New book reveals how Trump compared himself to Mao, Stalin, Attila the Hun
By Jamie Gangel, Jeremy Herb, CNN
(CNN) — When President Donald Trump sat down for an interview in March with New York Times reporters Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan for their new book, he showed them a document arguing he was more powerful than some of the most feared and treacherous leaders in history — including Attila the Hun, Genghis Khan, Napoleon, Stalin, Mao, and Hitler.
Trump had been asked by Haberman and Swan about the power he wielded as president in his second term and his place in history, which prompted him to tell the story of a two-page document he had received from “a historian” during an event honoring the hall of fame golfer, Gary Player. Trump proudly asked an aide to fetch a copy of the document, which argued that each of the other leaders, “however fearsome in his day, had no global reach. Their power was local. But (Trump’s) was not.”
Trump proudly showed them the letter, Haberman and Swan write, “reciting the names of some of history’s most powerful figures, explaining how each fell short of his own power as US president.”
These leaders “maintained power through fear,” Trump said, according to the book. “Who would ever do a thing like that? Right?”
But when Swan and Haberman tried to find the author, it turned out, he was not a historian, but actually Player’s longtime caddy and personal confidant. The caddy told Haberman and Swan that he “had first shared his assessment of Trump’s power with Player and later explained it directly to Trump over golf in Florida.”
Trump posted the document on Truth Social just after midnight Thursday — an interesting coincidence that one source told CNN may have been an attempt to get out in front of the book. Trump wrote that the author was a “presidential historian.”
The anecdote is one of many striking scenes captured in Haberman and Swan’s new book, “Regime Change,” which was obtained by CNN ahead of its release on Tuesday. The book provides a blunt, behind-the-scenes portrait of the first 14 months of Trump’s second term, in which the president has wielded his power without constraint — often in a haphazard, improvisational manner — to persecute his perceived enemies, rattle global markets and wage war abroad.
Haberman and Swan capture moments big and small, including the administration’s flailing response to the Epstein files scandal and Trump’s decision to go to war with Iran. Throughout, they illustrate how Trump’s second term is even more unconstrained than his first, depicting his willingness to break with longstanding norms and offering insight into the president’s often biting and unvarnished views of fellow world leaders and even members of his own team.
Based on more than 1,000 interviews over a three-year period, Haberman and Swan’s book contains direct quotes that they explain come from the person speaking, someone who heard them directly or from “contemporaneous notes, recordings, or transcripts.”
They both spoke to Trump several times over the course of their daily reporting, in addition to their hourlong sit-down with Trump in March.
Here are more key moments from “Regime Change”:
Trump’s personal gold touch — with superglue
Haberman and Swan recount a scene in the Oval Office that reveals how invested Trump is in the golden redecorating inside his White House office.
One morning, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt walked into the Oval Office and found Trump “clutching a tube of superglue and attempting to affix gold decorations to the marble fireplace mantel,” according to the book.
“As he was known to prefer his own aesthetic handiwork to anyone else’s, the sight of the President squeezing glue onto gilded appliques and mounting them on the wall himself surprised no one in his inner circle,” Haberman and Swan write.
After retaking office last year, Trump quickly transformed the look of the Oval Office, adding gold everywhere, including new gold vermeil figurines on the mantle and medallions on the fireplace, gold eagles on the side tables, gilded Rococo mirrors on the doors, and, nestled in the pediments above the doorways, diminutive gold cherubs shipped in from Mar-a-Lago.
A ‘con man’ and ‘better than The Apprentice’
Trump’s second-term foreign policy has been dominated by his decision to go to war with Iran alongside Israel.
Haberman and Swan capture Trump’s hot-and-cold feelings about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, including his initial hesitation about war with Iran. They write that Trump told an Israel skeptic in the early months of his administration that he didn’t want “any part” of a Netanyahu war with Iran.
Trump told another adviser that Netanyahu was a “con man,” according to the authors, who say that it is one of the worst insults in Trump’s lexicon.
In an excerpt of the book released by The New York Times in April, Haberman and Swan describe a February gathering in the White House Situation Room that included Trump, Netanyahu and a handful of top US and Israeli officials. In the meeting, Netanyahu presented Israel’s case for going to war with Iran, which Trump ultimately decided to back.
Haberman and Swan also write about Trump’s skepticism toward Ukraine and its leader, Volodymyr Zelensky, as Russia’s war in Ukraine dragged into Trump’s second year despite his campaign promise to resolve it within 24 hours.
After a remarkable argument in the Oval Office between Trump, Zelensky and Vice President JD Vance last February, Haberman and Swan write that Trump thought the confrontation was great.
“Better,” he would tell an advisor, “than The Apprentice,” according to the book.
‘You know what you are? You’re a p*ssy’
Haberman and Swan capture some of the president’s vitriol toward his own Cabinet, including Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick, a longtime associate of Trump’s who played a key role in carrying out Trump’s tariffs over the past year.
The authors recount a scene in April 2025 where Lutnick was trying to convince Trump that tariffs couldn’t put US automakers at a major disadvantage.
Trump said that Lutnick “used to be tough” but had gotten “weak” after coming to Washington, Haberman and Swan wrote.
“You used to be a killer, Howard,” Trump said, according to the authors. “I remember when you were thirty-five, you were a killer. And now you’ve got your beautiful wife, and your big house, and you’re just soft. And you’re a pussy. You know what you are? You’re a pussy.”
Months later, as tariff revenues began coming in, the authors write that Lutnick used Trump’s insult with a quip of his own, telling the president he was “your twenty-five-billion-dollar-a-month pussy.”
‘I want to bust his f**king balls, honestly’
The book dives into one line that Trump chose not to cross in his second term: Trying to fire then-Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.
Instead, Trump launched a campaign last year to try to make Powell’s life miserable.
An aide told the authors at the time that Trump was not going to fire Powell, he was just going to torture him.
Haberman and Swan recount how Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought brought Trump a plan to attack Powell over the renovations of the Federal Reserve building, which led to an extraordinary visit by the president to tour the site last July.
“I want to bust his fucking balls, honestly,” Trump said of Powell during a July staff meeting, according to the book. “What about that fucking building? Can we stop it? Can we stop construction. I just want to bust his fucking balls. Fuck him.”
Trump asked if they could stop construction. “I’ll look into it,” Vought said.
“No don’t look into it,” Trump replied. “Bring me a plan.”
Vought’s general counsel at OMB, Mark Paoletta, came up with the plan to appoint Trump allies to the National Capital Planning Commission, an arcane board that dealt with construction in the Washington, DC, region.
Trump told his then-deputy chief of staff, James Blair, to join the board. “It’s like a two-week campaign. You know what to do. I just put you on the board. You have fun, you be vicious, you do a job,” the president said, according to the authors.
After the meeting, Blair went to Will Scharf, Trump’s staff secretary, and had him join the board, too. Scharf chaired a meeting the very next day, where Blair ordered up a “full review” of the Federal Reserve renovation project.
‘Who was he?’ How Trump found targets to investigate
In April 2025, Trump issued executive orders instructing the Justice Department to investigate several perceived enemies, including Chris Krebs, the former head of DHS’ Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency who was fired in November 2020 after he stated publicly that the 2020 election was “the most secure in American history.”
Haberman and Swan reveal that the investigation came after Trump couldn’t remember Krebs’ name.
According to the book, Trump “began to muse about past grievances” while in a meeting with several staff, including his powerful deputy chief of staff for policy Stephen Miller and Boris Epshteyn, Trump’s longtime aide.
“I remember there was this lawyer who was in the administration who said the election was fair and there’s no fraud. Who was he?” Trump asked.
“Oh the DHS — I think you’re talking about the DHS guy,” Miller replied. “I forget his name.”
Epshteyn then googled Krebs’ name. “Yeah, Chris Krebs,” Trump said, according to the book. “Whatever happened to him? He was a bad one. Take a look at him.”
Haberman and Swan write that Miller then proceeded to have a presidential memo drawn up, “unleashing the resources of the federal government on a man whose sole offense against Trump had been to attest to the security and validity of his 2020 election.”
‘Can you sign that for me?’
Haberman and Swan offer new insights into the efforts of Trump’s special envoy, Steve Witkoff, to win over Russian President Vladimir Putin and end the war in Ukraine.
Trump tapped Witkoff, a longtime friend and New York real estate developer, as his chief negotiator for a number of diplomatic crises, including Gaza and Ukraine.
Witkoff sought a breakthrough with Putin based on personal chemistry, the authors write, adding that Putin “seemed to play into this” while giving up nothing on the battlefield.
Haberman and Swan write that during a meeting last year at the Kremlin, Putin was doodling on his personal stationary. Witkoff asked what it was and Putin held up the paper, which said “3+2,” which was shorthand for the territorial framework that Witkoff had discussed with him to stop the fighting.
“Can you sign that for me and can I take it home?” Witkoff asked, according to the book.
Putin signed the drawing, and Witkoff had it framed in black with a taupe mat, Haberman and Swan write.
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