By Bruce Wolpe
AMERICAN POLITICS
All In The Family: The Trumps and How We Got This Way
Fred C. Trump III
Gallery Books, $34.99
Now we know who is the best writer in the Trump family. It is not Fred C. Trump III, grandson of the (now) legendary New York real estate empire builder, Frederick Trump.
Frederick was the father of Donald, the future president; along with Frederick Jr; Robert, who Fred III describes as the Fredo of the outfit (to Fred III the Trump syndicate conjured up Mario Puzo’s The Godfather); Maryanne, who was appointed as a federal appellate judge by president Bill Clinton; and Elizabeth, who kept her life private.
Donald Trump’s nephew, Fred C. Trump III, lets his own words knife his uncle.Credit: AP
Mary, Fred III’s sister, became a psychologist and writer. And boy, is she a better writer. Mary turned completely against uncle Donald, and excoriated him in exceptionally powerful and bitter terms in her book Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World’s Most Dangerous Man as he sought re-election in 2020. It is a mission she continues to this day. In an early August post on X, Mary wrote: “When it comes to him, we shouldn’t overthink it. He is exactly what he seems: a racist, a misogynist, a liar. He is a bully who has no business getting anywhere near the White House.”
Fred Trump IIICredit:
Fred III, in describing Donald’s adult traits, explains that in his childhood, Donald had two slogans that carry through to this day: “I wanna do what I wanna do” and “That’s not fair”. He does not get more profound than that. The drama here is that his and Mary’s father, Frederick Jr, the patriarch’s firstborn, was determined not to go into the family business.
Frederick Jr rebelled against it, sought his own independent life. He was intelligent, charming, generous and creative. But every attempt he made to be free ended in failure and the resulting depression and alcoholism killed him at age 42.
Fred III and Mary were punished for their father’s perfidious rebellion. Donald ultimately took over the Trump real estate business, expanded into Manhattan from Queens, and then into casinos in New Jersey. He was leveraged to the hilt. His Atlantic City casinos tanked. He was at risk of losing everything – just as he was divorcing his first wife, Ivana.
Fred III recounts that Donald, to get his hands on more cash, together with his siblings connived to have his father change his will to disinherit Fred III and Mary, which buttressed the four siblings’ share of the hundreds and hundreds of millions of their father’s estate.
Fred Trump III quotes his uncle in his book. Credit:
Oh yes, there is plenty of salacious but unsexy material. Donald used the N-word to describe black people. Donald would not tolerate any slur about the genetic quality of the family: “Not in our family. There is nothing wrong with our genes.” We learn that there was Trump-branded soap in the bathroom adjoining the Lincoln bedroom in the White House.
What is worthy in the book is Fred III’s account of the very serious disability that afflicted his son, William, from the first days of his birth. The amount of care required was overwhelming, and Fred III and his wife were able to manage it even when Donald and his siblings cut off the private health insurance policy that covered the family. Fred III and his wife still are doing everything to care for their permanently disabled son.
Fred III’s knifing of Donald are quotes of what his uncle said about people with disabilities. As president, he told Fred III: “Those people … shape they’re in, all the expenses, maybe those kind of people should just die.”
Donald also made it personal during a call with Fred III, who was seeking more money to care for William. “I don’t know. He doesn’t recognise you. Maybe you should just let him die and move down to Florida.”
After the gross, pernicious travesty of his treatment by his family, Fred III still visited his uncle in the White House, sat at the Resolute desk in the Oval Office, played golf with him and enjoyed membership in the Trump clubs and resorts.
Mary played hardball in her book. There is nothing comparable here to halt uncle Donald’s march to make America great again.
Bruce Wolpe is author of Trump’s Australia.
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