Impersonator

Uncovered Tape Shows Trump Lying to Get Onto Forbes 400 List

Recording from 1984 reveals Trump phoning journalist as his alter-ego “John Barron.”

A tape recorded in 1984 appears to show Donald Trump impersonating a Trump Organization official and lying about his wealth in order to get onto the Forbes 400 ranking of America’s wealthiest people. Posing as “John Barron”—an alter-ego name Trump frequently used with reporters—the now-president insisted he had almost complete control of his father’s real-estate empire and should be called a billionaire rather than a millionaire. In The Washington Post on Thursday, journalist Jonathan Greenberg wrote: “When I recently rediscovered and listened, for first time since that year, to the tapes I made of this and other phone calls, I was amazed that I didn’t see through the ruse: Although Trump altered some cadences and affected a slightly stronger New York accent, it was clearly him.” Greenberg suspected a lot of the assertions from “John Barron” were untrue, but said Forbes’ estimations of Trump’s wealth ($100m) proved to be well beyond what he actually had in the bank ($5m). Neither the White House or the Trump Organization responded to questions about the uncovered tape.