Speaker 1: Today, I'm going to be speaking with Greg Barich, who's the author of Criminology
on Trump and also emeritus professor of criminology and criminal justice at Eastern Michigan University.
It's really great having you on.
I appreciate your time today.
Speaker 4: Thank you.
Speaker 1: So in the book, you really do an analysis of Trump and the Trump family and
the presidency and the business enterprise.
Trump a through through sort of a criminology lens, the idea of Trump operating as a sort
of pseudo mob boss, in a sense.
Can you first lay out the kind of general approach and perspective that you used here
and what and why you did it in this way?
Speaker 4: Okay.
Well, I'm a criminologist and I study crime and I study the administration of justice.
And I do so in a very broad based manner in the sense that I examine all laws, whether
they be civil or criminal.
Constitutional.
International.
So he was a perfect subject, a perfect object.
And what what I think makes my analysis unique or different from literally the thousands
of other books on Trump is that it is really the first and only criminal biography of Donald
Trump, and it tries to give the 45th president his rightful place in the history of U.S.
crime.
What it attempts to explain systemically or systematically throughout his entire life
is his uncanny ability to get over it.
Regardless of whether we're talking business economics, whether we're talking politics,
whether we're talking interpersonal relationships.
He has the ability to harm and abuse and to always escape the consequences or almost always
escape at least criminally.
He's fully escaped civilly.
He's been held accountable more than once.
Speaker 1: So let's let's talk about a few examples.
Before he was president, Trump would notoriously sue lots of people, and the outcomes of those
lawsuits varied pretty dramatically.
And in some cases, it seemed as though the lawsuit may have been a tool to maybe cover
up his own preexisting wrongdoing.
Can you talk a little bit about the use of lawsuits?
Speaker 4: Right.
Well, as many of your readers may know or many of your listeners may know, Trump's mentor
and surrogate father was.
Oh, yes.
How am I having a blank here all time?
The McCarthy hearings prosecutor.
Och.
Speaker 1: Whose name I also don't remember.
Speaker 4: Right.
How is this crazy?
You know, where's my Roy Cohn?
Speaker 1: Ro Marcus.
Roy Marcus Cohn.
Yeah.
Speaker 4: Right.
Right.
Okay.
So so Cohn is his his first mentor and surrogate father and really teaches him the art of weaponizing
the law and the two of them over a case involving housing discrimination in projects owned by
his father throughout New York.
Donald retained Cohn to represent them, and this is where it all began.
For Donald to use the law against the law and to always countersue, to never acknowledge
defeat.
So that's where it first began.
And whether he wins or loses the case, it almost, almost is immaterial to Donald, because
at the end of the day, he will always claim victory that that he won just as he won the
election.
He knows he didn't win the election.
He knows he didn't win the cases that he claims to.
But that's his narrative.
Speaker 1: Can you talk about other sometimes the term is used that he had a way to skirt
the law in his business career, which is skirting the law different than breaking the law.
Speaker 4: I you know, I can't tell you, you know, that there's any legal meaning to the
notion of skirting the law.
Right.
Evading the law.
It's like not getting caught.
It's not really not breaking the law.
He he's he's, you know, engaged in lawlessness pretty much day in and day out through various
types of business arrangements that he is he he's put put together.
Speaker 1: What are some examples of that?
Speaker 4: Well, the best example is the way in which beginning with Fred Senior Donald's
Donald's father, that he began to transfer his enormous wealth.
To his children, some of which you could legitimately pass on and some of which he created shell
companies that were companies in name only.
He created the arrangements where Donald and his siblings became owners of certain companies
within the Trump organization, and so he was billing them for work that he wasn't doing
that.
That's an example Donald has continued with with that into with at least three of his
children that were aware of Eric and JR and Ivanka.
Speaker 1: When we think about the Trump presidency.
He's really gotten away with the most kind of basic pedestrian, just kind of shrugging
off the things that are thrown at him.
I mean, he recently had four cell phones subpoenaed and he wrote, I lost the phones.
I don't know where the phones are now, but what's going to come of that?
We don't know.
Probably, probably nothing.
Endless requests for documents that seem to be legitimate requests, subpoenas, etc..
Now, here, it's executive privilege and there is a political witch hunt and it seems as
though he just gets away with it.
Is that, in fact the way that it has gone criminally?
Speaker 4: That is in fact, the way it has gone.
I mean, he's yet to be prosecuted for a single criminal offense.
Yes.
In his life.
So it's certainly got him that way there in terms of his civil litigation.
He has an impressive record.
Maybe he's lost 4050 cases, one 300.
The rest had been drawers.
Hmm.
Speaker 1: And when you say a draw, is that good for Trump or good for someone else?
Speaker 4: It's usually good for Trump.
Speaker 1: Okay.
Speaker 4: Because, you know, Trump has an interesting habit when he wins a case, you
and I, the taxpayers, pay his attorneys.
And when he loses a case, he stiffs his attorneys.
Speaker 1: Right.
Right.
When it comes to the current investigations, you know, I have people in my audience who
are convinced I mean, convinced that at some point Trump's going to face criminal prosecution.
I just don't think so.
And when we go through what's being looked at right now, there's the January 6th committee
who could make referrals depending on what they find to the justice system, they could,
although it's not their main charge as as described.
There's the New York investigation where we actually saw some investigators resign because
they got the impression that there's not really any interest in actually prosecuting Donald
Trump.
You've got the Georgia investigation for possible election fraud.
I mean, is there any shot, any of this stuff goes anywhere?
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's always there's always a shot that goes somewhere.
I think that what people want to know is whether Attorney General Merrick Garland, whether
or not he's going to come come forward.
And, you know, people have been very wishy washy and, you know, wanting this to have
occurred already.
What I think is significant, a couple of things I think are significant as to why I think
he ultimately will, oh, prosecute.
I mean, I've been very you know, you know, I've been mixed as to whether he will or he
won't in part.
One sign was Eric.
Former Attorney General Eric Holder.
HOLDER thank you.
Eric Holder, who is an institutionalist who, for example, didn't prosecute the 10,000 security
fraudsters on Wall Street, gave them all a pass.
He thought that in all likelihood, because presidents in the past had been given passes
by the next attorney general, that this would be the same situation with with Trump.
He's come around and thinks differently now that we understand that this was involving
a significant number of elected and appointed officials and how big the conspiracy was.
He now thinks that, you know, there should be a prosecution.
His change in position is significant.
But I think last but not least, because of the historical situation that we find ourselves
in, in terms of autocrats and Democrats and struggles with Ukraine and Russia and elsewhere,
that.
It becomes rather embarrassing and it becomes a slap in the face of so-called American democracy
when we prove that somebody and somebodies who have power are above the law.
It's not a very good marketing tool for the United States.
And I think that political pressure, because it's on the world stage, is also adding substance
to the fact that I think Garland is going to.
Speaker 1: Go after him.
How long could it take?
Speaker 4: Before he prosecutes.
Yeah.
In my mind.
It could.
It could go as long as before the primary of 2024.
Okay.
I mean, the problem is, if they go after him and if he can keep the delays from the actual
trial occurring before the primary begins, then he'll be able to probably sidestep whether
he wins or loses 2024, because I'm convinced that whether he loses or not, they will the
Republicans and company will actually steal the election.
So therefore, he can keep the attorney general and the Justice Department away from him to
2029.
Speaker 1: Which so I don't want to go I don't want to miss something you just said.
That's a big deal.
You believe that in 24, the sort of trial run that was 2020, some of those different
ideas that were floated for how to take an election, they didn't win.
You think they might successfully use those tools in 24?
Speaker 4: I think they're well on their way.
They have control of 26 out of the 50 state legislative bodies who could and are, in fact,
preparing themselves to overturn the election.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Okay.
Let's come back to that.
The many armchair mental health professionals during the Trump era would maybe not diagnose
but suggest that Donald Trump could be narcissistic, that he might be delusional, that he's self-deluded,
that he's mentally ill in different ways, that he lies uncontrollably, pathological
lies, etc..
One of the things that you write, if I understand it correctly, is that while all of those things
may be true, you don't believe that any of it is the sort of explanation or ultimate
cause of the criminality and the lying and the deception that in that sense, he knows
what he's doing.
Am I accurately summarizing your position?
Speaker 4: You are spot on.
That's exactly what we're arguing.
He is a rational player.
He may be, you know, suffering from a variety of mental illnesses.
But when it comes to his day to day affairs, he is a rational player.
He clearly knows that he did not win the election.
He is not self deluded for a moment.
He's a con, a performance artist, and he's just doing the script.
Speaker 1: So how do you know that?
And I guess with the election thing as an example, I've gone back and forth over time.
Does Trump think he won the election or does he know that it's that he didn't really win?
And I was kind of on the side of, he's lying.
It's a con.
But more recently, we've had reports from behind the scenes that he was privately talking
to people and saying that he won, which doesn't sound like something he would do if he knew
he didn't really win.
Speaker 4: It depends on who he's privately talking to.
Okay.
He wouldn't say that to Jared.
He wouldn't say it to Monica, but he would say it to the people who have all been subpoenaed
for.
Speaker 1: Like Mark Meadows, for example.
He would keep up the lie with Mark Meadows.
Speaker 4: He would keep off the lie with those people.
I mean, Jared knows better.
You know, he he knows that, you know, it wasn't stolen, just like Bannon knows it wasn't stolen.
Speaker 1: So then you're so.
So your assertion is when it comes to the audience that needs to hear the lies, Trump
knows he's not telling the truth.
Speaker 4: Oh, absolutely.
Absolutely.
That's why he's such a great performer.
Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: When it comes to zooming out a little bit now.
Sure.
One of the conversations that took place a bunch of times while Trump was president was,
are our checks and balances sort of like robust enough?
And one of the kind of answers that was zeroed in on was, generally speaking, they are.
But the founding fathers never imagined someone like Trump would be elected.
And that's why there aren't more checks and balances that would have prevented some of
the things that Donald Trump did.
What what's your sense of that?
Did the checks and balances fail?
Speaker 4: I'm not sure the checks and balances were where were tested until now.
Right.
You know, so, so.
And they clearly it remains to be seen whether or not they work or they don't work.
From my perspective, with respect to the popular story or explanation that the founding fathers
never thought that an oligarch or that some, you know, very wealthy person could be doing
similar things to Donald.
And they knew about kings.
And I mean, they knew about the danger of of of the parties reverting, you know, they
didn't care for parties, but yeah, so I don't buy that.
But, you know, I, I'm not that much of an expert to know they're fair.
Speaker 1: The book is Criminology on Trump.
We've been speaking with the book's author, Greg Baric, who's also emeritus professor
of criminology and criminal justice at Eastern Michigan University.
So appreciate your time today.
Thank you so much.
Speaker 4: Thank you, David.