Hiding in Plain Sight

January 13, 2020
Journalist Kendzior (The View from Flyover Country) charts nearly five decades of impropriety, shady business practices, and alleged crimes perpetuated by Donald Trump in this impeccably researched chronicle. Arguing that Trump is a “media-savvy con man” bent on dictatorship, Kendzior explores his protégé relationship with disgraced attorney Roy Cohn and his early dealings with the Soviet Union. She tracks Trump’s friendship with convicted underage sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein, noting that in 2016 one of Epstein’s victims accused Trump of rape (her lawsuit has since been dropped), and contends that Trump Tower has “effectively functioned as a dorm for the Russian mafia” since Soviet Army veteran and mob figure David Bogatin attempted to launder $6 million by buying five luxury condos in the building in 1984. Kendzior weaves autobiographical sketches and broad overviews of American culture and geopolitical events into her narrative; in many cases, these digressions create a more comprehensive picture, while others, including an extended thread on tabloid “voyeurism,” feel like tangents. Political junkies will be familiar with much of Kendzior’s claims, but she offers a few surprises and many valuable insights into the president’s psychological motivations and methods of manipulation. This comprehensive, page-turning account presents a stark and uncompromising indictment of the Trump presidency as the culmination of a “decades-long erosion of American stability, integrity, and democracy.”

February 1, 2020
A scathing indictment of Donald Trump and the "wider movement of white supremacists and international kleptocrats seeking to dismantle Western democracy." In a follow-up to The View From Flyover Country (2018), St. Louis-based Globe and Mail op-ed columnist Kendzior elaborates on her argument that a decadeslong "erosion of American institutions and social trust" paved the way for the present "autocracy, wrapped in a tabloid veneer." Although she reiterates points made by David Cay Johnston and others, Kendzior offers fresh views based on her experiences living in the declining economy of the Midwest and on observations as an academic researcher studying dictatorships in the former Soviet Union. In St. Louis, she watched the growth of increasingly harsh social and economic conditions from 2008 onward, foreshadowing national decline; in Uzbekistan, she witnessed the rise of dictator Islam Karimov, who sought to "make Uzbekistan great again," called independent media "the enemy of the people," persecuted marginalized groups, and abused executive power to enhance his personal wealth. Given those perspectives, the author has been tireless in sounding her dark alarm over the Trump presidency, in both her writing and public appearances. She explores White House nepotism, including the rise of the "rich, connected and unqualified"; Trump's "stripping America down for parts and selling those parts to the highest bidder"; and his close relationship to political operative Roy Cohn, who, since the early 1970s, taught Trump to "counterattack, lie, threaten, sue, and never back down." For decades, Trump "relied on oligarchs and mobsters from the former USSR for support" after being blacklisted by Wall Street following his 1990s bankruptcies. Kendzior also blames the "timid and plodding" Mueller investigation as well as the mainstream news media, "an industry for elites" reluctant to upset social peers. A passionate call for immediate action against the "transnational crime syndicate" that has supplanted the U.S.

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March 13, 2020

A scholar of authoritarian regimes and an experienced reporter, Kendzior (The View from Flyover Country) predicted Donald Trump's victory in the 2016 presidential election, as well as the current crisis of U.S. democracy. The author argues that the Trump administration's authoritarian tendencies that initially took many by surprise were preceded by larger political shifts that have eroded democratic policies and civil liberties since the 1980s. The narrative moves through important events and people in Trump's life during the 1980s through 2019, such as his Russian-connected real-estate deals and time on the reality TV show the Apprentice, while also focusing on the role that corruption and the media played in building his public profile. Similar to her previous works, Kendzior's latest maintains that Trump is a media-savvy, white-collar criminal. She links the changing landscape of media with Trump's political rise. VERDICT A chilling account of how the media, government, and public have failed to hold Trump accountable, and how this has significantly impacted U.S. democracy. Recommended for readers curious about the intersection of politics and media.--Rebekah Kati, Univ. of North Carolina, Chapel Hill

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