Woodward looks at Trump White House in new book
Latest offering on U.S. president reveals ‘harrowing life’ inside
In the worldwide capital of leaks and anonymous dishing that is Washington, secrets can be almost impossible to keep.
But somehow over the past 19 months, the fact that America’s most famous investigative journalist was quietly chipping away at a book that delves into the dysfunctions of President Donald Trump’s White House remained largely unknown. On Monday night, that veil of secrecy will be lifted when Simon & Schuster plans to announce that it will publish Fear: Trump in the White House by Bob Woodward on Sept. 11, according to a copy of the release obtained by The Washington Post.
In the book, Woodward’s 19th, the journalist and author “reveals in unprecedented detail the harrowing life inside President Donald Trump’s White House and precisely how he makes decisions on major foreign and domestic policies,” the publisher’s release states.
The expected tenor of the book is underscored by its unsettling cover: an extreme close-up of a squinty-eyed Trump depicted through a gauzy red filter.
The hush-hush project derives its title from an offhand remark that then-candidate Trump made in an interview with Woodward and Washington Post political reporter Robert Costa in April 2016. Costa asked Trump whether he agreed with a statement by then-president Barack Obama, who had said in an interview that “real power means you can get what you want without having to exert violence.”
At first Trump seemed to agree, saying: “Well, I think there’s a certain truth to that. ... Real power is through respect.” But then he added: “Real power is, I don’t even want to use the word: ‘Fear.’”
Woodward, 75, who declined to be quoted for this article, has privately described the remark as “an almost Shakespearean aside.”
Woodward, an associate editor at The Washington Post, is deeply embedded in the cultural fabric of American journalism. He is famed for his Pulitzer-winning reporting at the Post with Carl Bernstein on the deceptions and misdeeds of Richard Nixon that eventually led to his 1974 resignation. Their work was immortalized in the film All the President’s Men, in which Robert Redford portrayed Woodward and Dustin Hoffman played Bernstein. Woodward’s most recent work, The Last of the President’s Men, chronicled the story of Al- exander Butterfield, the Nixon aide who revealed the existence of an Oval Office taping system. But with his new book, Woodward will be returning to the sort of endeavour for which he is best known: real-time reporting on American power and the presidency.
His previous works on U.S. presidents, including books about George W. Bush and Obama, have tended to focus primarily on single, all-important decisions, such as whether to engage in foreign wars. Fear is expected to be a broader examination of the presidency.
Fear will add to the avalanche of books that focus on the Trump presidency, including offers by former FBI director James Comey, journalist Michael Wolff and the just-released book by Trump’s former press secretary, Sean Spicer.
According to the book’s publisher, “Fear brings to light the explosive debates that drive decision-making in the Oval Office, the Situation Room, Air Force One and the White House residence.”