A new book, “American Carnage,” explores the transition of the Republican Party into the Party of Trump, and includes revealing quotes from top GOP leaders and lawmakers who went from “Never Trump” to supporting the Oval Office occupant, and tells inside stories of how the President behaves in private.
Among the more stunning revelations in the book by POLITICO Magazine’s Tim Alberta is a depiction of Trump swearing at Evangelical Christians to Republican lawmakers, then praising himself for having captured their votes.
The Washington Post’s Josh Dawsey obtained a copy ahead of the book’s release next week. He writes:
“Those f—ing evangelicals,” Trump says in a meeting with GOP lawmakers, according to the book, smiling and shaking his head. In Trump’s mind, Alberta writes, he would “give them the policies and the access to authority that they longed for. In return they would stand behind him unwaveringly.”
Standing before the group of religious leaders in 2018, Trump said of Christianity, “ ‘I owe so much to it in so many ways.’ He then proceeded to explain that he wouldn’t be standing before them without it — not because of how the faith shaped his life or informed his worldview, but ‘because the Evangelical vote was mostly gotten by me.’ The attendees walked out of the room in a daze.”
Dawsey adds that Alberta “dings Vice President Pence and others for seeking to defend Trump as an evangelical and humble man behind the scenes seeking to help his country — while casting aside their core convictions.”
He reports that the vice president’s wife, Karen Pence, did not want to appear in public with her husband after the “Access Hollywood” tape and that Pence disagreed with Trump on many key issues, from immigration to trade.
Now, Pence’s oldest friends joke about whether Trump has blackmail material on him.