The announcement that New York Times White House correspondents Maggie Haberman and Glenn Thrush have agreed to do a Trump book for Random House, as I first reported Tuesday, was both bombshell journalism news and something of a foregone conclusion. Haberman and Thrush, two veterans of the New York tabloid world who both worked at Politico before joining the Times, have been the foremost chroniclers of the West Wing reality show. Haberman, in particular, is enviably sourced, and has a bond with the president himself that’s frayed at times but not broken. Thrush, wearer of a signature fedora, was parodied on Saturday Night Live by Bobby Moynihan. They are two of the essential stars of the Trump administration.
Gossip has been the fuel of the early Trump administration, and their Twitter feeds and author pages are steady streams of insider revelations and hot inside-the-room accounts of the administration and its foibles. But the duo’s ambition for the as-yet-untitled book, according to sources familiar with the plan, is to do something that goes beyond the palace intrigue (though there’ll be plenty of that as well) to tell a larger story about who Trump is, why the country chose him, and what it all says about America and where we’re headed. They’ve told people that they want the book to be “durable,” and that, “We want this to mean something.”
Random House only acquired the book, via literary agent Elyse Cheney, within the past two weeks, a person with direct knowledge of the matter told me. During the process, Haberman and Thrush have quietly looped in a small circle of Times and White House insiders, sources said, and are still ironing out the details, such as if and when they’ll take book leave and whether their potential leaves would coincide. Word about the advance is being closely held—but political books by similarly placed reporters have earned advances into the millions. Haberman and Thrush both declined to comment.
Haberman and Thrush are longtime friends, colleagues, and reporting partners. While this will be their first book together, they’d previously talked about collaborating on a Clinton book. Thrush has written e-books, and Haberman co-wrote a 2003 book about the kidnapping of Elizabeth Smart with her former New York Post colleague Jeane MacIntosh.
“I’ve admired their work from afar for a long time,” said Random House editor-in-chief Andy Ward in a brief phone interview. “This is the story of our time and I think they’re well positioned to write it.”
The Haberman-Thrush collaboration enters an already-crowded field of Trump books. Joshua Green’s recently published account of the Donald Trump-Steve Bannon partnership reached No. 1 on the New York Times list. Mark Halperin and John Heilemann are working on a third installment in their Game Change series; Politico Playbook columnists Anna Palmer and Jake Sherman have inked a deal for a book on the backroom dramas of Capitol Hill; Amy Chozick and Katy Tur landed campaign memoirs; and Rosie Gray has a biography of Breitbart News in the making.
In what may be only a coincidence, Trump fired off the following tweet a few hours before the Random House announcement: “Fascinating to watch people writing books and major articles about me and yet they know nothing about me & have zero access. #FAKE NEWS!”
