Donald Trump’s antics at the NATO summit this week laid bare the narcissistic instinct that has driven him over the “10 years of the Trump era,” his biographer says.
“He’s not about policy. He’s not about accomplishments. He’s not about ‘America first,’ he’s certainly not about cooperation, which is the nature... of NATO,” Michael Wolff said on the Inside Trump’s Head podcast. “It’s just about attention.”
The 80-year-old president dominated headlines during the summit in Ankara, Turkey, where he ricocheted between angry outbursts at America’s closest allies and gushing declarations of love, before restarting his war with Iran.
“He arrives there, and it’s, ‘What do I do to claim all of the attention?’” Wolff said, saying that Trump “very plausibly” resumed his war with Iran just to “upstage” the NATO summit. “Then coming back to Greenland, then coming back to dismissing everyone, dissing Europe. So essentially, how could he not but become the center of attention here?”
The Trump biographer, who has written four tell-alls on the president, continued, “You have to understand that there is no meaning beyond that. It’s not about anything else.”
“What has this 10 years of the Trump era been about? It has just been about what gets him attention,” he added.
Trump, who used to masquerade as his own publicist to court the tabloids during his days as a New York real estate developer, seized the spotlight at the summit by attacking America’s most important allies, scolding Spain, France, Germany, Italy, and Britain for not joining his war on Iran. He also renewed his demand for control of Greenland.
But the reality-TV celebrity-turned-president abruptly changed his tune in a private meeting with NATO leaders, later declaring, “It was a great meeting, there was a lot of love in that room, a lot of unity,” upending the narrative that had until then defined the summit.
“I mean, it is strange when you hear earnest and utterly sincere journalists trying to make sense out of what he does,” co-host Joanna Coles said.
She suggested Trump’s insatiable need for attention may have its roots in childhood, but Wolff argued the opposite, saying, “He has always gotten too much of it, and that has created an addiction which obviously has to be... satisfied with ever more attention.”
He added that this “personality quirk” ultimately manifests itself in a U.S. foreign policy that wreaks havoc on America’s alliances.
“Our foreign policy is not to cooperate with our allies because... our allies are irrelevant, we are the focus, we must be the focus, and by we Trump means ‘I’ must be the focus,” Wolff said. “That then becomes... the profile of America’s place in the world... No other interests matter, no other nations matter, no other leaders matter.”
When reached for comment, White House spokesman Davis Ingle sent the Daily Beast a shortened version of a statement that his boss, Steven Cheung, regularly uses: “Michael Wolff is a lying piece of s--t.”
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