Trump in Exile
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4.5 • 6 Ratings
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
Filled with deep insights and never-before-seen details, Trump in Exile is an explosive, all-access account from behind the scenes at Mar-a-Lago as former president Donald Trump regroups from an election defeat that he refuses to acknowledge and plots his return.
The Capitol riots on January 6, 2021, put a horrific closing note on a norm-shattering presidency, as the twice-impeached Donald Trump rode a wave of denial and resentment out of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue and crashed back at Mar-a-Lago—seemingly wounded, seemingly done.
But he wasn’t. And what, exactly, was he building in there?
Meridith McGraw vividly chronicles the incredible period of Trump’s exile in South Florida—a postpresidency like no other in American history—and brings us inside the gilded walls of his private club, where an alternate reality in which the 2020 election was stolen became Republican Party orthodoxy. How did the country go from Trump’s political banishment to his renewed dominance over his party, as he effortlessly destroyed the once-formidable Ron DeSantis and now stands on the verge of returning to the White House—all while facing the heavy shadow of multiple federal and state criminal indictments? The Mar-a-Lago period is essential for understanding Trump’s implausible resurgence and the many missed opportunities to stop him.
From a reporter who has covered the Trump era from its beginning, through the White House years, to his 2024 campaign, Meridith McGraw’s Trump in Exile is riveting contemporary history, vital to our understanding of this defining American moment.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In Politico correspondent McGraw's tart debut, ex-president Trump claws his way back to mastery of the Republican party thanks to crude bluster and the fanatical loyalty of his base. McGraw begins in 2021 with a disgraced Trump's post–January 6 retreat to Mar-a-Lago. His grip on Republican voters remained strong, she notes—two thirds of them believed his stop-the-steal narrative—and made him a kingmaker who compelled Republican candidates in the 2022 midterms to embrace his election denialism. Banned from Twitter and Facebook, he started his own social media platform, Truth Social (McGraw gives an eye-opening rundown of how Trump snookered the main investors in that venture). Later, he bested his main Republican primary rival, Florida governor Ron DeSantis, with a mix of schoolyard taunts ("Meatball Ron") and sheer chutzpah (he attacked DeSantis for promoting the same Covid vaccines that Trump did as president). In McGraw's vivid rendering ("at Mar-a-Lago he was like a spinning top losing momentum"), Trump was able to survive self-inflicted disasters that would ruin any other politician (lunching with Kanye West in the midst of furor over West's antisemitic remarks; calling for the Constitution to be suspended so that he could reclaim the presidency; undergoing criminal investigations). McGraw evocatively captures Trump's season of despond and the chaotic energy that powered him out of it.
