‘The Old Crow’s A Piece of Sh*t’: Trump Goes Scorched Earth on McConnell, Pence and DeSantis in New Maggie Haberman Book Excerpt

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Former President Donald Trump went on the attack against Mitch McConnell, Mike Pence, and an assortment of his other foes during a series of interviews with New York Times’ Maggie Haberman.

Haberman shared a series of Trump interviews she conducted with The Atlantic, which formed the basis of her upcoming book Confidence Man: The Making of Donald Trump and the Breaking of America. In the first of Haberman’s interviews with Trump back in March 2021, the former president reminisced about Meade Esposito and other political figures he viewed as “tough.” Asked if he believed the presidency would function in a similar manner, Trump revived his feud with McConnell for not adopting Esposito-type tactics when he was Senate majority leader.

From The Atlantic:

“Well, I figured that the Mitch McConnells would be like him, in the sense of strength.” There were plenty of factual problems with the criticism. In fact, McConnell had kept Republican senators in line over and over to advance Trump’s policy and personnel concerns and generally protect his political standing as the leader of the Republican Party. Nevertheless, Trump said to me in another session, using his favorite new nickname for McConnell, “The Old Crow’s a piece of shit.”

In her next interview with Trump five weeks later, Haberman described him as “not in a good mood” as he spoke about Sidney Powell, Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and Jared Kushner. Eventually, the conversation landed on Trump’s former vice-president, and he made clear his displeasure with Pence for refusing the order to throw out the 2020 election results showing Trump lost.

He was not so sanguine about Mike Pence, who had begun to defend his own actions on January 6 with increasing stridency, prompting Trump to escalate his condemnation of his former vice president’s judgment that day. “I said, ‘Mike, you have a chance to be Thomas Jefferson, or you can be Mike Pence,’” Trump recounted to me, repeating an inaccurate comparison to the election of 1800. “He chose to be Mike Pence.”

Trump, according to Haberman, has also been taking jabs at DeSantis — the man widely thought to be his most significant rival within the GOP if they both run for president in 2024. Trump has reportedly slammed the Florida governor as an “opportunist,” and Haberman added that Trump has also been insulting DeSantis over his weight just as he did with former ally, New Jersey ex-governor Chris Christie.

I brought up another potential future primary rival, by mentioning that he had been compared to New Jersey’s feisty Governor Chris Christie before the two men faced off in the 2016 primary. Trump replied, “I was compared to him? Why? I didn’t know I had that big of a weight problem.” A small smirk followed. Then: “He’s an opportunist.” I heard that Trump was describing Florida Governor Ron DeSantis in similar terms, calling him “fat,” “phony,” and “whiny,” while claiming credit for making his candidacy in 2018.

In the past, Trump claimed repeatedly that by endorsing DeSantis, he was fully responsible for his election as Governor of Florida. The relationship between the two has grown frosty however, and Trump reportedly feels that DeSantis stole his ideas by sending immigrants from Texas to Martha’s Vineyard in Massachusetts.