Woodward Weighs In - Rob Horowitz

Woodward Weighs In - Rob Horowitz

While today is the official publication date of Bob Woodward’s new book on the Trump Administration, “Rage,” the release of excerpts and review copies in advance of publication, topped off by the author’s first interview with Scott Pelley on 60 Minutes Sunday night, have already produced an outsized political impact.

The most politically damaging revelations come right out of President Trump’s own mouth, rather than from sources on background as is usually the case in books like these. Woodward interviewed the president for a total of 9 hours or so in 18 separate tape-recorded conversations.   Evidently, the president believed that Woodward’s previous highly critical book about the early days of the Trump Administration, “Fear” would have been more positive if he had spoken to the highly regarded veteran journalist, who as a young reporter, together with Carl Bernstein, broke most of the lead stories of President Nixon’s cover-up of Watergate.  This time the president made himself available and encouraged key members of his Administration to do so as well.

It is a marked understatement to observe that Trump’s participation did not bring about the result he desired.  While the portrait of the president as incompetent, untruthful, chaotic in leadership style and guided by impulse and willful ignorance--rather than facts, evidence and expertise-- is similar in both volumes, the negative impact of this new book is far greater because it is powered by Trump’s own words.

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The president does himself the most political harm in his comments about the Covid-19 pandemic. In early February, President Trump tells Woodward that Covid-19 is “more deadly than even your strenuous flu" and demonstrates that he does understand how contagious the virus is saying, “You just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed.”  As reported by Maggie Haberman in The New York Times, at practically the same time, he was telling the rest of us that Covid-19 was “under control” and “a little like the regular flu that we have flu shots for. And we’ll essentially have a flu shot for this in a fairly quick manner.”

This is one of several specific instances where Trump confesses the severity of the pandemic to Woodward, while minimizing it in public.  As the president told Woodward, “he always wanted to play it down.”  The president’s playing it down was not just a matter of misleading rhetoric. Despite knowing the risks, Trump pushed for states to re-open well before they met his own CDC’s guidelines for doing so, triggering large spikes in the states, such as Florida and Arizona that followed his lead.  The president’s public skepticism about the usefulness of masks and his refusal for several months to set an example by wearing one resulted in his supporters being much less likely to wear one than the rest of the public, contributing to the spread of the disease.

Unfortunately, the too rosy predictions and encouragement of flouting of public health recommendation continues. Only two days ago, President Trump held an indoor  in Nevada with thousands of supporters without masks and not socially distanced, putting his own supporters and those they come in contact with at risk.   With nearly 200,000 Americans now dead and the economy still reeling from the impacts of Covid-19, the president sticks to his same failed and dishonest playbook.

That is what makes the revelations in the Woodward book so politically damaging. With an overwhelming majority of Americans giving the president poor marks on his handling of the pandemic and believing that he is dishonest, “Rage” amplifies and brings more attention to these deficiencies.

When asked by Scot Pelley on 60 Minutes, “You write, in the book, that, "The president's handling of the virus reflects his instincts, habits, and style." What are those? Woodward’s response: “Denial. Making up his own facts.”

This drives Woodward’s conclusion in his book that “Trump is the wrong man for the job.”  Asked by Pelley, why he gave that stark an opinion, when in previous books about presidents he did not render this kind of judgment, Woodward replied, “It's a conclusion based on evidence, overwhelming evidence, that he could not rise to the occasion with the virus and tell the truth. And one of the things that President Trump told me, 'In the presidency, there's always dynamite behind the door.’ The real dynamite is President Trump. He is the dynamite."

With the publication of "Rage" Woodward brings his own special brand of well-timed dynamite to President Trump’s quest for re-election.

Rob Horowitz is a strategic and communications consultant who provides general consulting, public relations, direct mail services and polling for national and state issue organizations, various non-profits, businesses, and elected officials and candidates. He is an Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Rhode Island.