Publishers Weekly
07/29/2019
Zirin (Supremely Partisan), a former assistant U.S. attorney in the southern district of New York, examines in critical detail a host of President Donald Trump’s entanglements in the civil justice system. Zirin begins with a 1973 case brought by the federal government against Trump and his father for housing discrimination, during which Trump began his relationship with the infamous attorney Roy Cohn, from whom, Zirin contends, Trump learned his slash-and-burn legal tactics. Other cases include his being sued by undocumented people who had worked on a project for him, in which he denied knowledge of their legal status in order to avoid payments to pension funds (the judge deemed his claims “unworthy of belief”); threats of litigation to intimidate Rolling Stone and the Onion; a class action brought by those enrolled in his Trump University; and a defamation suit Trump brought against a New York Times journalist, during which he lied 30 times in one deposition and lost. Most of the critiques Zirin raises have been previously reported, and the effect of putting together all of these lawsuits can be both overwhelming and repetitive. This may not be a fun reading experience, but it’s a well-constructed documentation of Trump’s legal misdeeds. (Sept.)
From the Publisher
“One of the most useful and readable accounts of Trump’s early career in business…Zirin’s book is a valuable guide to Trump’s mind-set and a good primer for the months ahead as a series of investigations close in on the president.”
—David Fahrenthold, Washington Post
“‘Admit nothing, deny everything; lie, disassemble, and prevaricate. Make false and scurrilous accusations to demonize your adversary.’ Donald Trump‘s formula for litigation mirrors his presidency—as compellingly told by Jim Zirin. A must-read!”
—Richard Ben-Veniste, assistant Watergate Special Prosecutor, member of 9/11 Commission and former federal prosecutor
“Plaintiff in Chief captures the enigmatic qualities of a president who has, at turns, sought to bludgeon his enemies through the courts, even while disparaging the rule of law tenets on which our democracy stands. A compelling and insightful must-read.”
—Anthony W. Crowell, Dean and President, New York Law School
“Like a careful lawyer who knows how to enthrall a jury, Jim Zirin delivers a vivid page-turner that spans the angry, vituperative, mean-spirited, litigious life of Donald Trump.”
—Ken Auletta, author and columnist, The New Yorker
“Since becoming president, Donald Trump has shown a disturbing, but so far unrealized, inclination to use the justice system for political revenge. Plaintiff in Chief documents the honing of that instinct during Trump’s decades-long obsession with litigation as a weapon of financial and reputational war.”
—Heather MacDonald, author, The Diversity Delusion
“This book is a first: a presidential biography gleaned through hundreds of law suits, settlements and disregard for the courts. Here it all is, the crucial guide to an American kleptocrat’s anti-legal obstructions of justice, money laundering enterprises, alliances with mob bosses and bully boy tactics, taught by his mentor Roy Cohn. Jim Zirin has written a meticulously researched true crime thriller.”
—Marie Brenner, writer-at-large, Vanity Fair
“Donald Trump’s perverted manipulation of the law to serve his twisted ends is laid out as never before in Jim Zirin’s splendid new book. It’s an essential read for anyone who wants to really understand Trump.”
—Bob Herbert, author and filmmaker, former op-ed columnist, New York Times
“This examination of Donald Trump in litigation is a fascinating and riveting revelation of the calculating character and take no prisoners approach of our President.”
—Joseph A. Califano, Jr., attorney and Chief Domestic Aide to President Lyndon B. Johnson
“James Zirin knows Trump's legal history inside out, and he makes sense of it in this lucid book, as only a brilliant veteran lawyer can. Is Roy Cohn's malevolent spirit running the White House? Zirin shows us how terribly real that nightmare might be.”
—Sean Wilentz, professor, Princeton University
“Zirin advances the proposition that you can learn everything you need to know about Trump from the way he conducted himself in court—and that in fact he became the Trump we know today through his participation in some 4,000 lawsuits…Zirin has proven his case beyond a reasonable doubt.”
—Max Boot, Senior Fellow, Council on Foreign Relations, Washington Post columnist, CNN commentator
“President Trump regards the law as a weapon to be used for his own gain, not an ideal to be respected. In his great book, Plaintiff in Chief, James Zirin traces the origin of Trump's view through a multitude of lawsuits. It is a definitive history of what led us to a lawless presidency.”
—Corey Brettschneider, professor, Brown University
“James Zirin has had an essential insight: if you want to understand the 45th President of the United States, you should start with the 3,500 lawsuits he's been enmeshed in. Donald Trump thrives on litigation: he gets sustenance from it, he gets pleasure. And his life's story can be told through arranging and recreating them. This is a brilliant book that could only have been written by someone like Zirin—a man with a long history as a lawyer, a prosecutor, a journalist, and a New Yorker. It's an absolutely marvelous read.”
—Nicholas Thompson, editor-in-chief, Wired
"A unique approach to the continuing deconstruction of the Trumpian edifice. Former federal prosecutor Zirin pieces together a highly damning portrait of Donald Trump as a serial abuser of the law. The book is so incriminating not only because of the author's credentials, but also because the details are grounded in lawsuits filed by Trump, against Trump, or, in some instances, cross-filed by the opposing parties."
—Kirkus Review
“A fascinating insight into Trump’s legal history—exposing his motives and methods, psychology and morals.”
—Frances Gibb, Spectator USA
“Zirin is to be commended on a fully referenced and readable book in which his own sense of commitment to the rule of law, and disapproval of what he describes, are palpable.”
—Lord Mance, London Times
Kirkus Reviews
2019-07-01
Another searing exposé of the current president.
Former federal prosecutor Zirin, a "middle-of-the-road Republican," pieces together a highly damning portrait of Donald Trump as a serial abuser of the law, lifelong liar, perjurer, business fraudster, tax evader, racist, and serial perpetrator of sexual assault. The book is so incriminating not only because of the author's credentials, but also because the details are grounded in approximately 3,500 lawsuits filed by Trump, against Trump, or, in some instances, cross-filed by the opposing parties. Because litigation generally includes sworn affidavits attesting to accuracy and testimony given under oath if a trial occurs, the author is able to accurately document, page after page, the unbelievably long list of Trump's exaggerations and outright falsehoods. In fact, the documentation provided by Zirin is impossible to refute, by Trump or anybody else who might take exception to this book (most of whom will ignore the facts anyway). The author began his painstaking research in 2015, soon after Trump announced he would seek the presidency on the Republican Party ballot. Because Zirin had spent his decadeslong law career in New York, he had already formed an impression of Trump as a businessman who lacked respect for the Constitution and the courts. Among other topics, the author focuses on Trump's ties to organized crime; his business frauds related to hotels, casinos, and residential rental properties; and his phony Trump University. An entire chapter covers litigation related to Trump's mistreatment of women, including physical assault. In every chapter, Zirin explains how Trump abuses the court system, which is funded by American taxpayers, by filing lawsuits in bad faith. He also targets Trump's lawyers for their unethical behaviors. Though the author's writing is not always easy to follow, as he sometimes lapses into lawyerly jargon, his overall message is achingly clear: "All this aberrant behavior would be problematic in a businessman….But the implications of such conduct in a man who is the president…are nothing less than terrifying."
A unique approach to the continuing deconstruction of the Trumpian edifice.
