‘A Warning’: Donald Trump depicted as cruel and inept in anonymous insider account

The author – who first captured attention in 2018 as the unidentified author of a New York Times opinion column – describes Trump careening from one self-inflicted crisis to the next

The book recounts senior officials waking up in the morning ‘in a full-blown panic’ over the wild pronouncements the president had made on Twitter

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Published: 3:01pm, 8 Nov 2019Updated: 8:25pm, 8 Nov 2019

Senior Trump administration officials considered resigning en masse last year in a “midnight self-massacre” to sound a public alarm about President Donald Trump’s conduct, but rejected the idea because they believed it would further destabilise an already teetering government, according to a new book by an unnamed author.

In A Warning by Anonymous, a writer described only as “a senior official in the Trump administration” paints a chilling portrait of the president as cruel, inept and a danger to the nation he was elected to lead.

The author – who first captured attention in 2018 as the unidentified author of a New York Times opinion column – describes Trump careening from one self-inflicted crisis to the next, “like a twelve-year-old in an air traffic control tower, pushing the buttons of government indiscriminately, indifferent to the planes skidding across the runway and the flights frantically diverting away from the airport”.

The book is an unsparing character study of Trump, from his morality to his intellectual depth, which the author writes is based on his or her observations and experiences. The author claims many other current and former administration officials share his or her views.

The 259-page book, which goes on sale on November 19, does not recreate many specific episodes in vivid detail, which the author writes was intentional to protect his or her identity.

At a moment when a stream of political appointees and career public servants have testified before Congress about Trump’s conduct as part of the House impeachment inquiry, the book’s author defends his or her decision to remain anonymous.

“I have decided to publish this anonymously because this debate is not about me,” the author writes. “It is about us. It is about how we want the presidency to reflect our country, and that is where the discussion should centre. Some will call this ‘cowardice’. My feelings are not hurt by the accusation. Nor am I unprepared to attach my name to criticism of President Trump. I may do so, in due course.”