Tim Devine - Days of Trump: The Definitive Chronology of the 45th President of the United States

DAYS OF TRUMP

The definitive chronology of the
th President of the united states

Tim Devine

with Amanda Decker

The Devine Company, LLC.

Los Angeles, California

DAYS of TRUMP

The Definitive Chronology of the 45 th President of the United States

Copyright 2021 by Tim Devine

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher or author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, contact the publisher using the information below.

Books may be ordered through booksellers or by contacting:

Tim Devine

or

Battle Press

www.battlepress.media

ISBN: 978-1-7378-2387-2 (SC)

ISBN: 978-1-7378-2388-9 (HC)

ISBN: 978-1-5136-8281-5 (eBook)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021923630

First Edition

CONTENTS

DEDICATION

To Lynn, my guiding light
every step of the way.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

W riting a book on the Presidency is hard stuff. There are so many angles and events that its nearly impossible not to leave something out. Multiply those times ten for Donald J. Trump.

Helping us keep it all together were Americas political journalists and we have relied on them amply in this volume. From the wire services like AP and Reuters, to the countrys topline broadsheets like the New York Times and Washington Post, to a slew of specialty publications who cover such wide-ranging categories as the military and medical news, to the financial papers and of course the electronic and television journalists from ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox, MSNBC and others, and finally from the blogs and podcasters who form the basis of the new grassroots journalism. They are all represented here, and we couldnt have done it without them.

Finally, to those who helped me put it all into a form that makes it logical and organized for your reading pleasure, Amanda Decker, Steve Gillem, Virginia OBrien and Joe Regis as well as our supporters Jennifer Creelman, Byron Hontas and Dave Lumian who helped turn four years of chaos and mayhem into a consistent and readable history that will not soon be forgotten.

I remain eternally grateful to them all.

ABOUT THE COVER

Front Cover:

"In the middle of all the chaos of late May and early June, 2020, no more chaotic image (in my view) circulated than one of Donald Trump holding a Bible in front of historic St. Johns church in Washington. (Official White House Photo by Shealah Craighead)

Ive given up hoping that main news journalism will finally get the religion story right, but this is a case where it is critical that they do so. Heres why. This picture holds within it so many contradictions that are critical to public understanding of this political moment and the role of religion in it. But it is too complex for a journalism that still chooses to see religionif at all, in uni- or bi-dimensional terms. Lets try to see a few of the contradictions here. For starters, the picture was made possible by the President and his entourage intentionally breaking into a moment of national anguish and activism, using police force to disperse peaceful demonstrators to clear the field for this publicity shot. Second, Trumps own relationship to the Bible is tenuous at best (remember two Corinthians?) Third, the most incoherent and contradictory part of this is that it is a superficial and trivial attempt to curry favor with the religious liberty crowd among his base. This is a contradiction because St. Johns is an Episcopal church with an active social ministry, not an Evangelical mega-church riven with feelings of grievance. Fourth, the invocation of the Bible in such a place is a direct assault on the kind of religion that church represents, which is *not* one that celebrates the moral-culture virtue religious revanchism represented by Attorney General Barr, Secretary Mike Pompeo, and Trump-whisperer Steve Bannon. Fifth, this image is an attempt to elide the real contradiction between the moral culture of a nation reeling from its racial reckoning and forces in the world of religion (Barr, etc., as well as Trumps religious cabinet of Evangelical leaders) who want the nation to remain comfortable with its history of religion-sanctioned racial tension." - Stewart Hoover

Stewart Hoover is a Professor of media and religion at the University of Colorado, Boulder. He studies the co-dependency of religions and media. His blog can be found at

Back Cover:

While hospitalized after contracting Covid-19, President Donald J. Trump greets supporters during a joyride outside of Walter Reed National Military Medical Center on Sunday, Oct. 4, 2020, in Bethesda, Md. (Official White House Photo by Tia Dufour )

https://www.flickr.com/photos/whitehouse/50423102728/

ABOUT THE AUTHORS

Tim Devine is an award-winning news and editorial writer, as well as a former music, entertainment and technology executive and a Political Science and Media graduate from the University of California, Berkeley. He lives in Los Angeles with his wife Lynn. This is his first book.

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Amanda Decker is an award-winning journalist with 20 years of experience working as an anchor, reporter, producer, web writer, executive producer and news director. Decker has received several major broadcast awards for coverage of veteran's issues, natural disasters, and auto racing, and has also been honored by several organizations for her volunteer work.

Six-time Associated Press award winner.

Four-time Society of Professional Journalists award winner.

Indiana Broadcasters Association award winner.

PREFACE

W hen we decided to do a book on the presidency of Donald J. Trump, we knew it wouldnt be easy. Unlike any of his predecessors, Trump was determined to run a mile a minute. His stated goal was to vanquish his enemies, to own the headlines; own the news cycle... or as one-time Trump advisor Steve Bannon put it, flood the zone, each and every day.

Keeping up with Trump was a Herculean task for many journalists. The Washington Post, a paper that hired 100 extra journalists to cover the 2016 presidential campaign, kept many of those writers on long after the race was over, due simply to the activity level of the Trump presidency and the actions of those surrounding it.

Perhaps the New York Times, Michael Schmidt put it best when he said, The problem about the Trump era is that there was so much going on that it was hard to keep track of and to document everything as it was going. Hence the reason for this book.

What you will read about in these pages are not just the activities of Trump himself, but the actions and issues surrounding many of his key aides and others who stepped into the frame at one point along the way. A wide-ranging list of players from Michael Flynn to Paul Manafort, to Rudy Giuliani and Bill Barr, as well as other colorful characters ranging from Stormy Daniels and Michael Avenatti to Michael Cohen, to Roger Stone, Sydney Powell, E. Jean Carroll and a laundry list of names almost too long to remember.

This obviously doesnt include the two most obvious group of players which were Trumps cabinet and, of course, the first family.

In the cabinet department, more players came and went in the first year of the Trump administration than any other presidential administration in American history. Perhaps it was Trumps inexperience or the character of many of his hirings but in just over the first year alone, we saw the departure of a massive number of top associates ranging from EPA administrator, Scott Pruitt, to HHS head Tom Price, to Dept. of the Interior Secy, Ryan Zinke to even bigger names like Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Secy of State, Rex Tillerson and many more. Eventually, these lists would include nearly everyone in Trumps orbit including such close staffers as Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, ubiquitous spokeswoman Kellyanne Conway, Attorney General Bill Barr, Anthony Scaramucci and his eleven-day (dont call it ten!) stint as White House Communications Director and more Chiefs of Staff than any other one-term president in U. S. History.