The Writing Has Been on the Wall

In Conversation with Jim Acosta

[Transcript edited for clarity, flow and length]

Mary Trump: I was on with Jim Acosta not long ago, and Jim and I discussed just how worried we should be about the kinds of stunts the Republicans, led by Donald, are going to pull in the midterms by sending ICE to polling places, and what Democratic governors can do to combat that. And we covered a whole lot of other territory. Jim is amazing, so I hope you enjoy this as much as I did.

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Jim Acosta: Mary, it’s great to see you, as always.

Mary Trump: Jim, it’s great to be here. I love hanging out with you. And yeah, a thing or two happening on this day.

Jim Acosta: A thing or two happening, no question about it. I mean, the election stuff, and I want to get into Natalie Harp and the way he’s been losing it lately, the Kennedy Center, and so on. But this election stuff, I really am concerned because we’ve already been through this. This idea that, the way it’s covered in legacy media, as if this is something that may occur or it’s something that he’s threatening to do or warning he may do. He’s doing it. He’s doing it. And I think everybody’s being too cautious in saying it. What’s been your observation of this? How worried are you about these upcoming midterms?

Mary Trump: I’ve been worried about Donald’s willingness to cheat and steal elections since 2016 because he’s so deluded himself into believing that he deserves to win that he’s perfectly comfortable cheating in order to do so. And as we know, the only way this guy ever does win is by cheating. So we should all be concerned.

As you said, it’s not like this is new. The writing has been on the wall for a very long time, and especially since 2020 with the Big Lie and the insurrection. How much more evidence do we need that Donald Trump is capable of doing whatever it takes in order to stay in power?

And the thing about the mail in voting that’s particularly concerning is because it affects all elections. Now, gerrymandering, partisan gerrymandering, racist gerrymandering, those are all very bad things, but they can affect statewide or federal elections. Mail in voting can, and it’s just an indication that Donald knows that without this assist, this fraudulent assist, his party will lose, and that is not going to end well for him. So, of course, he’s going to pull out all the stops, and of course, the corrupt, illegitimate Supreme Court is going to help him.

Jim Acosta: Yeah, I mean, that’s the scary thing about it. I also have a problem with our judicial system and the way the judges and the Supreme Court have been behaving. I mean, this judge today lifted an order that had blocked the administration from carrying out these efforts. This is what The New York Times reported:

The Postal Service can for now move ahead with plans to restrict mail in voting ahead of the midterm elections in November after a federal judge lifted an order that had blocked it from carrying out Trump administration efforts.

The judge wrote that she felt compelled to act in response to a ruling from the Supreme Court on Monday that the action by the courts was premature. Under the plan, the Postal Service would not deliver mail ballots in states that do not share voter data with the agency and would deliver only ballots that meet certain criteria.

And just this week, Mary, the Supreme Court basically lied about Trump’s intentions. They lifted this lower court stay of the executive order on the mail in ballot stuff, and it begins with a lie. The ruling from the Supreme Court begins with a lie. It says:

About five months ago, President Trump issued an executive order designed to maintain public confidence in federal elections.

That’s not true. It says he issued an executive order regarding election integrity. He doesn’t care about election integrity. He cares about elections being tilted in his favor.

Mary Trump: Yeah. And apparently the aforementioned corrupt, illegitimate supermajority only cares about that too. Clearly, these people don’t care about the Constitution. Donald’s never read it. It is in the Constitution that elections are run by states. The federal government has no role here. And just to make it as simple as possible, Donald votes by mail.

The hypocrisy and the willingness of the Roberts Court to bend over backwards to give Donald an assist is bordering on the grotesque at this point.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. I was asking the other day, who’s the biggest superfan of Donald Trump? Is it Natalie Harp or is it Chief Justice John Roberts? I mean, they’re both in serious competition with one another.

Mary Trump: Roberts has done much more to help out Donald Trump than Natalie Harp has.

Jim Acosta: Yeah, there’s no question about it. And I mean, there’s example after example. Again, not to harp on this, hello, using ICE as a weapon against voting. There’s a Republican nominee for governor in Maine who told supporters he plans to ask Homeland Security to send ICE to polling places in Maine before the midterms. The Washington Post has a story today. Trump is threatening to arrest election officials. I mean, it goes on and on and on. This is what I want people to understand. It’s happening right now. It’s already started.

Mary Trump: Absolutely. And it would be malpractice for governors in blue states, or Democratic governors, not to be taking this seriously and not to have a plan in place. I mean, the good news is that Democratic AGs meet regularly to make sure that they do whatever they can to protect their state’s elections, so that should make us all feel better.

But I think that governors, who have a massive amount of power, and we forget that sometimes, states are sovereign, and Democratic governors could make sure that they counter any ICE presence with the National Guard, for example, just to make sure that there is no violence and there is no voter intimidation, which is exactly what will happen if ICE is allowed to show up to polling places in Democratic cities unchallenged.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. No, and states have state police forces. I mean, I think that you could just have a couple of squad cars in certain locations and just say, “Hey, you’re keeping an eye on us. We’re keeping an eye on you.”

I mentioned Natalie Harp. Let’s talk about this because, Mary, you and I haven’t had a chance to speak in a while. We’ve seen Donald go through this over the years where he collects these aides who get super clingy with him. Natalie Harp seems to have blown all of them out of the water in her clinginess.

And I mean, just over the weekend, they had this big race here in Washington where they spent a whole bunch of money and I guess not a lot of people turned out, but Melania turned out. The First Lady showed up out of nowhere, and we haven’t seen her in a while. We have some video of this. She looked really angry with Trump. I’m sure you saw this. She did not look happy, and I guess maybe she was not happy that she had to make an appearance as part of her deal with Donald there. But what do you make of this whole Natalie Harp fiasco? We haven’t had a chance to talk about it.

Mary Trump: Well, I mean, obviously Melania only shows up if she’s handsomely paid, and that’s probably where most of the money went to get her there. But I think the Natalie Harp situation is of a piece with Donald’s general decline. It makes him look like such a pathetic, frail, needy old man that he has to have a woman young enough to be his granddaughter constantly with him, protecting him, making sure that he sees positive press clippings about him, positive articles, most of which are probably fictional. It’s a very bad look for him.

And it also shows you that probably, in the not too distant past, somebody like that would have been too much even for him. But because he’s in so much trouble, and he is really lashing out and is really desperate to change the narrative, and his ego is being threatened at every turn, he needs somebody constantly filling his head with compliments and positive messages. And she fits the bill, I have to say that.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. And this is more than what we’ve witnessed in the past, it seems, what she’s doing.

Mary Trump: Yeah. It’s extreme. It’s over the top. And again, it looks terrible. I personally don’t care what the contours of their relationship are. I really don’t care. Clearly, she’s somebody who needs help, though.

What I do care about, besides, again, the fact that it’s just another example of how far gone he is, is that she presents a very real national security threat to the United States of America, all because the president is a flailing, failing old man whose ego is fragile. That’s the most alarming thing about it to me.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. And I mean, there are signs of decline all over. The way he’s lashing out about the Kennedy Center. Now they’re threatening to demolish the Kennedy Center if they don’t put his name back up there. He’s lashing out at the Canadians. It sort of reminds me of Grandpa Simpson shaking his fist at the moon or the clouds or whatever it was.

And he’s got these Truth Social posts that he’s going to rename Lake Ontario “Lake America,” and nobody’s going to go along with that. Sort of like when your crazy uncle makes stupid racist jokes at the Thanksgiving dinner table and everybody just does one of these things, “Oh, geez, can’t wait for this dinner to be over so we can all go home.” He’s acting like that guy.

Mary Trump: Well, yes. Well aware.

Jim Acosta: Yeah, I’m sorry. And I mentioned uncle.

Mary Trump: That was my whole family at Thanksgiving, actually. But it’s getting worse, obviously. And he is. He is that guy shaking his fist at the clouds, but really what he’s shaking his fist at is reality because he has completely lost control of this narrative, and people are beginning to see that there’s no need to capitulate to this profoundly weak person.

There is no reason to go along with his rantings and his ravings because not only do they make him look bad, they make his supporters and enablers look bad. So you know that you’ve lost the plot when cattle ranchers have turned against you.

Jim Acosta: Right. Yeah, no, it’s so true. I mean, everybody is mad at him right now. Forty seven states and the District of Columbia. Apparently, he’s underwater in all of those places.

Mary Trump: If you enjoy this kind of content, please drop us a like and subscribe to the channel, and don’t forget to leave a comment below. Your support really does make a difference. Thanks.

Jim Acosta: One of the features of Donald Trump, Mary, and this is not really age relative, is the way he will throw people under the bus. And there was a Truth Social post where he reposted somebody saying that the GOP doesn’t understand how badly they’re messing things up. “I don’t think the GOP fully grasps how badly they’re messing up right now.” Trump put that on his Truth Social.

Mary Trump: Well, that’s a way to message it right ahead of the midterms. Hey, thank you, Donald. That’s actually really helpful. And what’s interesting is, what’s the rationale for thinking that? Because the truth of the matter is, the ways in which the Republicans are messing up is by continuing to be completely, 100 percent behind him every step of the way, even though he got rid of two incumbents who easily would have won reelection, and he installed Darlene Nordon, who is likely to lose against a far superior Democratic candidate, Annie Andrews, in South Carolina. Wow. So that’s the way in which they’re messing up, not by doing anything that he could objectively object to.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. Darlene, she doesn’t know about national security. She doesn’t know anything about it. She admitted that during a debate. Okay, good luck with that. But the funny thing about Trump throwing the entire Republican Party under the bus is that, I mean, he is the one that is largely, I mean, he is 100 percent responsible for where we are as a country right now.

He put up a Truth Social post declaring “Mission Accomplished” with Iran. I mean, this is also the detachment from reality thing. He’s making fun of Bush for the “Mission Accomplished” thing. Mission not accomplished. And this says “Mission Accomplished 2026” with Iran. Nobody thinks it’s mission accomplished. Zero people think that.

Mary Trump: No. Well, we’re still at war. So, yeah, and tell that to the sailors of the USS Lincoln.

Jim Acosta: Yeah.

Mary Trump: Yeah, it’s an interesting strategy, but I think this is also part of what will eventually be his undoing. Now, strongmen, people like Donald who’ve always gotten their way and who have successfully used the strategy of humiliation to co opt people and gain power over them, can only do that if they still are in control. And I think he’s just used to that.

And to be fair, Republicans have let him get away with it. They stay in line even though he humiliates them all the time. Even people like JD Vance. It’s one of his favorite hobbies that he learned from my grandfather. But as his grasp of reality and his grasp on power weaken, they’re not going to sit still for it anymore. I mean, we’re seeing this with our allies. We’re seeing this with universities who aren’t caving in and bending the knee automatically anymore. So I think we’re going to see a steady stream of Republicans also starting to push back.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. And Fred Trump, he enjoyed a good humiliation ritual. Was that a thing?

Mary Trump: Next to money, my grandfather’s favorite thing was humiliating people who were weaker and less powerful than he was.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. And the apple doesn’t fall too far from the tree in that regard, it seems.

Mary Trump: Yeah. This one did not.

Jim Acosta: This one did not. The other thing that, Mary, we should talk about too is, and I don’t know, I should have asked you what your thoughts were ahead of time on this. We’ll just do it. The way he has been picking on the trans community, the way he has been picking on trans kids. I’m old enough to remember when Donald Trump used to try to appeal to the LGBTQ community as a Republican, even though we knew he wasn’t a Republican way back then.

And the way these days he just totally picks on vulnerable people in the trans community, to me, it’s one of the more disgusting things that I’ve seen take place during the second administration. It’s not covered enough because I don’t think our legacy media, national media, I was doing a Google search, they don’t know how to cover it. And I guess he was at this event, what was it, yesterday in the Rose Garden? His hair looked super weird, by the way. I don’t know what you, maybe we can talk about it. His hair looks so weird, but he was talking about this.

This is what Donald Trump said:

The students proficient in reading and math. That was under the last administration. Under the Trump administration, we’re systematically ending every single one of these radical left betrayals, and we’re putting the parents back in charge. They’re the ones that love our children. They’re the ones that should be in charge. So immediately upon taking office, I signed an executive order to ban critical race theory and to ban transgender ideology from public schools. That was a big deal. We banned men from playing in women’s sports. That was so easy to do. I don’t get it.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. I mean, some of this stuff is gross. I don’t want to play it too long, but it’s almost like his favorite campaign thing now that he talks about. Your thoughts on this?

Mary Trump: Well, unfortunately, this stuff works. Republicans are very good at crafting these kinds of vile, divisive messages, and they almost always do target the most vulnerable among us. We just need to look at how they’ve treated and talked about immigrants.

Now, here’s the thing. I agree with you that Donald is largely responsible for many of the horrors that we’re living through, but he couldn’t have done it without his enablers in Congress and on the Supreme Court and throughout the judiciary. This is not his idea. He didn’t come up with this stuff. Somebody else did, and it works, it tracks. And shame on anybody who actually believes this vile nonsense.

Trans people make up less than one percent of the population in the United States of America. Imagine what tiny percentage of those are children who want to play sports with their friends. So they are endangering the lives, the physical and mental well being of children, all to get people’s votes by instilling completely unreasonable fear in their base.

And it is so horrifying to witness this and watch it not be covered at all, or when it is covered, not covered properly, not to make it clear to people just what a nonissue this always was. Trans people have always existed. This is not new. So this was never an issue before. And then to have the President of the United States make up the most insane lies about schools giving people gender surgery, it’s maddening that anybody in their right mind would believe it and that it’s been allowed to take root. And I don’t know, it’s shameful.

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Jim Acosta: It is shameful. And you know what? You make a great point, Mary, in that this did not originate in his head. And the way he stupidly lies about it kind of makes that point because it’s so stupid and it’s so outlandish and it’s so exaggerated beyond the pale that it’s laughable how dumb it is. It would be laughable if it wasn’t so horribly tragic.

And there are so many people in the very culturally conservative MAGA community who should be holding their heads in shame over this because they’re the ones who put those talking points in his head. There’s no question about it. And you know they must sit around one of the tables at the White House and gin up how they can rake the trans community over the coals and rake vulnerable communities over the coals for political gain. And it’s disgusting.

Mary Trump: It is.

Jim Acosta: He uses them. He uses them, by the way.

Mary Trump: Yeah. And they use him, I guess. Because I think that the deal with the devil has been, as long as Donald has power and as long as he’s able to steal as much money from the American people as he wants and grift as much as he wants, the Nazis like Stephen Miller can come up with whatever cruel policies they want and Donald will sign off on them.

I think that’s pretty much where we are. He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care about other human beings. He doesn’t care what the impact of these horrible policies might be. He doesn’t care. So as long as he gets what he wants, and that is truly what we’re dealing with right now, it’s like the entirety of the United States government right now is in service to protecting his ego and to making him and his useless children rich, while the other people in his inner circle inflict such extraordinary damage to our country and the people in it.

Jim Acosta: Yeah, it is astounding. When I saw Jared Kushner meeting with Hakeem Jeffries the other day, I mean, I was like, “Wait a minute, what is going on here?” It is astounding how the kids have resurfaced in this White House. Remember when Jared and Ivanka, they ran off into hiding and they secluded themselves and they didn’t want to go in front of the cameras and they wouldn’t go to New York anymore?

And now Jared Kushner’s brother’s buying the Lakers, and Melania and Jared want to buy an island, and Jared’s meeting with Hakeem. It’s kind of sickening to see that come back too, I will say. And Donnie and Eric making all that money in a ridiculously corrupt way. It’s all corrupt.

Mary Trump: And Barron. And Barron. What 19 year old doesn’t have the business savvy to make $200 million in a year? Yeah, it’s disgusting. It’s despicable. And again, it wouldn’t be happening if we had a functioning government, which we clearly don’t.

It is not a good thing to have Jared Kushner or any of Donald’s useless children involved in anything. And what Jeffries did is inexplicable to me. Jared is not a member of this government. He doesn’t have a job in this government, and he’s one of the people who needs to be held accountable. So basically what Jeffries is signaling here is that when and if the Democrats regain power, people like Jared Kushner are going to have a say in how we work things out. No.

It’s mind boggling to me that you would do anything to legitimize or normalize or empower somebody as vile and traitorous as Jared Kushner.

Jim Acosta: Yeah. But it is happening, and I think Hakeem Jeffries maybe touched the hot stove and he learned his lesson, and we’ll see. We’ll see how that plays out. But when you bring up the kids, it’s extraordinary because I remember watching Don and Eric and Ivanka. They were all crying at that farewell ceremony to Donald Trump when he left office in disgrace the first time around.

I was there at Joint Base Andrews, and the way they’ve all come back and just made a fortune, to me, books could be written on that. It’s totally insane.

Mary Trump: Yeah. And it’s all been allowed to happen by other people.

Jim Acosta: No question. Chiefly, the Republicans in Congress who won’t investigate it at all. Mary, great to see you. Thank you so much for coming on, and wonderful to catch up.

Mary Trump: Thanks, Jim. This is always great.

Jim Acosta: Yeah, thanks, Mary.

Mary Trump: Please leave a comment in the section below, and let’s keep the conversation going.