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TommyT139

(1,767 posts)
17. Here's my summary.
Sat Jul 19, 2025, 02:27 AM
Jul 19

Trump admired Bob Woodward (who broke the Watergate story with Carl Bernstein; see All the President's Men). Bob W wrote a series of books during Trump's first term, based on interviews with Trump and Trump staffers (at Trump's encouragement).

For the last of that series, Rage, Bob W had about 8+ hours (20 interview sessions) with Trump alone. You might recall a controversy when the book came out after Trump's term: Trump knew covid was lethal, but admitted lying about it to America. Woodward was criticized for not sharing that info, which he learned in Spring 2020.

Anyway, Rage was published, as a book and as an audiobook. A bit later, the interviews were published as The Trump Tapes,, as a book (which included the Kim Jung Il "love letters," and others)...and as an audiobook consisting of the interview recordings themselves, along with Bob W's commentary & context. Trump was credited as the "reader" on the audio...but [only] Bob W was the listed author.

Trump claims that the interviews were only to be used for Rage, not released as a whole. Bob W said 1) no such agreement was made; 2) as interviews were done on presidential time, they didn't belong to Trump; 3) being a public figure, fair use would apply. (I'm not a lawyer, but that's my understanding. Anyone please correct me if I'm wrong.)

And of course, Bob Woodward was correct.

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