President Trump Forced Governors to Flatter him and Ask 'NICELY' to Get Vital Federal Disaster Aid

[Norbert]

Former President Donald Trump made governors flatter him personally for federal aid after natural disasters, a new book says.

The revelations are made in an upcoming book, "This Will Not Pass: Trump, Biden, and the Battle for America's Future," by New York Times reporters Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns, according to The Independent.

In the book, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan, a Republican, said Trump told governors who wanted aid: "You have to call and ask me nicely."

Hogan claimed that Trump had a policy in which only Texas and Florida, two states with governors Trump considered close allies, would be given federal aid when needed without question.

Governor Ned Lamont of Connecticut, a Democrat, recounted a similar experience, The Independent reported.

Lamont said he asked the White House for assistance in obtaining federal disaster aid after a storm in August 2020 left parts of Connecticut without electrical power.

He was surprised when he received a call from then-President Trump himself hours later, who said: "There's something you want me to ask about FEMA?"

When Lamont replied that he wanted to ask about FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) aid, Trump reportedly said: "Well, ask me nicely."

The governor told the book authors that he felt like Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy during the infamous 2019 call in which Trump pressured him to investigate Joe Biden while withholding vital military aid.

Lamont said he decided to play along and flatter Trump into agreeing, telling him "it would mean a lot to the people" if Trump "could bring it upon himself" to authorize the aid, The Independent reported.

The flattery worked, and Trump reportedly replied: "You got it."

i can remember seeing this in action. At events one speker after another showering TDFG with compliments and thinking 'I may need to make a B-line into the bathroom to barf.' It is unimaginable that someone is so insecure that he demands to be flattered or else disaster relief will likely not come yur way. If this isn't extortion, I don't know what is.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/president-trump-forced-governors-to-flatter-him-and-ask-nicely-to-get-vital-federal-disaster-aid-a-new-book-says/ar-AAWx86z?ocid=msedgntp&cvid=816f64e6e61a492db3435504b43e8ad9

[BeyondGeography]

1. The R base admires an extremely deformed and vile person

I try, unsuccessfully, not to to let it affect my opinion of them.

[Lochloosa]

13. I have nothing to do with them. Fuck them.

[smirkymonkey]

2. What a f***ing sociopath!

I honestly cannot believe this disgraceful pig was ever the actual President of the United States. What is even worse is that I can't believe the republican party wants to re-install him as POTUS again. I feel like I am taking crazy pills.

[Martin Eden]

17. Also: Malignant Narcissist

Pathological liar
Racist demagogue
Sexual predator
Vindictive bully
Treasonous tyrant
Stochastic terrorist
Criminal con man
Corrupt grifter
Ignoramus

Never has a president been so mentally and morally unfit for the office.

That the Republican Party is in thrall to this evil creature and its voting base devoted to him speaks volumes about the dangerous mental pathologies afflicting nearly half of America.

[True Dough]

26. And they're too gutless to stand up to that bloviating piece of garbage

We have only a few examples of those among the ReThugs who found the courage to hold their ground, like Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger. And their political future on the right looks mighty grim.

[rickford66]

3. We knew this at the time, but tan suits make better news

[2naSalit]

4. +1

[Claustrum]

11. Exactly. We knew it at the time.

I remember then governor Cuomo of New York had to do a whole going to DC to meet TFG tour so he can get the aids for NY. And Cuomo was very compliment both publicly and privately to TFG to get that aid.

For any other presidents, all they needed to do was a phone call and the aid would be given. The governor who needed aids had better things to do than taking a detour to DC to please the "king".

[Demovictory9]

5. fool

[Irish_Dem]

6. This is a form of sadistic cruelty. People in emergency situations have to grovel and beg for help.

These are high level officials too.

Trump enjoys humiliation and degradation of others. Makes him feel powerful.

[mopinko]

12. sadistic is indeed the word.

srlsy, at this point i want medical science to examine his brain.
now, or in an autopsy. but better now. a great research problem to figure out wtf is wrong w him. hopefully identify what kind of malformations make a person so very sick.

[Irish_Dem]

15. No mystery at all. He is a sociopath and narcissistic personalty disorder.

Textbook case.

[mopinko]

24. nailing down the neurology would be a big thing.

the convos i've had here and elsewhere has convinced me that we rly need to recognize mental disorders, definitively.
the mental health diagnostic tools we have right now are as crude as they were in the 50's. i know, i've taken those tests. 50 true/false questions and you can lose your liberty. biased damn questions.
we rly need to get to the brain science of it all.
we are getting there w the research, but we are still a long way from something like a pet scan that can tell you, exactly, what is going wrong w a brain.
personally, i no longer accept there is such a thing as 'mental health', separate from brain health.
and there is no brain health separate from the rest of the body's health. nor do i believe brain health cannot be seen. we have ct scans, mri's, pet scans. so far the va has sussed out the dif between ptsd and tbi's, an extremely important distinction. the tools are there, now we need data.

in my perfect future, you need a full medical eval to get on the ballot to be prez. and that includes your brain, and we have standards to compare to.
the days of people arguing whether a person is mentally ill, has a personality disorder, or has beginnings of dementia would be over. tfg's mri becomes a poster of who not to let have car keys, let alone high office.

[Irish_Dem]

28. We don't yet have that kind of technology.

To make mental health diagnoses from brain scans.

Except of course for brain damage and some dementias.

[mopinko]

33. that would be my point.

we're getting there, but we arent yet.
the biggest thing w need now is data, and esp data on aberrant brains. imho, tfg's brain is one hell of a data point.

[Novara]

7. I am so sick of these motherfuckers making a buck off information that may have done some good

...if they didn't hold onto it in order to make a buck off a goddamned tell-all book!

Please, don't buy this book. Enough of the information will come out in the news anyway. Don't give these fucking traitors to America your money.

[twodogsbarking]

8. When Trump passes there will be celebration. Speaks volumes.

[70sEraVet]

9. Just one step from Caligula

Or, rather, Caligula's horse - Putin is Caligula in this comparison.

[maxrandb]

10. You have to ask me nicely

[Siwsan]

16. Exactly what immediately came to my mind

I'm beginning to think this is one of tfg's role models.

[TheRickles]

27. Col. Jessup, plus the Mafia

The documentary "Where' My Roy Cohn?" only includes a few minutes about how Cohn mentored Trump, but the Mafia connection is made clear and the techniques are just the same. "Ask me nicely" is only the mildest version of the threats Trump used.

[maxrandb]

29. Yeah, but the scary thing is

About 38% of the people who saw that movie think Colonel Jessop was a role model.

[sop]

23. Hopefully, Trump will end up like Col. Jessop on the stand, incriminating himself and being dragged

off by two burly guards after admitting: "You're god-damned right I ordered the coup!"

[SCantiGOP]

35. He would be exactly like that

Any 2nd year law student could goad him into exploding in the stand.
That is why you won’t see him testify.

[Takket]

14. Recall the masks and ventilators

Remember that start of the pandemic? I’m in Michigan. Whitmer wanted aid and was getting nothing. Meanwhile Florida had ventilators Getting handed out like Halloween candy. And they all just walked away from that Scott free after literally killing Americans.

[mountain grammy]

18. We knew this in real time..

but barely a blip in the mainstream.. not so good for ratings. It's best to keep the fascism a secret so we can save it for the books.

[Rebl2]

19. I guess

I didn’t realize the president actually was the one to make the decision on who gets help. I thought it was FEMA that governor’s called for help, not the president.

[Cozmo]

20. We knew this when it was happening, this is way old news

[speak easy]

21. spread those those cheeks,

say ma! ...

[tanyev]

22. Disgusting. One might even say deplorable.

[Historic NY]

25. Maybe Biden should take this up with Abbot and his ilk.

since Texas cost this country billions

[niyad]

30. Not a new revelation. We knew it at the time, because he bragged about it.

[msfiddlestix]

32. just wrote similar post. I added a few other thoughts/questions

[msfiddlestix]

31. I feel like I'm in some sort of time warp. Who didn't know this throughout his term in office?

how is it possible for journalists and print publishers to make bank on reporting events observable in plain sight and written about at the time? Common knowledge. What is the point of it? Inform people who are not cult followers that were possibly in a coma or living a cave during tfg's reign of terror?

Did we love being traumatized by this sociopath so much that we just can't quit him? Like an addiction to an abuser?

Sometimes this weird phenomenon of posting everything we lived through feels like a sado-masochist experience.

creepy.

[niyad]

34. You made excellent points. I wish that I had answers.

[SCantiGOP]

36. "Dear Gidfather, with all due respect...."

Many people have pointed out in the recent past that the current Repub party more closely resembles a Mafia family than a national political party.

[moniss]

37. Look what he did

regarding Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. Honestly the list of horrible,despicable things he did in 4 years is astonishing. Demeaning and belittling refugees, demeaning a Gold Star family, taking bribes by way of his properties, incredible corruption/financial abuse by his appointees while in office, separating immigrant/refugee children from their families while knowing they had no system to track them, extortion of leaders of allied countries, telling an obvious record number of lies, issuing pardons to cronies who obviously were covering for him, placing obviously unqualified people in administrative positions and as judges, putting through massive tax cuts for the rich to benefit himself and cronies and holding a party to celebrate the passing of the cuts, purposely hampering the administration of the ACA as well as trying to scuttle it entirely while having absolutely no replacement plan, openly engaging in witness tampering by dangling pardons and issuing threats, openly encouraging white supremacists, rolling back environmental regulations, refusing to release his tax returns, the Muslim ban, publicly siding with Putin against our own intelligence folks, withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement, suggesting vaccines cause autism, cutting the pandemic early warning system, revealing classified information about an ally to the Russians, accusing people of treason because they did not applaud his State of the Union speech, forcing the longest government shutdown in history, failing to ever submit an infrastructure plan while bitching about the infrastructure constantly, rampant nepotism, planning to sow doubt about election results in order to subvert the results, demanding elections officials "find" votes for him, planning (along with operatives and extremist groups) to obstruct the peaceful transfer of power by pressuring Pence to not certify the Biden election and organizing/inciting a mob to engage in a violent insurrection attempt and then failing to make a public statement demanding the violent overthrow attempt be stopped and then finally after several hours of mayhem injury and death he told the insurrectionists that he loved them. Finally there is certainly more that could be added to the list.

[halfulglas]

38. BOW DOWN. Remember that phrase a few Trump campaign aides made during the

2016 campaign? Saying that if he won we would all have to BOW DOWN to Trump. I can't remember her name when she said it and I thought she meant it about worshiping him and I thought she was crazy. This kind of thing is probably what she meant. He was a royal ruler who expected everyone to come and pay him homage and request what they needed and he would decide if they deserved it - F--- federal law. F--- Puerto Rico for thinking they deserved help. They didn't kiss the ring sufficiently. Only autocrats like Putin deserved his respect.

[Skittles]

41. ultimate Trump humpers Abbott and DeSantis got a pass

imagine that