The White House is facing a fresh wave of internal jitters over a coming book about President Donald Trump's presidency by two of Washington's best-connected chroniclers, with reporting indicating that the administration has been gripped by "high anxiety" over its publication.
The book, titled "Regime Change: Inside the Imperial Presidency of Donald Trump," by Jonathan Swan and Maggie Haberman, is set to be published on June 23rd. Axios reported that the project has triggered concern inside the Trump administration because officials suspect the authors obtained leaks from high-level meetings, including from this year.
The publisher claims the book "takes the reader inside the Situation Room and into the secret Oval Office deliberations that have remade the global trading system and launched military operations that have shocked the world, and behind the scenes of a presidency that has transformed the culture, turned the Justice Department into an agent of retribution against the President's enemies and the office itself into a brazen vehicle for profit."
The nerves appear tied not only to the book's existence, but who wrote it. Haberman has covered Trump for years and previously wrote the bestselling Confidence Man. Swan built his reputation on deeply sourced reporting and a memorable 2020 interview with Trump. According to the outlet, the pair have spent more than two years working on the book.
Trump himself had the authors on his radar, and that he lashed out on Truth Social calling Haberman "Maggot" and "just another SLEAZEBAG writer for The Failing New York Times, insists on writing false stories about me," threatening to sue the Times. He later sat down with them for about an hour in the Oval Office after they were seen in the West Wing in March.
The book's subtitle signals why aides may be worried. Simon & Schuster and other descriptions say "Regime Change" examines the first year of Trump's second presidency and argues that it is "a term liberated from every constraint that defined his first."
The publisher lists the book at 496 pages, "based on hundreds of interviews and unprecedented reporting from deep within the administration's most closely guarded rooms." The synopsis further writes that the book portrays Trump entering his second term as president "more powerful and vengeful" after years marked by indictments, convictions, and political exile between his first and second terms.
