Journalist Jonathan Alter combined the personal and the political in a discussion of his latest book, “American Reckoning: Inside Trump’s Trial — and My Own” at the White Hart Thursday, Nov. 15.
Alter was interviewed by John Hendrickson, a senior editor at The Atlantic magazine.
The book, published in October, is an account of the “hush money” trial of Donald Trump, which ended in May 2024 with a Manhattan jury finding Trump guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records.
He said he was one of a handful of reporters who attended all 23 days of the trial. The trial was not televised, and cameras were not allowed except briefly at the start of proceedings.
Alter said binoculars were allowed, and he spent time looking at one juror, who looked back at him as if to ask “What are you looking at?”
He said he was mindful of the importance of the trial to the recent election, and what it would mean for the book.
If Democratic candidate and Vice-President Kamala Harris won the election, the book would be similar to Jimmy Breslin’s “How the Good Guys Finally Won,” about Richard Nixon and Watergate.
If Trump won, the book would be more akin to William L. Shirer’s “Berlin Diary,” about the rise of Adolph Hitler and the Nazis in Germany, Alter said.
He said he felt compelled to cover the trial, saying it was unlikely curious citizens would “go to the transcripts.”
Alter said his previous book, about former president Jimmy Carter, took five years to write. “American Reckoning” had to be done in five weeks.
He described writing the book as “the process of nine years of dealing with this odious man.”
Alter said he interviewed Trump in the late 1990s for the “Today Show.”
“He had forgotten he’d sued me,” he said with a grin.
Alter wasn’t impressed.
“He was a New York celebrity, kind of a clown. Not a lot of presence.”
But by the time Trump announced he was running for president in 2015, he had acquired a certain quality of being a leader.
Hendrickson recalled talking with a community college student in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, before the 2016 election and being surprised when the young man said half his classmates were Trump supporters.
Alter said ”People think he’s entertaining,” adding “I find his louche lounge act unbearable.”
Asked what he thinks will happen regarding sentencing, given that Trump is now president-elect, Alter said one scenario is a suspended sentence that doesn’t go into effect until 2029, when Trump is no longer president.
Asked how Trump survived the multiple legal problems of the last four years, Alter said “There’s something feral about Trump. He survived in a tough world in New York.”
He said Trump is very experienced when it comes to media.
“He took those skills national,” Alter said. “There’s a lot he understands intuitively about America.”
Alter was cautiously optimistic about the next four years.
“Democracy is not dead,” he said. “We will survive this.”
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