has certainly never acted as a president’s personal defense firm. The more he is allowed to roam free and be unconstrained, the worse his condition gets. The more he is going to start sensing that he is losing control of things. There is only so much you can protect a person who is as extremely online as he is from the reality of the numbers.

Wajahat Ali: Natalie Harp is trying. She is really trying.

Mary Trump: Yes, she is trying hard. But if he is watching Fox, we see this on Fox and I have even seen it on Newsmax. They are starting to tell people what is actually happening as opposed to what they want people to think is happening. That is going to filter through. That is going to make him even more desperate. The guy literally banned three major news organizations the other day, depriving himself of a microphone. This is not a sane or measured thing to do.

Wajahat Ali: Can I ask you about the psychology of Donald? Because something has stuck with me for ten years. I watched a Merlin miniseries starring the late, great Sam Neill when I was in high school. In the end, Merlin defeats Morgan Le Fay by turning his back to her and depriving her of attention. She dies. That scene has always stayed with me. I have always thought clearly you cannot ignore Donald because he is the leader of the MAGA fascist movement. The GOP is him. He is the GOP. He is the president. But I have always wondered what would happen if we simply ignored him if he was deprived of the one thing that sustains him: nonstop adulation, coverage, praise, and media hits.

He said it at the White House Correspondents Dinner: “Without me, you are nothing. You are going to miss me when I am gone. I made you millions of dollars.” He was right. And now they have finally grown a collective spine. The only reason Fox has done this is because Fox realizes, oh no, Democrats are probably going to win the House and the Senate, and if we have a free and fair election, they are probably going to win the presidency. Then we will be frozen out. We will not be an opposition party because all we have is opposition and whining and we are going to lose our business. That is why Fox has joined CNN, Politico, NPR, and PBS in this collective effort to stop covering Trump. I am curious, because you know him. I do not think he is going to last long because he is going to come back doubled down. But how long will he last? He is a narcissist and now no one is talking about him.

Mary Trump: I think people are going to find out what a pleasure it is not to have to listen to him. I tweeted a clip of him speaking into the void because there was no press pool and no microphones. I just wrote “Paradise.” A lot of people found that. I think he is not going to be able to last. He is not going to be able to withstand it. We have a tiny bit of insight now into what might have happened if he had been deprived of a microphone in twenty-fifteen. To which I say, what if he had been deprived of a microphone in nineteen seventy-nine? We would have been spared so much horror.

Wajahat Ali: Mary, let me add one thing because nothing is going to happen to these people. But I want to bring receipts. In twenty-fifteen, the CEO of CBS, Les Moonves, openly said:

Les Moonves: “Donald Trump might be bad for America, but he is great for CBS.”

Jeff Zucker of CNN did business with him for many years and did not regret his hand in helping him become president. Face-eating leopards eat all faces. Please continue.

Mary Trump: Well, I am sure CBS executives have been really appreciating Les Moonves’ willingness to sell out CBS journalists just to make a buck. I think a couple of things are going on. We are going to see that he cannot handle it. I have no doubt that we will see lots more lashing out on his failing social media site. He will go to outlets that are still willing to publish his lies or spin them favorably. But I think we are also going to see, and we are already seeing this increasingly, outlets like Fox and even Newsmax understand there is really nothing to talk about if they are not talking about how bad things are and how bad he is. What else is there to talk about right now? He is not doing anything. He is not doing anything constructive. When he is out in public, he is rambling. He looks tired. He looks ill. He is delusional. He is lying constantly.

Wajahat Ali: Your psychological assessment is clear.

Mary Trump: Well, anyway, Donald, because he is so good at ruining everything, has painted himself and the entire right-wing media echo chamber into a very bad corner. And it is kind of fun actually, except for the fact that everything is terrible.

Wajahat Ali: He is putting his name on everything, if you have noticed. Now he is trying to put his name on everything aggressively. And secondly, he is making the bunker. In addition to making the bunker, which by his own words is not a ballroom bunker anymore, he called it a military complex. So we went from ballroom to military complex. You saw the latest news that he wants to put snipers, drones, and ammunition inside. I just passed it at the George Washington Bridge right in front of the Lincoln Memorial at the two arches. This to me does not look like a man who plans on leaving legally or peacefully, Mary.

Mary Trump: Really? What gives you that impression? One of the funniest questions I got in twenty-twenty was, “If Donald loses, is he going to accept the results of the election?” I said, “No.”

Wajahat Ali: We said no.

Mary Trump: I said no. Actually, there was a condition. If the Republicans and Donald both lost by massive margins so nobody could pretend anything other than that they lost by huge margins, he would basically leave the country and say, “You guys do not deserve me.” But unfortunately, although he lost by a large margin, the Republican Party did very well in twenty-twenty, which is one of the reasons we are here. Another question I got was, “If Biden wins, will Donald go to Biden’s inauguration?” I thought that was not a serious question.

Wajahat Ali: We talked about that. We said no. Stop trying to normalize this man. He is a freak. What more do you need to see? He has been a freak his whole life. But people said, “No, maybe he will come around, Mary. Maybe he will be presidential.”

Mary Trump: No. Instead of taking that for what it meant, Biden then invites him to his second inauguration. It is despicable. Biden should never have been in the same room with him again. Democrats just do not understand what is at stake here. He is not going anywhere. There are a couple of reasons he has not picked a successor. One is because psychologically, he is incapable of admitting that there is going to be one. Nobody could possibly succeed him, right?

Wajahat Ali: Right.

Mary Trump: But the second reason is because he does not have any intention of leaving. Obviously, if a Republican won in twenty-twenty-eight, it would make it easier for Donald to stay. Who knows what kind of shape he will be in then. Some deal could be made. If, and this is ridiculous, J.D. Vance won a presidential election, hypothetically, if he did, it would be easier for them to figure out some highly unconstitutional, traitorous deal that has Donald staying. But he has no intention of leaving. He is increasingly paranoid. He feels like he needs all these drones and a bunker because he feels like there is a target on his back. Metaphorically speaking, there is in his view because a Republican, not him, will run for the presidency.

Wajahat Ali: Julius sees her time.

Mary Trump: Yes, exactly. He knows on some very deep level that everything is coming crashing down and the vast majority of why it is crashing down is him. That is not an easy thing for him to process. He may not be capable of wrapping his head around it actually, but that does not mean he is not going to feel it.

Wajahat Ali: Mary, we have been talking for about six years now. Time is a flat circle. It feels like an eternity and a moment all at once. I feel no joy in what I am about to say because I am just recalling all the conversations we have had, you and me and the Mary Trump Nerd Avengers. We warned about all of this. It is like getting no joy from an “I told you so.” You wrote books about it. We get no joy from this prediction coming true. And here we are.

We said the Republicans would make a Faustian bargain. They would go all the way up with Donald Trump and then all the way down because he would not let them go. If they turn on him, he would use his bully pulpit to go after them. Face-eating leopards eat all faces. Fascists come for everyone, even fellow fascists. But in the last minutes I have with you, I want to game this out very clearly.

Some people get really upset at me. They ask why I criticize Democrats. Why? It is either Republicans or Democrats. You and I said vote for Hillary Clinton. You and I said vote for Biden. We said Biden was making a mistake but he was in the race, so vote for Biden. Harris is there, vote for Harris. You better vote for Angie Nixon. You better vote for people fighting for change. Now I want to game this out. If Democrats, who for ten years have told us Donald Trump is an existential threat and Republicans are complicit, nonetheless feel more comfortable moving to the right and punching left. If the tent opens to the right but never to the left. If they attack Medicare for All. If they attack affordable healthcare. If they attack challenging the billionaires. If they are sitting there taking money from APAC, AI, and crypto. If California Democrats sell out the state and allow Larry Ellison and his son David Ellison to merge Paramount with Warner Brothers. Then what?

Elon Musk is looking at being brought in as a partner because probably the funding from Saudi Arabia and the UAE fell through. A handful of people will consolidate news media. Thousands of jobs will be lost. Yesterday this happened. People say, “Why do you knock Schumer and Jeffries?” Hakeem Jeffries was set to attend a fundraiser hosted by Fox News’s favorite disaffected Democrat, Michael LaRosa, who is also deeply Islamophobic and wants Democrats to vote for Mike Rogers. This was with a number of Democratic lobbyists at Trump world’s most influential firm. After that news came out, Hakeem Jeffries canceled it. This is on top of Hakeem Jeffries saying he will take money from APAC. This is on top of the news that Democrats have told Democrats not to hit AI too hard, even though it is an eighty to twenty issue.

After we found out that Hakeem Jeffries met with Jared Kushner, I do not think people are seeing the big picture. If you get these Democrats elected with all these problems, they will uphold an institution that continues to crush people. In twenty-twenty-eight, Republicans will take the House and Senate. In twenty-thirty-two, you are going to get your first Nazi economic populist leader. Am I wrong here?

Mary Trump: You are not wrong. I wish you were wrong. You are not wrong. That is why, listen, we are in the general election right now. There is a clear choice. Democrats need to win. That is it. However, the twenty-twenty-eight election starts on November fourth of this year, and we have time. Hakeem Jeffries needs to be primaried, especially if he becomes Speaker of the House. Chuck Schumer needs to be primaried. I do not believe that primaries are a tool that should be used often, especially if they are not done properly. If you think you are a better alternative and you want to run in the Democratic primary because you are better on some issues, that is fine. I think it can potentially strengthen the candidate in the general. But far too often what happens is the person gets weakened.

Also, they are expensive. They deplete the coffers for the general. Republicans have more money. So use primary challenges sparingly. That does not mean they should not be used. We are at an existential point in our history where we can no longer afford people in positions of power who are willing to fall back on the status quo. We cannot afford people who ignore their constituents in favor of special interests or the money classes or Republicans. We cannot afford it anymore. I think there are a number of Democrats in safe seats who have the power of incumbency and who desperately need to be challenged even if they win the primary. They need to learn what voters are demanding of them. They need to be forced to pay attention.

Wajahat Ali: Let me tell you what Democratic consultants are saying right now because they are saying it openly. They are saying abolish ICE polls badly in Iowa and Georgia. Taxing the billionaires and fighting the oligarchy. The regular American does not know that. They have to support Israel even though poll after poll says the base and independents say no. AI and crypto. This is just how the business works. They give money to both sides. They are looking at these polls and they are telling you that in twenty-twenty-eight and twenty-thirty-two, they are going to give you a milquetoast center-left white man who is not going to say abolish ICE. He is not going to call out Israel genocide. He is not going to tax the billionaires. He is not going to support Medicare for all. They will give you incremental change. They said the same thing about progressive candidates who supposedly could never win.

Look at Mondaire Jones. It was impossible, they said. He won. A year later, he is one of the most popular national political figures. Donald even goes to Mondaire because he realizes this guy has momentum. Let me be clear with you. Who does not go and do the social rounds with Mondaire? Gillibrand, Jeffries, and Schumer. But who is also very popular? Ocasio-Cortez. They said she would not last. Who is also rising? Angie Nixon. They said she would get destroyed by the incumbent. Look at all our polls, they said. She won by double digits.

The consultants said Abdul would never win. We are going to spend sixty million dollars to crush him. He seems like he is going to win by five to seven points. It reminds me of twenty-oh-seven and twenty-oh-eight when the same people said, “We have seen all the polls. There is no way regular Americans will ever vote for a Black Muslim Barack Obama. So you better vote for Clinton.” How did Barack win? I was one of the few people who did not vote for the war on terror. People said, “I am also different and I am going to bring hope and change.” Once he actually ran, people said, “Oh, we have this option and he is viable. He becomes president.” I think this is a generational fight.

I am going to say what I said recently. I am only speaking for myself. All you collaborators, all you centrists, all you corporate Democrats, all you corporate consultants, all you people taking money from AI, APAC, and crypto. Enjoy the next two to four years. Feather your nest. Get paid. Make sure your children have their nest feathered. Make generational wealth. We are coming after you. We are coming after your seats. You are not entitled to them. There is no birthright. You have two to four years. Evolve or be cut. We are coming after all of you because you are not the fighter that we need. Everything is going to get worse. I will be damned if I am going to keep doing this Groundhog Day for another ten years, Mary.

Mary Trump: I am entirely with you. Also, stop throwing trans children under the bus for heaven’s sakes. Use your platform to educate people about how cruel it is to weaponize the legal system and our government against this incredibly vulnerable population. We need people to be brave. We need people to have the foresight to understand what has to change down the road. We cannot afford to continue having Democrats who weaken us and therefore strengthen the opposition. It has got to stop. We need to put every single one of them on notice. If Chuck Schumer does not get primaried, I do not even know what to say at that point.

Wajahat Ali: I do not think they are going to evolve. I think they are going to become Joe Manchins and Kyrsten Sinemas. I think they are going to become lobbyists. We have to get rid of them. We will get rid of them. I just want to let you know, people say, “Wajahat wants to call the Democratic Party out.” Yes. Who am I? I am nobody. I am speaking metaphorically about calling the party and replacing them with fighters. Everything is going to get worse, folks. Everything is going to get worse. You are going to see the collapse of America. And if you have people who have the politics of restoration, they are complicit. We need the politics of transformation. In God willing, I have faith that the people will wake up. Mary, always a pleasure. Thank you for taking the time.

Mary Trump: Check out my Substack, The Good in Us. Please check out the Mary Trump Media YouTube channel and subscribe to The Left Hook with Wajahat Ali.

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