Eric Trump is laying out how his father will use a second term in office, revealing that he has no interest in a scorched-earth revenge sweep against enemies.
The 40-year-old, who runs the family’s Trump Organization business empire, spoke with the Daily Mail on Thursday at his office in Palm Beach, Florida.
In a scene-setting interview ahead of what he is convinced will be an Election Day victory, Eric presented his father’s priorities.
‘He would want nothing to do with prosecuting Hunter Biden or Hillary Clinton, he doesn’t give a damn. He wants these games to end,’ Eric said.
‘He wants a safe, prosperous world and a fruitful society. He wants to get back to a country that is actually functional that wins on everything we do. He wants to win on education, safety, economy, military – he doesn’t want to go into senseless wars.
‘He wants the respect of the entire world.’
But while he maintains there will be no retribution for his father’s political foes – he said the former president will be merciless in his pursuit of the truth behind the two assassination attempts that nearly claimed his life.
The family, and much of the American public, remains unconvinced that the FBI is doing all it can to solve the almost fatal incidents.
Eric Trump, who runs the family’s business empire the Trump Organization, spoke with the Daily Mail on Thursday at his office in Palm Beach, Florida in a scene-setting interview for what he is convinced will be an election day victory
Donald and Melania Trump at Madison Square Garden on Sunday night. Eric says his father ‘wants the respect of the entire world’
Eric is steely-eyed when he discusses the forces he believes are behind the attacks, the first at his father’s rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, on July 13 and the second at the Trump International Golf Club in West Palm Beach on September 5.
‘It is highly possible,’ Eric said, that a foreign power or the so-called Deep State is connected – if not wholly responsible.
‘I hate to say that because I’m as far away from a conspiracy theorist as humanly possible. But they’ve done everything they can to try to take my father out over the last 10 years.’
Like countless of Americans, Eric was watching his father’s Butler rally on July 13 from home, his young children perched on his lap to watch their beloved grandpa.
They watched in real time as a bullet nicked Trump’s ear, and sent Secret Service agents flying across the stage to shield the former president.
As horrifying as it was, he says he was not surprised by the attempt, which he views as only the latest in a long line of hits against the family.
Eric, as head of the Trump Organization, has been subpoenaed 111 times. He, like his father, views the mountain of prosecution they’ve faced as a political witch hunt.
‘He wants the respect of the entire world,’ Eric said, explaining his father has no interest in political retribution – but instead ‘getting back to business’
Donald Trump raises his fist defiantly as he is mobbed by Secret Service agents after being shot through the ear at his rally in Butler, Pennsylvania on July 13
‘They tried to destroy me, they tried to destroy our company, they tried to take him off the ballots in places like Colorado and Maine. They tried to literally remove him from our system of voting in this country,’ Eric said.
He referred to the ‘Russia hoax’ peddled by Hillary Clinton’s campaign, the FBI raid on Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home and banning the ex-president from Facebook and Twitter.
This campaign to ‘destroy’ Donald Trump was so pervasive that Eric predicted an attempt to kill his father months before Thomas Matthew Crooks opened fire in Butler.
‘I said something a number of months ago before the shooting and I said, my biggest fear is that they try and inflict bodily harm, and I got a little bit of criticism when I said that.
‘This guy was cremated faster than a household pet… what’s the FBI hiding?’ Eric says of Thomas Crooks, the man who tried to assassinate his father at his July 13 rally
‘But I saw everything else, every other way that you could try and destroy somebody – their friends, their family, everything that they had ever built, their reputation, I’d seen every lie and I’d seen so much of this come from our own government.’
‘And that’s why Butler really didn’t surprise me, as atrocious and horrendous as it was, they tried everything else and so, I do think there are real questions.’
The Secret Service has failed to provide any motivation for the assassination attempt in Butler.
The FBI has been criticized for releasing Crooks’ body to his family for cremation within days of the shooting, with Republican lawmakers arguing that the corpse was still under the jurisdiction of the County Coroner.
‘I’m going to get hit for saying this, but this guy got cremated faster than most household pets that pass away,’ Eric said.
‘Why haven’t they figured out who this guy was? Why haven’t they gotten into his phones?
‘This isn’t just something that the American people want to know, this is something the entire world deserves to know. They tried to kill the commander-in-chief, the former commander-in-chief and very likely the future commander-in-chief on a national stage.
‘Had they been successful in doing that and were it not for the Grace of God, America would have looked like a Third World country. And they can’t figure out, the greatest law enforcement agencies in the world, can’t figure out who this guy was?’
He adds: ‘I’m not sure people buy it and I think we need real answers.’
Many commentators have expressed disappointment at how quickly the story evaporated from the agenda of the predominantly liberal mainstream media. Eric believes it has been ‘swept under the rug.’
‘I promise you that if my father is elected in 12 days, we will figure out who’s behind this.’
Donald Trump and his family are nothing if not resilient and through it all the Republican candidate has remained good humored.
‘It’s the last thing she thinks about when she goes to bed,’ Eric said of his wife Lara’s RNC leadership and protecting ‘election integrity’ (pictured last night at Madison Square Garden)
Indeed, he has been able to see the funny side of the assassination attempts. Two weeks ago at the Al Smith dinner in New York he joked self-deprecatingly: ‘I don’t see the point in taking shots at myself when other people have been shooting at me.’
Publicly, Trump refuses to concede that the attempts have him spooked.
Eric reveals that the Florida incident has driven his dad off the golf-course.
‘He’s not playing any golf right now. Every time he does, they shoot at him!’ he quipped.
Affable as as he may be, Donald Trump the father is ‘tough’, Eric said.
‘He’s great, he’s tough, he’s no BS, he doesn’t sugar coat things, he’s very real, he generally says what we’re all thinking – that people are too afraid to say.’
The ex-president’s son believes this authenticity from the real estate mogul turned media personality is part of his appeal to voters – because he is not simply a regular politician steeped in the Washington, DC ‘swamp’.
‘It’s why no one shows up to their events…my father has rallies where he’s getting 30, 40, 50,000 people showing up.
‘When we went back to Butler you couldn’t see the end of the crowd, it was the biggest thing I’d ever seen, there must have been 100,000 people there. I’ve never seen a love like it.’
Eric says of the MAGA supporters, they ‘want our country back, they want safety for the world, they want freedom of religion, they want the government to stop meddling with their kids. They think it’s wrong that six foot five men should be swimming in women’s sports. It’s insane.
‘It’s amazing that it takes a billionaire from New York with a very loud voice and a lot of backbone to go out and fight for all these people.’
Away from the rough and tumble of political life, Donald Trump’s family have remained close knit.
‘They’ve tried everything to divide us,’ Eric says of his family. Despite the ‘political noise’, they remain united
The former president is father to five children and grandfather to ten, including Eric’s son Luke and daughter Carolina who he shares with wife Lara, chair of the Republican National Committee.
On the shelves in Eric’s office, surrounding the MAGA caps and Trump wine bottles, are photos of Donald Trump with his grandchildren.
Eric attributes his father’s ‘tough and strong’ personality with helping to keep the family together and also describes a softer side to the 78-year-old.
‘My daughter will hop in his golf cart, he’ll be out playing, and she’ll have a big Pokemon doll or teddy bear and he’ll be driving around, the speakers will be blaring because he loves listening to music when he plays, he’s running around the golf course drinking Diet Cokes, probably on the phone to some world leader and she’s in his arms.
‘It’s a lot of fun to see – it’s a side of Donald Trump that a lot of people sometimes can’t believe. It isn’t really out there and it’s not one of the things that we really project either.’
Eric discusses his affection for his siblings, older brother Don Jr., 46, and sister Ivanka, 42, from Donald Trump’s first marriage to Ivana; his younger sister Tiffany, 31, from his father’s marriage to Marla Maples, and 18-year-old brother Barron – from the 45th president’s current marriage to Melania.
Eric’s Trump Org office is decorated with family photos, MAGA memorabilia and trinkets
Eric’s desk at the Trump Organization offices in Jupiter is scattered with family photos
Next to family photos lie Eric’s law enforcement accolades
MAGA hats, Trump champagne and a coveted pair of Trump sneakers decorate the shelves in Eric’s office
It’s a complicated family dynamic, and when you throw in the business empire and the White House, potentially explosive.
But there was no sign of any strife at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee shortly after the first assassination attempt, when the entire family – including grandchildren – took to the stage for the traditional balloon drop, accompanied by a rendition of Nessun Dorma.
Eric says: ‘It is rather remarkable that the five of us, that the five kids, we are so close and we go out there and fight. And they haven’t been able to divide us – and they’ve tried. They’ve tried in every way that you can possibly imagine to make it so miserable, so uncomfortable.
‘He’s running around the golf course drinking Diet Cokes, probably on the phone to some world leader and she’s in his arms,’ says Eric of his father’s relationship with his daughter, Carolina. Donald Trump brought the young girl on stage with him at his September 21 rally in Wilmington, North Carolina
‘They haven’t been able to do so.’
Trump’s youngest son Barron has become the subject of public fascination, in large part because Donald and Melania have been successful in shielding him from the spotlight.
Eric offers some fraternal advice for the teenager who attended his first classes at New York University’s Stern School of Business at the start of September.
It was Trump’s youngest son, NYU student Barron, who convinced him to appear on podcasts popular with his generation
‘My advice to Barron is you are the most watched person, probably the most watched bachelor in the world right now. I’m really lucky, when I was a bachelor we had a lot of attention but not quite the attention that he’ll have – especially if in 12 days we win.
‘Just be careful, just be careful,’ Eric said with a smile. ‘There are a lot of eyes on you.’
He added seriously that the youngest Trump child is a credit to his father.
‘He’s a great kid. He’s a smart kid. He conducts himself very, very well. He’s been brought up well and he’s gonna have a great future ahead of him.’
On the election, Eric is optimistic.
In recent days, Kamala Harris’ rhetoric has turned increasingly extreme as her rival pulls ahead in the polls. Major betting markets are offering odds on Donald Trump that imply a 60 percent chance of victory.
Eric believes the election spins on two issues: the border crisis that has flooded the streets with the deadly synthetic opioid fentanyl and red-hot inflation that burns families every time they go to the grocery store or gas station.
‘We’ve had 20 million people come into this country from around the world, we don’t even know who these people are and they do not have American interests at heart.
‘We’ve had 320,000 children die from fentanyl. And no one’s even talking about fentanyl. No one’s even talking about drugs, and how it’s destroying society,’ he said of the immigration crisis.
‘America has become almost unaffordable. Everything’s too expensive,’ he continued.
Donald (center) and Eric Trump (far right) speak with staff during work at the Trump International Golf Links in Aberdeenshire, Scotland. The business role allows Eric to ‘switch off’ from politics and ‘hide in the background’ – an opportunity, he says, he cherishes
‘There’s a massive war on oil and gas, gas prices have literally tripled in this country. Mortgage rates are up four X, grocery prices and insurance prices are through the roof. Everything has become unaffordable and it didn’t need to happen. It all started with a war on oil and gas and massive inflation.’
Eric said that people ‘will be voting with their wallets and with their sanity.’
But there is no complacency in the Trump camp.
Eric returned from a rally with his father in Georgia in the early hours of the morning ahead of being interviewed and Trump Force One, Donald’s Boeing 757, is constantly in-and-out of Palm Beach airport, zigzagging across the swing states from Michigan to Arizona.
‘It’s going to be close,’ Eric conceded.
But the tight margins that complicated the result in 2020 and sparked accusations from Donald Trump, as well as his eldest sons, that the Democrats had rigged the election, are not at the forefront of Eric’s mind as he witnesses huge lines outside rallies across the country.
‘We always say as a family, “too big to rig”, and that’s our intention and hopefully that’s what these massive lines signify.’
***
Read more at DailyMail.co.uk