The below article first appeared in David Corn’s newsletter, Our Land. The newsletter comes out twice a week (most of the time) and provides behind-the-scenes stories and articles about politics, media, and culture. Subscribing costs just $5 a month—but you can sign up for a free 30-day trial.
Let’s go back to June 2, 2024. That morning, Fox & Friends Weekend aired an interview with Donald Trump conducted by the show’s hosts—Pete Hegseth, Rachel Campos-Duffy, and Will Cain. Three days earlier, Trump was found guilty in his porn-star/hush-money case. (Remember, he’s a good convicted felon!)
And Campos-Duffy brought up a subject that’s long been of great interest to Trump: revenge. As I’ve written many times, Trump’s three most powerful psychological motivations are revenge, revenge, and revenge. (Last month in this newsletter, I traced some of his history as a “revenge junkie.”)
In the aftermath of the verdict that found Trump guilty of 34 counts of falsifying business records to hide his $130,000 payment to Stormy Daniels, Campos-Duffy gently prodded him: “You [previously] said, ‘My revenge will be success for America.’ You just had this verdict. Do you still feel the same?”
“It’s a really tough question in one way because these are bad people,” Trump replied, referring to his critics and those who had brought criminal cases against him. “These people are sick.”
He rambled about how tough he was and bragged about how during his first term he had fired FBI Director Jim Comey. He then returned to the issue of retribution: “Look it’s a very interesting question.
I say it, and it sounds beautiful: ‘My revenge will be success.’ I mean that. But it’s awfully hard when you see what they’ve done. These people are so evil.”
A far-too-sympathetic Cain tried to push Trump toward a clearer answer. “I hear you struggling with it. I hear you say it’s a tough question—a bit unsure. You famously said, regarding Hillary Clinton, ‘Lock her up.’ You declined to do that as president.”
Trump responded: “I beat her. It’s easier when you win. They all said lock her up and I could’ve done it. But I thought that would have been a terrible thing. And then this [verdict] happened to me. So, I may feel differently about it. I can’t tell you. I’m not sure I can answer the question.”
Here was a more interesting and revealing exchange than most of Trump’s softball sessions with Fox sycophants. He was still tethered to his lifelong obsession with revenge—if they screw you, screw ’em back 10 times worse, he often said when asked to describe his key to business success—but he knew it was unwise to vow vengeance during his comeback campaign.
Yet he could not promise to abandon revenge altogether, as if he realized it was impossible for him to pass up an opportunity for retribution. In a rare (for him) moment, he said he could not provide a firm answer.
He seemed to be saying, It would be great to promise I won’t be fixated on vengeance if I’m elected president, but I know me—and that ain’t me.