Former White House counselor Kellyanne Conway has a memoir out May 24: “Here's the Deal” is billed by her publisher as a look beyond the headlines of the Trump administration and her family life, including her husband and prominent Trump detractor, George Conway
“Not just the story of the White House, ‘Here’s the Deal' takes the reader inside Kellyanne’s own house, on her own terms,” Threshold Editions announced Wednesday. “Kellyanne became a fulcrum between the see-sawing demands of a West Wing job in one of the most consequential eras in our history, motherhood to four school-age children, and marriage to a man who suddenly went from an ardent supporter of his wife and the President to one of the administration’s most caustic and constant public critics.”
Conway's deal for her memoir was worth seven figures, according to a publishing official with knowledge of negotiations. The official was not authorized to discuss financial terms publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity. “Here's the Deal” had been rumored for more than a year and was formally announced Wednesday by Threshold, a conservative imprint of Simon & Schuster that published Trump’s campaign book “Crippled America” (later titled “Great Again”) in 2015.
Conway, 55, is a longtime Republican pollster and consultant who first supported Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas in 2016, but eventually backed Trump and became his campaign manager as he defeated Democratic candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton in one of the biggest upsets in American political history. She was a top presidential adviser and one of the longest serving members in an administration known for frequent turnover. Conway departed at the end of August 2020, citing a need to spend more time with her family.
In a statement Wednesday, Conway wrote, “I’d made a career out of calling things as I saw them, with no notes in front of me and no net beneath me. I brought that same approach to this book, which should engage, engross and entertain plenty of people.”
Up to now, Conway's most famous words are likely “alternative facts," her description in 2017 of White House’s Press Secretary Sean Spicer's false contention that the new president had attracted “the largest audience ever to witness an inauguration” — both in person and “around the globe.”
Conway's credibility became an ongoing source of debate over whether she should be booked as a guest on news programs, with NYU professor and media critic Jay Rosen calling her a “fog machine.” In 2019, CNN's Don Lemon said it was “beneath the dignity of this network” to interview her, not long before colleague Dana Bash featured Conway in a segment for her ongoing series “Badass Women of Washington.”
Asked whether Simon & Schuster had fact-checked “Here’s the Deal” — something publishers rarely do, citing time and costs — or could otherwise assure readers of the book’s reliability, a spokesperson responded: “We will let the release speak for itself. We will only add that Kellyanne has worked hard through multiple drafts to provide an accurate portrayal of her life and her time in the White House.”
Simon & Schuster employees have expressed unhappiness with the publisher over reports of Conway’s book deal and over its seven-figure deal with former Vice President Mike Pence. At a company town hall meeting last May, Simon & Schuster CEO Jonathan Karp said it was important to present a range of perspectives, but he did cite some limits. Karp said he opposed releasing a memoir by Trump because he couldn't trust him to provide an honest narrative.
