First published 2021
Philip Rucker and Carol Leonnig chronicle Donald Trump's catastrophic final year as president through firsthand accounts from White House insiders. The Pulitzer Prize winning reporters reveal how the administration bungled the coronavirus response as over half a million Americans died. They show Trump contemplating military deployment against George Floyd protesters to project strength before the election. The book exposes his refusal to accept electoral defeat and his spreading of fraud claims. Sources describe a president who repeatedly chose personal interests over national welfare. The authors provide a minute by minute reconstruction of January 6, when Trump supporters breached the Capitol while democracy hung in the balance. Drawing on unprecedented access to doctors, generals, senior advisers, and Trump family members, Rucker and Leonnig document which officials enabled Trump's desperate attempts to retain power and which ones resisted. This forensic examination reveals the inner workings of a dysfunctional presidency during its most devastating period.
Genres: history, political-science, politics, non-fiction, biography-memoir, 21st-century, current-affairs, american-history
Vibes: emotional, fast-paced, thought-provoking
Tropes: insider-account, political-drama
Setting: Capitol, United States, White House
Period: 2020, 2021
592 pages · Hardcover · Penguin Press/Penguin Random House LLC
Content warnings: death, violence