Will use ghostwriter’s help to take on ‘thin-skinned’ opponent in first presidential debate
‘‘He’s a showman and a master manipulator. He understands instinctively how to engage a crowd.’’ Tony Schwartz
Hillary Clinton is turning to the man who helped ‘‘create’’ Donald Trump in the hope of unlocking the secret of how to neutralise the billionaire populist in tomorrow’s presidential debate.
With the exception of his children and perhaps his wives, no one knows the Republican contender better than Tony Schwartz, who spent 18 months shadowing Trump while ghostwriting his 1987 blockbuster The Art of the Deal.
The book defined Trump as the brash New York property mogul who was the epitome of American success. To the horror of Schwartz, who says that he penned every word, Trump has since moulded himself into the persona he fashioned for him.
After having been Trump’s Dr Frankenstein, Schwartz, a lifelong liberal who took on the writing project for the money, says he is now determined to atone by helping to slay the monster he unleashed.
Schwartz, 64, said he felt so ‘‘significantly guilty 30 years on’’ he had to intervene to help Clinton. He has been part of the Democratic Party nominee’s preparations for tomorrow, meeting campaign officials to discuss ‘‘Trump the man’’ and how to expose him.
It is hard to exaggerate the importance of the 90-minute debate at Hofstra University on Long Island, New York, the first of three encounters between the two contenders. Clinton, 68, has spent nearly four decades in public life preparing for this moment. Trump, 70, is tantalisingly close to becoming the first US president never to have held elected office, or a senior government or military role.
The RealClearPolitics average of national polls puts Clinton 3 per centage points ahead, but Trump has made headway in key battleground states and the latest LA Times/USC tracking poll gave him a 2-point advantage. Trump’s bellicose anti-immigration rhetoric and call to overturn the political system seem more in tune with the mood of voters than Clinton’s calculating caution.
A survey conducted by Deep Root Analytics found two-thirds of registered voters were expecting to watch, which should translate into viewing figures of 81m to 94m. The previous most-watched political event was the sole debate between Ronald Reagan and Jimmy Carter in 1980.
Schwartz declined to reveal the precise advice he had given Clinton but said he believed Trump’s own past statements could be his undoing.
‘‘He is very thin-skinned and when he is confronted with his own lies, rather than apologising he tends to double down on them and be more emphatic,’’ he said. ‘‘What he has said is so indefensible that to simply bring that to his attention in a relentless way strikes me as both the best way to get under his skin and the best way to make the case that he’s unqualified to be president.’’
But Trump’s background as a reality TV star presents dangers for Clinton. ‘‘He’s a showman and a master manipulator,’’ Schwartz said. ‘‘He understands instinctively how to engage a crowd.’’
Trump insists he has not conducted mock debates, despite an offer by the radio presenter Laura Ingraham to play Clinton. But he appears to be taking the debate seriously, though Schwartz claims that he has probably never read a book in his life and ‘‘is not capable of paying attention long enough to get informed’’.
Whereas Clinton has used an array of briefing files, Trump ‘‘crowdsourced’’ his preparation, seeking advice from supporters in a survey that included questions such as: ‘‘Do you think Trump should refer to Hillary as ’Crooked Hillary’ on stage?’’
Trump believes that practising polished answers would be counterproductive and has balked at using a lectern tomorrow. But he has been persuaded to take questions on his feet and be subjected to a countdown timer.
Some advisers fear the mogul’s tendency to get bored might cause him difficulties, while others recall that his worst moment in the primary debates was when he was confronted by a rival, Carly Fiorina, about a comment that her ‘‘face’’ made her unelectable.
Trump’s tendency to make personal comments about women means he is vulnerable to accusations of sexism and even misogyny. That could be a trap Clinton – who won sympathy in 2008 when Barack Obama said dismissively that she was ‘‘likeable enough’’ – will lay for him.
One of Trump’s coaches is Roger Ailes, the former head of Fox News. He helped repackage Richard Nixon for the television era in 1968 and was a debate coach for Ronald Reagan in 1984, when his self- deprecating one-liner about his opponent Walter Mondale’s ‘‘youth and inexperience’’ took the age issue off the table.
A problem for Clinton is most Americans have higher expectations of her than of Trump. A CNN poll found 53 per cent of likely voters said they thought she would do a better job in the debates, with 43 per cent predicting Trump would be the winner.
Trust remains a stumbling block for both candidates. A recent CBS poll showed that 63 per cent believed Clinton was not honest, while 60 per cent did not trust Trump.