Jo Freeman’s Review of “Frankly, We Did Win This Election” By Michael C. Bender

 

TrumpWorld was a hornets’ nest.  The book begins and ends with the January 6 insurrection. This “inside story of how Trump lost” the 2020 election shines a light on his entire presidency. Indeed, he filed papers for his re-election campaign the day he was inaugurated in 2017, so the two were never completely separate endeavors.  This “inside story of how Trump lost” the 2020 election shines a light on his entire presidency.  Indeed he filed papers for his re-election campaign the day he was inaugurated in 2017, so the two were never completely separate endeavors.

 

Everything revolved around the King Bee, as the worker bees tried to push, kick and sting each other to get close.  The exceptions, those who weren’t sycophants, who relied on facts rather than fantasy, who had programmatic more than personal agendas, usually didn’t last.

 

As the White House reporter for the Wall Street Journal, Michael C. Bender had ready access to all the bees.  In different chapters he works his way through many of the public incidents of Trump’s four years in office and some of the not-so-public, telling us about the jealousy, competition and infighting inside the hive.

 

Trump’s favorite things to do were playing golf and speaking at mass rallies.  Covid-19 put a damper on the latter, but didn’t wipe them out.  Trump didn’t see getting close without masks as a problem; nor did his followers.

 

Bender includes some fascinating descriptions of TrumpFans who would travel thousands of miles to go to MAGA rallies.  The Front Row Joes, as they called themselves, set up folding chairs at a rally entrance two to three days in advance to be sure to get front row seats from which to cheer their hero.  Some came a week early for the first rally after Covid-19 led to a three-month suspension.  They mourned the loss of one of their number without letting it affect their willingness to sit close to each other.

 

The FRJs were among the most fiercely loyal of the Trump junkies, as Bender calls them. Some of Trump’s staff were equally addicted; indeed that’s what Trump wanted from his staff.  Loyalty bordering on addiction meant he could “rip their face from their skull” without worry that they would leave or retaliate.  

 

That’s what happened if they criticized him or told him he screwed up.  Thus no one inside the hive contradicted him when he claimed he had totally won the first presidential debate.  He had to hear about his poor performance from the fake media.

 

There was still a high turnover rate among both campaign and presidential staff.  His campaign manager was demoted and replaced 109 days before the November election.  While he resented the demotion, he still wanted back, in any capacity.

 

The book begins and ends with the January 6 insurrection (his word) — though there is a March 2021 interview as an Epilogue.  At his Florida resort, Trump can play as much golf as he likes, but is still living in a fantasy world about the 2020 election.  It does make you wonder how the country ever elected this septuagenarian with the mind of a 10-year-old to the nation’s highest office.

 

Names float in and out, so much so that it’s hard to keep track of who’s who.  Resist the temptation to look a name up to review its first use, because there is no Index.  Why a top-notch writer with a Big Five  publisher would not include this essential section is as hard to understand as the chaos and confusion of TrumpWorld.  Maybe they were infected by the TrumpWorld virus that let them fantasize that it wasn’t necessary.  Like the Trump campaign, they were wrong.