Trump's niece says the way he was raised left him 'utterly incapable of leading this country'
President Trump grew up in a family with so many issues that it left him "utterly incapable of leading this country, and it's dangerous to allow him to do so," his niece, Mary Trump, told ABC News' George Stephanopoulos on Tuesday.
Mary Trump's tell-all, Too Much and Never Enough: How My Family Created the World's Most Dangerous Man, was released on Tuesday. She is a clinical psychologist, and describes her grandfather, Fred Trump Sr., as being a "sociopath," telling Stephanopoulos he was "incredibly driven in a way that turned other people, including his children [and] wife, into pawns to be used to his own ends."
It is impossible, Mary Trump added, "to know who Donald might have been under different circumstances and with different parents." After her grandfather died in 1999, Mary Trump learned that he had almost entirely cut her and her brother out of his will. They filed a lawsuit, and she told Stephanopoulos in order to "cause us more pain and make us more desperate," her aunts and uncles canceled the health insurance they received through Fred Trump Sr.'s company. The siblings reached a settlement in 2001, but she said it wasn't a fair one.
The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
Mary Trump also shared that she visited her uncle in the White House a few months after he was inaugurated, and he "already seemed very strained by the pressures. He'd never been in a situation before where he wasn't entirely protected from criticism or accountability or things like that." Stephanopoulos asked her what she would say to him if they spoke today, and Mary Trump responded, "Resign."
A free daily email with the biggest news stories of the day – and the best features from TheWeek.com
Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.
-
A fentanyl vaccine may be on the horizonUnder the radar Taking a serious jab at the opioid epidemic
-
The 8 best comedy TV series of 2025the week recommends From quarterlife crises to Hollywood satires, these were the funniest shows of 2025
-
Codeword: December 16, 2025The daily codeword puzzle from The Week
-
Senate votes down ACA subsidies, GOP alternativeSpeed Read The Senate rejected the extension of Affordable Care Act tax credits, guaranteeing a steep rise in health care costs for millions of Americans
-
Abrego García freed from jail on judge’s orderSpeed Read The wrongfully deported man has been released from an ICE detention center
-
Indiana Senate rejects Trump’s gerrymander pushSpeed Read The proposed gerrymander would have likely flipped the state’s two Democratic-held US House seats
-
Democrat files to impeach RFK Jr.Speed Read Rep. Haley Stevens filed articles of impeachment against Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.
-
$1M ‘Trump Gold Card’ goes live amid travel rule furorSpeed Read The new gold card visa offers an expedited path to citizenship in exchange for $1 million
-
US seizes oil tanker off VenezuelaSpeed Read The seizure was a significant escalation in the pressure campaign against Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro
-
Judge orders release of Ghislaine Maxwell recordsSpeed Read The grand jury records from the 2019 prosecution of convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein will be made public
-
Miami elects first Democratic mayor in 28 yearsSpeed Read Eileen Higgins, Miami’s first woman mayor, focused on affordability and Trump’s immigration crackdown in her campaign
