Et Tu, Mary?

There are lots of people in the streets these days trying to bring Donald Trump down. But Arwa Mahdawi writes that it may be Trump's family who drives the final nails into his coffin:

The Daily Beast reported on Monday that Mary, 55, who is the daughter of Donald’s late brother Fred Trump Jr, has written a “harrowing and salacious” book about the president. Too Much and Never Enough will be published in the US on 28 July, a month before the Republican National Convention. The timing is clearly designed to do maximum damage.

Why the bad blood? Well, for one thing, Mary reportedly blames Donald for mistreating her alcoholic father – behaviour she believes contributed to his death from a heart attack at the age of 42. Then there was the fight over Fred Trump Sr’s estate in 2000. Mary and her brother, Fred Trump III, claimed they were dealt with unfairly in their grandfather’s will as a result of “fraud and undue influence” by Donald and two of his siblings. The ill will is said to have escalated when Donald, in retaliation for the lawsuit, cut off medical insurance for Fred III’s seriously ill infant son, who required round-the-clock care. Fred III was quoted as saying: “Our family puts the ‘fun’ in dysfunctional.”

Perhaps it's only fitting. Apparently, Trump told his children that they should never trust anyone:

According to a GQ profile of Donald Trump Jr, the president used to ask his children whether they trusted him. When they replied: “Of course,” he would tell them off for not learning their lesson. Maybe he had a point: Mary’s book (which is also said to contain “damning” comments from Donald’s sister, the retired federal judge Maryanne Trump Barry) marks the first time a Trump has written a critical tell-all about the president, but I would be surprised if it were the last time one of his own undermined him. The question is: which Trump will turn on the president next?

Mahdawi doubts that Trump's children will do Daddy in. But she suggests that it would be wise to keep your eyes on Melania:

Melania may be taciturn, but she is no dummy – nor is she a pushover. According to a new unauthorised biography of Melania (which the White House has dismissed as “fiction”), an enterprising Ivanka tried to rename the First Lady’s Office the “First Family Office”, but Melania was having none of it. She also, apparently, put an end to Ivanka treating the White House as if it was her own home. In addition, it has been widely reported that she used her husband’s presidency as an opportunity to renegotiate her prenuptial agreement – staying in New York during the first few months he was in office as leverage for negotiations. “That woman! She will be the end of him,” one of Trump’s friends was reportedly overheard saying about Melania’s refusal to move to Washington. Who knows, those may be prophetic words. Perhaps Melania will end up finishing what Mary has started.

There would be more than poetic justice if Trump's dysfunctional presidency was finally brought down by his dysfunctional family.

Image: Disinherited