In two weeks, Donald Trump will lose. He’ll lose big. He’ll lose in historic fashion. He’ll lose so big, in fact, that the only drama left is whether he can eke out a victory in Texas and Utah. That’s how big he’ll lose, going down in history among the nation’s yuuugest losers.
He’ll lose so big, that Republicans down-ballot will go down with him, including some never considered endangered. And he’ll motivate so many hard to turn-out voters, engaging so many of the formerly apathetic, that he will have endangered GOP chances well into the future.
That’ll be fun! But really, that’ll be just the beginning. Because Trump’s entire world is about to crash down on him, and the only question is how he handles things when even a tiny shred of this new reality enters the narcissistic bubble around his head.
Let’s start with his businesses
His brand, which he self-valued at $4 billion, is in tatters, so damaged that his company just launched a new line of hotels fleeing the Trump name. Meet “Scion,” which everyone should avoid—just as they now avoid anything bearing that white supremacist, bigoted “Trump” name.
A room at the Trump International Hotel with a king size bed and a city view could have been yours any night of the week starting Nov. 14 for about $505 or $555, according to a check of the hotel’s website last week. By contrast, five major luxury competitors in the city generally charged more—sometimes hundreds of dollars more—or were sold out. For instance, the St. Regis only had rooms starting at $975 on Monday and Tuesday. The Four Seasons in Georgetown had no rooms available at any price for those days, and the Jefferson Hotel for those two days plus Wednesday.
Rates at the Trump hotel have continued to sink, too: By the end of last week, the price of many Trump rooms had been cut by 10% or more.
Business is so bad at his hotels, like the new one in D.C., that his family has to resort to smoke and mirrors to try and mask the failure.
At lunchtime on a recent weekday, 17 people were eating in a space that seats 120 [...] Ms. Trump swept up the steps into the restaurant. Half the diners stood up. They weren’t customers, somebody in the entourage said, but employees.
One doesn’t have to have an MBA to realize that when you alienate half your potential customer base, and the people you do attract can’t afford your luxury offerings, business is destined to fail. And given his $1.1 billion debt, he needs that cash flow to continue making payments on that debt. That debt may not matter much when business is good, but he just shot a huge chunk of his business between the eyes.
Now, much of his real estate holdings are trophy buildings in Manhattan, and presumably rents and occupancies will remain high. He may not get entirely wiped out, but his hotels and golf courses and stupid steaks and whatnot? All that won’t be sustainable. So we’ll spend the next couple of years watching his properties get shut down and sold off, one by one, a steady drip of delicious Trumpian humiliation.
And who will join Trump in any new ventures? He’s made clear he’s out for himself, and only himself, and doesn’t care if employees, contractors, or investors get hurt along the way. He brags about screwing people over in negotiations, and brags about making out like a bandit when things fall apart around him. His lack of business acumen has been exposed, as has his pathological lying. He wields an army of lawyers to protect him from anyone who might challenge his betrayals.
Why would anyone, knowing what they know now, go anywhere near a meeting with Trump?
He’s lost his precious social status
At the Al Smith dinner a week ago, Al Smith IV joked, “[B]efore the dinner started, Donald went up to Hillary and asked her how she was doing. And she replied, ‘I’m fine, now get out of the ladies’ dressing room.'” Yup, in New York’s upper crust society, Donald Trump is now a joke. And worse than a joke, he’s a creepy sexual predator. A pedophile, even.
This means that Trump’s cherished social celebrity status is dead. Who will invite him to their party, knowing attendees would be disgusted and offended? What woman would want to be anywhere near him? What parent would want their children anywhere near him? He will be a social pariah, shunned outside teabagger circles. And it’s going to kill him.
The recordings reveal a man who is fixated on his own celebrity, anxious about losing his status and contemptuous of those who fall from grace [...]
“[Arsenio Hall] Couldn’t get on television,” Mr. Trump said with disgust. “They wouldn’t even take his phone call.”
His celebrity won’t be dimmed, but it’ll be the celebrity of the mass murderer, the infamy of villainy. By any definition, that’ll be a fall from grace, and sitting at home, wondering why no one will take his phone call, his insanity will only deepen, his conspiracies will only flourish, further hastening his descent into madness.
His legal woes
For the famously litigious Trump, legal fees are nothing new. But he’s never experienced what’s about to hit him.
There’s Trump University, whose case will proceed right after the election. There’s the Trump Foundation, which could present both criminal and civil penalties rising to the tens of millions. There are a dozen women who have already come forth with accusations of sexual assault, and you know there are dozens more, some who may wait until the glare of the election is over (or the promise of successful litigation is proven) before stepping forward.
There are jilted contractors and business partners and investors, who might’ve been afraid to challenge Trump at the top of his game, but are now willing to go after a wounded Trump in retreat. And if his lawyers are smart, they’ll demand payment upfront, because Trump can’t be trusted to keep his word on anything.
His family
Nothing has struck me more deeply than the Trump children’s speeches at the Republican National Convention. Other than Tiffany, who knew him least, the speeches evinced nary a shred of warmth, or affection for their dad. That’s not surprising, since Trump has made clear he had zero interest in being a father beyond writing checks. So they focused instead on what a great businessman their dad was. It was a fascinating yet incredibly depressing look into Trump’s relationships with those who should be closest to him. We already know he has no friends, and now we know he barely has a family to speak of.
But, by all indications, he has crafted a family of business mercenaries. So what happens when they see their father dragging down their business? How does that affect his relationship with them?
And what about Melania, who has had to suffer through dozens of women accusing her husband of sexual assault? One wonders if any of it comes as a surprise to her. But now that it is open knowledge, does she continue on with a boorish asshole whose social status is on the way down, down, and down? No matter how airtight the prenup might be, they have a young child together. Child support would go a long way, as would the proceeds of her tell-all book.
But even if all the above is bunk, and a true loving relationship exists between him and his family, what happens as his world begins to collapse? He must already be insufferable in private, with a neverending stream of self-accolades and self-praise and didn’t you know he was the bestest at being the best, ever? But suddenly his businesses are failing, high society is shunning him, legal bills are piling up, and the only people giving him the time of day—the deplorables—won’t sustain the things he really craves (the validation of his peers).
What then? How much can anyone be expected to tolerate of his ever-unhinged conspiracy theories, with enemies under every bed? How long before his paranoia is turned against his family? We all know that professional pressures are seldom kept outside the home. How could Trump, who can never let any slight go, however irrelevant or minor, protect his family from his internal turmoil? He can’t, and he won’t.
That’s a lot of future pain
So that’s his future: business failures, legal woes, and social shunning, without friends or (apparently) a tight family network to sustain him. Oh, and he just lost the presidency by historic margins, making him literally the nation’s biggest loser.
Of course, he has his bubble, and that narcissism might provide continuous justification for his failures—everyone is out to get him and blah blah blah. But at some point, reality has to seep in, right? Even if just a little? And if that happens, then what? That’s a scary path to tread.
The irony, of course, is that Trump’s perfect self-crafted world would remain intact today if he hadn’t run for president, if President Barack Obama hadn’t mocked him at that one (now brilliant) moment in time. His “brand” would remain mostly untarnished, he’d be assaulting women’s pussies with reckless abandon, and he’d still be getting invited to the best parties and TV shows.
Instead, he decided to bare all to the nation, completely unaware of just how ugly he was. And as a result, he’s getting his just desserts.