Dear Pr*sident Trump,
I was so pleased to learn last week that you had promised to donate a million dollars of your personal money to Hurricane Harvey relief efforts.
What a wonderful example to set for the nation. So very generous of you. So badly needed by the victims of the storm and its horrific aftermath. I was even tempted to call your contribution unprecedentally presidential.
So I watched your Twitter feed, waiting to see the tweet in which you let the nation know which charity or other fund you had given the million dollars to. Or which one you were planning to give it to.
I watched. And watched. And watched.
There were your tweets praising the efforts of the first responders and the volunteers in the wake of the hurricane and deluge it brought with it. But nothing about your million-dollar pledge.
Soon, I thought, soon.
Then I remembered something I had read about your charitable giving. And while I was watching your Twitter feed, I came across a tweet from this guy
You remember him, right? The guy who wrote the book about deal-making with your name on it 30 years ago?
And I thought this can’t be true. Only a really screwed-up asshole would vow to give money to people in the midst of disaster and not keep his promise.
Especially a guy for whom $1 million is a 10,000th of the $10 billion you say you’re worth. Pocket change. So little you’d never even notice it gone. You’re so good at deals, you’d have that back in, what, 90 minutes?
So today I get up and I see that you and Melania are off to the Gulf Coast again. But still no mention of the million.
I thought, maybe you forgot and just need a little reminding about your promise. Or a bit of cajoling.
Okay then. Look, $250 is a whole lot more than 1/10000th of my net worth. And I’ve already donated to the recovery efforts. Nonetheless, if you’ll pony up, why shouldn’t I?
I mean how could you renege when you want everyone to know what a great, tremendous guy you are? A guy hungry to be beloved? A guy who knows the value of a photo op?
Think of the avalanche of publicity you’d get if you donated that million to the Hurricane Harvey Relief fund administered by the Greater Houston Community Foundation that Houston Mayor Sylvester Turner established last week. Sure, he’s a Democrat. But what a perfect opportunity for you to show that tragedy is not captive to partisanship. Front-page news of you shaking the mayor’s hand, and pointing your finger as you hand over your donation.
But no check, okay?
Cash only. Just to be sure there’s not a stop payment phone call after the reporters are out of earshot, eh? Not that you would stoop so low. But cash makes everything transparently copacetic. I know that a million in Benjamins is a lot to carry around, but you’ve got Secret Service agents with you at all times to protect every dollar until you get it to Houston. And nobody’s going to rob you on Air Force One.
Look, $250 isn’t much, I admit, but the very minute you deliver a briefcase full of cash to the mayor, I’ll send Hurricane Harvey Relief a check. (You don’t have to worry—I have a reputation for keeping my promises, including the money ones, and my checks don’t bounce.)
There is one additional condition. I want Pete Souza to take photos of the whole cash handover thing. He did such a good job of capturing President Obama, I’d like to see him do the same for you.
Do all this and not only will I send my money and urge others to send theirs, I’ll also stop inserting an “asterisk” into Pr*sident every time I write about you.
Deal?