Donald Trump’s transition to the presidency was anything but smooth, as his first month in office was characterized by failed or contentious executive orders, huge protests, and an unhealthy obsession with the crowd size at his inauguration. Now, an excerpt from Fire and Fury: Inside the Trump White House, a new book by Michael Wolff chronicling the first few months of Trump’s term, reveals the transition to the actual White House was equally rocky, as POTUS sparred with everyone from Secret Service to housekeeping.
According to Wolff, one of Trump’s first orders of business was to install two additional TV screens in his bedroom. At the time, Melania was still living in New York with their son Barron, so Trump was left alone in the room at night. Sometimes Trump would have a 6:30 p.m. meeting with former chief strategist Steve Bannon, but if not, “more to his liking, he was in bed by that time with a cheeseburger, watching his three screens and making phone calls.”
That may sound like a nice relaxing evening for the average person, but it’s not exactly the behavior one usually looks for in a head of state. Especially when you consider that, according to Wolff, these weren’t necessarily business phone calls Trump was making, but instead personal calls where he would ring up his friends and complain about how everyone is out to get him. On one 26-minute-long call, Trump reportedly vented to a friend about CNN chief Jeffery Zucker and the infamous piss dossier, and forcefully declared that Bannon, whom many were characterizing as the power behind the throne at the time, had “zero” influence over his decisions.
Wolff reports that Trump’s paranoid behavior didn’t stop there, however. Early in his stay at the White House, Trump got into an argument with Secret Service who did not approve of POTUS’ request to have a lock installed on his bedroom door. He even yelled at some of the staff for picking his dirty shirts up off the floor to wash them, insisting, “If my shirt is on the floor, it’s because I want it on the floor.” He also barred housekeeping from touching his toothbrush out of fear of being poisoned, a fear which Wolff also claims explains the president’s affinity for McDonald’s because “nobody knew he was coming and the food was safely premade.”
Read the rest the excerpt at New York Magazine.
