THE STAKES WITH JOHN HARWOOD

Read the Warnings Trump's Own Officials Have Given About Electing Him to a Second Term

No one sees the danger Trump poses more vividly than aides and advisers who worked with him.

JOHN HARWOOD

JUN 19, 2024

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(Trump speaks as then-Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley looks on after a briefing from senior military leaders at the White House on Oct. 7, 2019, in Washington, D.C. Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)

Like many others, I recognized Donald Trump as a preposterous figure from the moment in 2015 he entered the race for president.

The run-up to the Republican debate I moderated that October only affirmed that assessment. Ahead of the debate, he called my cell phone repeatedly to boast about his poll standing — strange behavior I’d never seen in three decades of covering presidential campaigns. When the debate began, I suggested he was running a “comic-book” campaign in the belief that gentle mockery might help burst his bubble and allow Republicans to consider their genuine contenders for the White House.

That belief proved mistaken, to say the least. Trump’s bubble didn’t burst. As his nomination rivals ruefully discovered, he was both preposterous and serious at the same time. The likes of Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio, who later described him accurately as a “pathological liar” and “con artist,” respectively, got steamrolled.

What I failed to recognize, even after Trump won the nomination, was the extent of the danger he posed to the country. That required watching him wield power as president – from the Muslim ban he pursued by executive order during his first week to the deadly insurrection he incited during his last month before reluctantly leaving the White House in defeat.

No one saw the danger more vividly than aides and advisers who worked with Trump on the most sensitive issues a president faces. Last year, NBC News reached out to 44 of the dozens of people who were part of Trump’s Cabinet at some point during his first term. Only four at the time had said they would vote for him again.

So, as the first debate of the 2024 Trump-Biden general election approaches, it’s worth remembering the damning assessments many of them and others have offered:

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