President Donald Trump can hear the “Grim Reaper” creeping up behind him, political analyst David Rothkopf says.
Speaking on The Daily Beast Podcast, Rothkopf ripped the president’s effort to leave his mark on every corner of American life after host Joanna Coles pointed to an AI-generated image Trump posted to Truth Social on Sunday depicting himself alongside President John F. Kennedy at the White House.
Rothkopf argued that despite Trump’s relentless self-mythologizing, the reality TV star-turned-president actually “feels extremely insecure.”
“Trump probably, on some level, despite the fact that he’s a narcissist and a psychopath and all these other things... has the worst case of imposter syndrome in history,” he argued.
“And he knows he doesn’t belong there. And so he’s like, ‘Well, look, I have the same job George Washington had. I have the same job John F. Kennedy had. I could be surrounded by all of these people.’”
Rothkopf noted the “particular irony” behind Trump’s Kennedy post, given that the president has spent much of his second term upending the Kennedy Center—the memorial built in Kennedy’s honor after his assassination—by attempting to attach his own name to it and shuttering it for purported renovations.
“It is an empty disaster. There’s still tarps over the front of it because Trump can’t bear to see the front of it without his name on it now,” he said.
Coles noted that Trump, 80, has now turned his attention to another landmark, seeking to attach his name to New York City’s Penn Station.
“This guy, he’s got imposter syndrome,” Rothkopf responded. And I also think he hears the Grim Reaper.”
“You know, he’s hearing the footsteps of the Grim Reaper in the background... and he wants to memorialize himself everywhere he looks,” he said.
Trump has become preoccupied with his own mortality in his second term. Dogged by physical ailments, including his severely swollen ankles and severe hand bruising, he has pondered at times about whether he will make it to Heaven or not, declaring multiple times that he believes he does not have a good chance of making it to the Pearly Gates.
He revealed his obsession with his death earlier this month, when he declared that he has “1000 missiles” ready to strike Iran, should the country “act on its threat, pronounced in many corners of the Globe, to assassinate, or attempt to assassinate, the sitting President of the United States of America, in this case, ME!”
When reached for comment, White House spokesman Davis Ingle sent the Daily Beast a recycled statement: “David Rothkopf is a far-left loser who clearly suffers from a severe and debilitating disease known as Trump Derangement Syndrome that has completely rotted his peanut-sized brain.”
Meanwhile, Trump has spent much of his second term chasing personal legacy projects—such as his $400 million ballroom and his $100 million triumphal arch—often at the expense of traditional policy goals and efforts to strengthen Republicans heading into the midterms. “I don’t care about the midterms,” he declared in May.
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