'Art of the Deal' ghostwriter says he will donate all royalties to endangered immigrants in response to Trump's DACA decision
'Trump hasn't given a $1 of royalties to charity'
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Your support makes all the difference.The man who ghost wrote Donald Trump’s most famous book and who famously fell out with the subject, has claimed he will be giving all his royalties to “endangered immigrants”.
On the day the Trump administration said it was terminating a programme introduced by Barack Obama that had permitted 800,000 undocumented children to remain in the country, Tony Schwartz attacked the President over the royalties from Art of the Deal.
“Trump hasn’t given $1of Art of Deal royalties to charity. I give 100 per cent of mine. All my donations for now will go to endangered immigrants,” he said on Twitter.
Mr Schwartz spent 18 months interview and shadowing Mr Trump for the 1987 The Art of the Deal. During the election campaign, the New York television reality star cited the book as proof of his skills as a negotiator.
But Mr Schwartz fell out with Mr Trump long ago. Last summer, he said that making Mr Trump appear like a smart, sharp businessman was akin to putting “lipstick on a pig”.
In an interview with The Independent during the election campaign, Mr Schwartz predicted that Mr Trump would impose martial law if he was elected.
“I started out saying … that my highest fear was that because he was so thin-skinned, and because he is so insecure, he is a huge risk to set off, to punch in, the nuclear codes, because he happens to be irritated or frustrated by an enemy,” Mr Schwartz said.
“When I said that, I got a lot of rolling of the eyes from people in the media and other people to whom I was making that case. I think today, people do really begin to understand that this is a volatile man with very low self control.”
Last week, the White House said Mr Trump would donate $1m of his own money to relief operations in Houston. Mr Schwartz responded to the news by saying there was no way Mr Trump would follow through with his promise.
“No way Trump donates $1m of own money to Harvey victims. He only promises to give. Never actually does,” he said on Twitter.
The White House has said it has yet to decide where the funding would be allocated and asked reporters to suggest who should receive it.
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