No One Is Intimidated by Trump Anymore

 

No One Is Intimidated by Trump Anymore

From Iran to the Supreme Court, the president’s attempts to bully both his adversaries and allies are proving increasingly fruitless.

Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

A quiet fell upon the Supreme Court chamber on Wednesday as Donald Trump arrived and sat in the public gallery with his soon-to-be-dismissed attorney general, Pam Bondi, and White House counsel David Warrington. He was purportedly there, in a presidential first, to witness oral arguments for Trump v. Barbara, a case concerning Trump’s executive order to limit birthright citizenship. In reality, his appearance was the culmination of a weeks-long intimidation effort targeting the justices, during which he lambasted his own appointees, Neil Gorsuch and Amy Coney Barrett, as “an embarrassment to their families” and insisted that only “Dumb Judges” would disagree with his position. Now he’d come to the court to stare down any robed figure who might dare oppose him.

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Yet none of the Supreme Court justices appeared to even notice, much less care, as they entered the room and sat, never so much as acknowledging Trump’s presence. If the president intimidated anyone, it may have been his own solicitor general, D. John Sauer, whose raspy voice wavered as he began to make specious arguments about the intentions of those who had crafted the Fourteenth Amendment. Evidently, Chief Justice John Roberts was far from convinced. When Sauer contended, “We’re in a new world now … where eight billion people are one plane ride away from having a child who’s a U.S. citizen,” Roberts rejoined, “Well, it’s a new world. It’s the same Constitution.” Laughter echoed throughout the chamber.

And there sat Trump. His glare had evidently failed to do the trick. As the justices questioned the ACLU’s Cecilia Wang, the attorney representing the opposition to Trump’s gambit to gut birthright citizenship, he walked out. It was the latest example of what has become a clear trend in his second term as president: No one of consequence is intimidated by him.

Attempts at intimidation—sometimes successful, often failed—have always been part of Trump’s modus operandi, dating back to early in his real estate career. The tale of 100 Central Park South is a telling example. After buying the rent-stabilized building in 1981, Trump menaced the tenants to get them out so that he might raze and replace it. His tactics included threatening them with eviction, ignoring a rat infestation, and shutting off the heat and hot water. Though at one point Trump paid out over half a million dollars to the tenants and agreed to government monitoring, the fight dragged on for decades.

Much of Trump’s intimidation strategy as a businessman—threatening lawsuits and using the media to level attacks—was influenced by his friendship with Roy Cohn, the notoriously pugilistic attorney and Communist-hunter. And Trump often doubles down on this strategy when he’s on the losing end of a fight. After his failed attempt to buy an NFL team in 1981, he bought the New Jersey Generals of the upstart rival USFL in 1983. He tried to use the team and the media coverage he’d garnered as leverage to buy an NFL team in 1984—and failed again. (He would later admit that he had no interest in owning a team filled with “low class, all third-rate players.”) Trump also sued the NFL, claiming it was an illegal monopoly. Here, he won: A jury ultimately awarded him the massive sum of one U.S. dollar. The USFL, bleeding money and exhausted from Trump’s constant feuds, folded in 1986.

But then Trump realized that he could control his public image even more by becoming part of the media. In 2004, he became the host of The Apprentice, a reality-TV competition show that sold the fantasy that Trump was a successful businessman rather than simply the spoiled scion of a real estate empire established by his much savvier father. Falsely claiming to be “the largest real estate developer in New York,” Trump relished the opportunity to intimidate contestants who had not been born with a silver spoon and the filial resources to survive multiple failures. In season 3, he asked contestant Michael Tarshi if he was stupid, called him “lazy,” and said that the difference between them was that Trump works hard. In a 2013 episode of Celebrity Apprentice, Trump remarked to the former Playmate Brande Roderick that “it must be a pretty picture, you dropping to your knees.”

Over the course of 15 seasons, plus another eight for its celebrity spin-off, The Apprentice projected exactly the image of Trump that he desired—an image that endures in the minds of many millions of Americans to this day. Sitting in his leather wingback chair at the head of a shiny wood table, spotlighted in the show’s otherwise dimly lit “boardroom,” he cut a physically and mentally imposing figure. Before The Apprentice, Trump had been a loud and obnoxious playboy, no doubt; arrogant, yes, but not quite imperious. The show made him into a kingly figure: all-powerful and all-knowing. (“Nobody outthinks me,” he said in one episode. “Nobody.”)

Hollow as it was, this omniscient-bully act played well on TV—which proved just as true in politics as in entertainment. In his 2016 run for president, Trump dispatched the Republican field by publicly belittling his opponents at every turn, then tried to do the same to Hillary Clinton. In their second debate, following the emergence of the infamous Access Hollywood tape, Trump brought along several of Bill Clinton’s accusers and sat them in the audience to intimidate his Democratic opponent. But that’s largely forgotten today because of what happened later that evening: He stalked Clinton around the stage as she spoke, his chin raised high, attempting to loom over her.

This imperial glare became his signature as president, or one of them. An even odder mannerism is his aggressive handshake, which, like a country club test of masculinity, often involves tugging the person’s hand toward him and refusing to let go. It has led to some rather awkward situations. There was the famed “Handshake Showdown” with the newly elected Emmanuel Macron, during which Trump sought, rather literally, to exert pressure on the French leader; more such handshakes would occur between the men over the years. Other world leaders have been subjected to this puerile charade, as well. There was the extra-long lock with the late Shinzo Abe of Japan, several deeply analyzed grips with former Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, and more recently his tug-of-war shake with the president of Paraguay, Santiago Peña.

These efforts seem silly, but Trump’s intimidation shtick can sometimes work, which is of course why he does it. During his first term, he continually pressed NATO allies to increase their defense funding. Recently they agreed to raise their military spending to 5 percent of their national income—a significant increase. His tariff threats may have been ridiculous and ultimately prove damaging, but they did lead to a series of deals as nations tried to avoid his wrath. While many educational institutions have fought back against his attempts to limit free speech on college campuses, some weak-willed and shortsighted universities, including Columbia, capitulated to him. Some of the country’s biggest law firms proved similarly weak-kneed.

More often than not, though, Trump’s intimidation act falls flat. This is largely because, despite the fact that so many alpha males see him as the top alpha—an image he continually promotes through nonsensical memes refashioning his flabby, overweight body as some sort of iron-fisted muscleman—in the end he’s all bark, no bite. Or, as some put it, Trump Always Chickens Out.

We see his true colors when it counts. During his infamous meeting with Vladimir Putin in Helsinki in 2018, Trump not only failed to confront the Russian dictator about his nation’s interference in our elections, but he practically kowtowed to him, stating that he trusted Putin more than our own intelligence agencies. In his second term, Trump’s been louder and more demanding than ever, with rarely a day going by without him spewing vitriol and threatening someone or some nation. But it’s hardly made a dent. He’s repeatedly threatened Jerome Powell for not lowering interest rates, even ordering his Justice Department to open a bogus investigation to put the screws on the Federal Reserve chair. But the Fed has refused to do his bidding. Trump tried to bully Denmark into ceding Greenland, yet that just made that nation more determined than ever to protect the territory. He’s also tried to bully Canada, repeatedly calling Trudeau a “governor” and threatening the current prime minister, Mark Carney, with closing the Gordie Howe International Bridge between Detroit and Windsor, Ontario. And he’s gotten bupkis.

No one’s buying Trump’s routine any longer, but this is not to say that he isn’t still dangerous. He is, very much so—not because he’s an iron-willed titan but because he’s a foolhardy buffoon. He’s never been tough enough to admit defeat, like a real man would, so he’ll go to great lengths to deny his losses and cover up for his failures.

We’ve seen this in his war with Iran. As the U.S. fails to meet Trump’s stated objectives there, he’ll continue moving the goalposts. Though he initially promised the Iranian people freedom, he’s abandoned that promise of late, suggesting that somehow that goal was already achieved, even though the Iranians remain under the thumb of a vicious theocracy. So, no regime change after all. What about “ensuring” Iran will never get a nuclear weapon? Iran still has its stockpile of enriched uranium. Meanwhile, the Strait of Hormuz, where maritime traffic flowed freely until the U.S. and Israel bombing campaign began on February 28, remains closed, and the global economic repercussions continue to worsen—indeed, the damage may be permanent.

Trump has given Iran a deadline of Tuesday night to reopen the strait. Otherwise, he wrote on Truth Social on Sunday, “you’ll be living in Hell—JUST WATCH!” At the White House on Monday he added, “The entire country could be taken out in one night, and that night might be tomorrow night.” But Iran’s leaders aren’t scared of Trump, and why should they be? He’s been giving such ultimatums and deadlines for weeks, to no avail. Iran has learned what’s now finally dawning on Americans, including even some Republicans in Congress: Trump’s will never matches his bluster, and his attempts at intimidation are merely the hallmarks of a weak, insecure, and overcompensating coward.

 

Break Now, Fix Later What a ballroom can tell us about the future Ed Elson Apr 7 Here’s a question for you: What was last week’s most important headline? Was it Trump’s address to the nation (where he told us nothing)? Was it the jobs report (which will likely be revised down)? Was it the firing of Pam Bondi (who’ll likely be replaced by someone worse)? No. Last week’s most important headline was something else. Per The Wall Street Journal: JUDGE HALTS CONSTRUCTION OF TRUMP’S WHITE HOUSE BALLROOM. We’ll get to why this matters in a moment. But first, a quick refresher on this ballroom. Last summer, President Trump announced plans to build a 90,000 square-foot ballroom for a proposed budget of $200 million. (That budget has since doubled.) In order to do this he needed to demolish the East Wing, a historic portion of the White House complex that was built more than a hundred years ago. This was a controversial decision that required permission from Congress, however Trump didn’t seek any permissions and tore down the East Wing anyway, giving rise to one of the most iconic and disturbing images in recent memory. That was the East Wing seven months ago. Fast-forward to today, the structure remains obliterated, a giant crater in the middle of our nation’s most historic site. It’s an unpleasant sight, but one we assumed was temporary … until last week. A federal judge ruled the ballroom project unconstitutional, which means the ballroom may never get built — but more importantly, the East Wing will remain in ruins for the foreseeable future. This matters for historic, ceremonial, and architectural reasons obviously, but also for a more profound reason. The ballroom has become a metaphor for the President’s entire approach to policymaking. It is the mirror image of every major executive decision that has reverberated across economies, markets, and borders. It’s U.S. policy, if U.S. policy were a building. I have a name for this strategy. I call it BNFL: “Break Now, Fix Later.” It describes the President’s tendency to break things (often old and historic), promise to build something “bigger” and “better” in their place, until he realizes he doesn’t actually have the wherewithal (or the constitutional authority) to get it done — at which point he becomes bored and moves onto the next shiny object. The end result is that “the builder” never actually builds anything, but mostly just destroys things. Break Now, Fix Later. As we shall see, BNFL describes almost every important decision the President has ever made — and it may help us predict those he’ll make in the future as well. Iran Let’s start with the crisis du jour: Iran. It’s still not entirely clear why we invaded Iran. Supposedly it’s because Iran’s nuclear capabilities had grown significantly, even though he literally told us last summer that they were obliterated. Either way, the general idea was that Iran posed an “imminent threat” due to its belligerent regime led by Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei. The solution, then, was obvious: Install a new regime. Indeed, Trump said regime change would be the “best thing that could happen.” As with the ballroom, the regime change operation kicked off by tearing things down. The U.S. launched more than 12,000 airstrikes on Iran, hitting 11,000 targets and more than 150 vessels. It also (according to preliminary investigations) destroyed a girls’ elementary school, killing over a hundred children in the process. Trump quickly swept those details aside and hailed the successful assassination of Ayatollah Khamenei that brought the murderous dictator’s regime to an end. A few days later, we learned who’d be running the new regime: the dictator’s son. Yes, the Iranian succession plan went exactly according to script — only instead of the 86-year-old Ayatollah dying of natural causes (which was already imminent), he was assassinated by the nation’s sworn enemy. So not only did we not install a more friendly regime, we made the existing regime even angrier and more radical. Soon after Khamenei Jr. was installed into power, Trump arrived at the “fix later” part of the operation. The “goal has been attained” he said. “We’ll be leaving very soon … within two weeks.” Few believe his new timeline after he blew the first one. But what’s more important is the sentiment: The operation was more tiring and complex than he bargained for — he’s over the whole Iran thing. A trail of destruction is left in his wake. Not just in terms of lives (nearly 4,000 and counting) but the economy too. U.S. gas prices have risen more than 30%. In Europe, they’re up more than 50%. Fertilizer prices, an essential input cost for food, have risen nearly 50%. Construction material prices are ballooning, which will lead to even higher housing costs. Investors went from expecting multiple rate cuts this year to expecting a rate hike, and recession odds have risen almost 10%. As I wrote a couple weeks ago, this war is making all of us poorer. In sum: lots got broken and nothing got fixed. Tariffs The same pattern played out last year in what has become Trump’s most defining policy: tariffs. On Liberation Day, Trump invoked the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to authorize the largest tariff hike on foreign imports in nearly a century in an attempt to rein in the trade deficit. Many of our closest allies were blindsided with tariff rates as high as 50%. He even tariffed the Heard and McDonald Islands, a territory inhabited by only seals and penguins. Chaos immediately ensued. The S&P 500 sold off nearly 10% – its largest weekly drop since the pandemic. $5 trillion in market value was erased. As Trump started to ease and pause tariffs, markets recovered — but supply chains didn’t. Nearly a third of all sea shipments were cancelled immediately. As import costs rose, companies began to pass those costs onto their customers. Within a few months inflation was ripping upward again, as nearly 80% of the tariff burden was funneling down to the consumer. The financial loss for the average American household was estimated to be nearly $2,000. Things got even stupider when the Supreme Court determined in February that the tariffs were illegal. This wasn’t a difficult decision: Trump had falsely claimed emergency powers and levied a tax on Americans without congressional approval. As our founding father James Madison put it, “Congress alone has access to the pockets of the people.” The U.S. government must now return the $160 billion it had collected over the course of the tariff saga. (In other words, this was all for nothing.) Ironically, despite bearing the majority of the costs, consumers won’t see a penny back as they did not directly pay the tariffs themselves. So not only did we not get anything done, we also set back American households even further. #BNFL. DOGE A major component of the Trump 2.0 agenda was to reduce wasteful government spending. The goal was, in Trump’s words, “to do what has not been done in 24 years: balance the budget.” So he created the “Department of Government Efficiency” and employed Elon Musk to get it done. Within days it was clear how Elon and Trump had a shared passion for blowing things up. They immediately ripped up thousands of contracts, fired more than 200,000 government workers, and fed an entire agency known as USAID “into the wood chipper.” It’s estimated the elimination of USAID (which specialized in foreign assistance) will lead to nearly 10 million preventable deaths over the next four years. A high price, but a price they were willing to pay. That was until DOGE got shut down. After a highly predictable falling-out between the President and Mr. Musk, the agency was quietly dissolved and its employees let go. The department said it saved $215 billion. Independent analyses have concluded the real number was a fraction of that, but for simplicity’s sake we’ll go with it. On their own terms those results were underwhelming: Elon’s original projection was $2 trillion. It wouldn’t be a true BNFL, however, if Trump didn’t actively make matters worse — and in the case of government efficiency, that’s exactly what he did. Right as Elon was cancelling spending plans, Trump was building a new one: the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which would prove to be one of the largest government expenditures in American history. The bill both reduced revenues and increased spending, loading up our government with an additional $850 billion in expected interest payments, and adding an estimated $4.2 trillion to our national debt over the next decade. There is literally no bill less efficient than this, which begs the obvious question: What was DOGE even for? Take Your Pick So far we’ve reviewed three major policy decisions, each of which were quintessentially BNFL, but let’s be clear, there have been plenty more. For example: Promising (threatening) to “take” Greenland, thus ruining our relationships with NATO allies, only to get distracted and ultimately reverse the decision on the global stage. Pressuring the Fed Chair to cut rates (and threatening to fire him), which eventually raised yields as investors priced in the danger of an un-independent Federal Reserve, only to walk back his comments and let Powell play out the rest of his term. Pursuing greater energy independence with “Drill, Baby, Drill” policies, which actually just meant gutting clean energy programs, which backfired when we spiked oil prices with yet another war in the Middle East making us even more in need of renewable energy than we already were. Like the ballroom, each policy starts with a grand vision that could feasibly be framed as a net positive for society but is soon followed by a cynical fit of destruction. Then, once it’s time to actually build the thing, the circumstances suddenly change and it’s no longer possible. The strategy amounts to annihilation. It’s “move fast and break things,” minus the innovation. Two Interpretations There are two ways to interpret the BNFL strategy. One reading is that he’s simply in over his head. After all, it’s easier to break things than to make things. To build anything worthwhile, you have to invest time and effort, you have to achieve a consensus, you have to pay attention to detail, and the President has no interest in any of these things. There’s also a darker interpretation, however, and although I don’t necessarily believe it, I think it would be unwise to rule it out. That reading is the following: Maybe he genuinely only wants to destroy things. Maybe this systematic pattern of destruction is actually by design, and his promises to build things anew are in fact lies designed to conceal his thirst for destruction. That would make him a psychopath, sure, and psychopaths are rare. At the same time, though, the probability that a series of policies would all lead to the same destructive end by accident is … equally rare. Again, I’m not saying I believe this interpretation. I’m just saying it’s possible. Artemis I’ve struggled to write this, as every time I try to type my mind returns to Artemis II. More specifically, it returns to the mission’s recent image of Earth, which will go down as one of the most iconic images ever. The image is a reminder that to build anything worthwhile takes time. It took nearly a decade of planning to send these astronauts into space. The astronauts themselves prepared for this specific mission for more than three years. The operation didn’t just involve them, but the coordinated efforts of tens of thousands of people. Nothing this hard could ever get done without collaboration and planning. In a way, it’s the opposite of BNFL. Build now, fix … forever. A stark contrast to the image with which this post began. See you next week,

NEW INC. MAGAZINE COLUMN FROM HOWARD TULLMAN

 

What No One Tells You About Life After Work (and Why Your Old Playbook Won’t Save You)

Your post-employment days are likely to be much longer than you might think.

EXPERT OPINION BY HOWARD TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH INVESTORS @HOWARDTULLMAN1

Apr 7, 2026

 

One of the great quotes from the writer and podcaster Gretchen Rubin is that “the days are long, but the years are short.” Every day may seem like a dreary Sisyphean struggle, but then one day you wake up and you’re carrying a cardboard box of your belongings out of the building and on your way to whatever’s next. Whether you want to admit it or not, for millions of us, retirement—whether voluntary or otherwise—is much closer than we imagine and now’s the time to start thinking about it.

I’m not talking about anything relating to financial matters, buying cheap life insurance, or whether it’s wise to have a will. You can see ads for those concerns everywhere you look. I’m talking about making some plans and decisions about how you’re going to spend your post-employment days which—in somewhat of a mixed blessing way—are likely to be much longer than you might think.

For better or worse, we’re living much longer these days, although the quality of life in those bonus “golden” years is an entirely different question. This longevity is largely because we’re paying much more attention to our diets, we’re exercising more regularly, the meds and medical treatments available to keep us alive are far more powerful and effective, and only the morons are still smoking and/or drinking too much.

Having lived through this transitional process several times and talked with dozens of others who are similarly situated, I have a few ideas and suggestions, warnings and words of encouragement, and other observations which I hope will be of value to you as you start to give some serious thought to an increasingly uncertain and challenging future.

First of all, try to avoid squandering your savings, severance and social security payments (such as they may soon be) on a startup or in buying a quaint neighborhood business that you’ve always liked and frequented. You may think you’re ready to roll up your sleeves, do whatever it takes, and jump back into the game, but the game has changed radically in many ways and you’re most likely not up to the task. And if my list of perils isn’t persuasive enough, try filling out a loan application or a new credit card app and putting the words “unemployed” or “retired” on the form. The word “retired” on a loan app is like a bright red stop sign for lenders—even at your own bank—and the pitiful excuses they give you are even more depressing.

Second, don’t try to teach anyone younger than 35 anything. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a bunch of high school kids who really don’t care, college students who simply can’t be bothered, or MBAs in grad school who think they already know everything. You probably don’t have the patience to deal with their lack of patience, the thick skin to deal with their arrogance, or the disposition to put up with their indifference and laziness. Worse yet, if you try to instill a little rigor or discipline, it’s like walking on eggshells among a bunch of snowflakes. It turns out too often that you’re the nasty ogre who just doesn’t get it. Teaching exec education courses is a slightly safer path, but even there no one is really interested in paying a ton of money to hear you rehash your old war stories.

Third, don’t expect or try to replace your prior earnings. That’s a pipe dream. It’s an employers’ market and there are dozens of over-qualified and out-of-work candidates chasing the same slots and opportunities. Sadly, it’s often a race to the bottom in terms of salary or other compensation and it rarely includes health insurance or other fringe benefits. It takes an especially strong stomach to settle for something which you regard as beneath your abilities and experience and it’s even more painful when you end up reporting to supervisors and managers who may be younger than your own grown kids.

Fourth, most of your technical skills are going to be regarded as anchors to the past rather than valuable tools. Look for jobs that take advantage of your negotiating experience, social skills, and storytelling ability. These may be the most satisfying positions anyway because you won’t be spending your days in a race trying to catch up with constant technological changes and dealing with patronizing nerds who are half your age.

Fifth, get comfortable with answering the omnipresent question: what are you doing now? Men and women who have worked hard and successfully for decades have a great deal of difficulty answering this inquiry without being embarrassed in one way or another. If you’ve retired after 40 or 50 years, be proud of that and understand that it’s perfectly fine to say either that you’re doing “nothing” or that you’re “looking” for what’s next. You’ve earned a break and some time off and there’s nothing to be ashamed of or any obligation on your part to be rushing around trying to get back in the saddle.

And finally, remember that it’s a great time to get back in touch with your kids, grandkids, and old friends you haven’t seen lately. You never know how much time you have left and no one’s kids ever said, “we wish he’d spent more time at the office.”