Season 2017 Episode 1 | 55m 17s | Video has closed captioning.
FRONTLINE examines the key moments that shaped President-elect Donald Trump. Interviews drawn from The Choice 2016 with advisors, business associates and biographers reveal how Trump transformed himself from real estate developer to reality TV star to president.
Aired: 05/08/17
>> We will make America great again.
>> Tonight on Frontline, the man who will be president.
>> The way the game got played in his household was if you did not win, you lost.
>> The moments that shaped him... >> His lawyer taught Donald how to come out punching, how to use lawsuits like machine gun bullets.
>> The battles he's fought... >> As quickly as the banks loved him, that's as quick as they saw him as a pariah.
>> And the battle he won.
>> Donald Trump was somehow finding a way to connect with the people who mattered at that moment.
>> Tonight, drawing on Frontline's critically acclaimed film "The Choice"-- "President Trump."
>> NARRATOR: On election night 2016, Donald Trump watched as his world suddenly changed.
>> You see in these pictures Donald Trump sort of wearily and warily looking at the screen.
And he looks like someone who can't actually believe that he's winning.
>> Donald Trump will be the 45th president of the United States.
>> Impossible political upset to become the president-elect... >> NARRATOR: It was an historic upset for a political outsider.
>> I pledge to every citizen of our land that I will be president for all Americans.
>> NARRATOR: And it was a moment of vindication for a candidate who had climbed back from a bitter public humiliation.
>> We're talking about the White House Correspondents' Dinner tonight.
>> Donald Trump has been invited.
>> NARRATOR: It happened in April 2011, at one of Washington, D.C.'s most glamorous nights.
>> Annual White House Correspondents' Dinner, the event... (din of crowd) >> I got to talk to Donald as we were going to our seats, and he was in just such a great mood, and he was very jovial, and people were taking pictures.
It was very exciting that Donald was there.
>> Donald, over here!
>> NARRATOR: Trump's invitation to the exclusive gathering came after weeks of attacking President Barack Obama on television.
>> You are not allowed to be a president if you're not born in this country.
He may not have been born in this country.
But there's something on that birth certificate, maybe religion, maybe it says he's a Muslim, I don't know, maybe he doesn't want that, or he may not have one.
But I will tell you this: if he wasn't born in this country, it's one of the great scams of all time.
>> Absolutely.
>> NARRATOR: But that night, in front of Washington's journalists, politicians, and powerbrokers, Obama would hit back.
>> President Obama takes the microphone.
>> All right, everybody, please have a seat.
Donald Trump is here tonight!
>> And proceeds to filet Donald publicly.
>> No one is happier, no one is prouder to put this birth certificate matter to rest than the Donald.
And that's because he can finally get back to focusing on the issues that matter, like did we fake the moon landing?
>> I was sitting 20 feet from him, and just the look of discomfort on his face.
>> What really happened in Roswell?
And where are Biggie and Tupac?
>> Donald's face was so incredibly serious.
It was so incredibly just...
He just put on a poker face.
>> I was two tables away from Trump.
The conventional way in Washington of absorbing a joke at the White House Correspondents' Dinner is to keep your chin up and at least pretend to have a sense of humor about it, even if you go cry into your pillow that night.
Trump was steaming.
His face was all locked in, he was not having a good time.
>> All kidding aside, obviously, we all know about your credentials and breadth of experience.
(laughter) For example... No, seriously, just recently, in an episode of Celebrity Apprentice, at the steakhouse, the men's cooking team did not impress the judges from Omaha Steaks.
And there was a lot of blame to go around.
But you, Mr. Trump, recognized that the real problem was a lack of leadership.
And so, ultimately, you didn't blame Lil' Jon or Meatloaf.
You fired Gary Busey.
And these are the kind of decisions that would keep me up at night.
(laughter) >> And he's being treated like a piñata by the president of the United States.
And I think he felt humiliated.
(applause) >> Well handled, sir.
Well handled.
>> But it just kept going and going, and he just kept hammering him.
And I thought, "Oh, Barack Obama is starting something that I don't know if he'll be able to finish."
>> Say what you will about Mr. Trump, he certainly would bring some change to the White House.
Let's see what we've got up there.
>> Donald dreads humiliation and he dreads shame.
And this is why he often attempts to humiliate and shame other people.
So in the case of the president ridiculing him, I think this was intolerable for Donald Trump.
>> I think that is the night that he resolves to run for president.
I think that he is kind of motivated by it.
"Maybe I'll just run.
Maybe I'll show them all."
>> Every critic, every detractor will have to bow down to President Trump.
It's everyone who's ever doubted Donald, who ever disagreed, who ever challenged him.
It is the ultimate revenge to become the most powerful man in the universe.
>> God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America.
>> Donald Trump's fantasy was to be the guy who takes the key to the Oval Office from Barack Obama's hand in 2017.
And it's personal.
This is a burning, personal need that he has to redeem himself from being humiliated by the first black president.
>> This is New York, a miracle city, a city of tall buildings, narrow, dark streets, magnificent parks... >> NARRATOR: Back in the 1940s... >> The borough of Queens, occupying part of Long Island... >> NARRATOR: Just across the East River from Manhattan... >> A municipally operated electrical railway system spreads through four of the five boroughs... >> NARRATOR: ...Donald Trump grew up in a posh suburb called Jamaica Estates.
>> It's perhaps typical of New York's residential areas.
>> The Trump family had a huge house in Queens that they used to refer to as "Tara."
It had nine bedrooms, it had columns, it was quite beautiful, but it was in Queens.
>> NARRATOR: The Trump family would spend 50 years building memories here.
Fred Trump, a real estate developer, designed the house himself and raised Donald and his brothers and sisters in luxury.
>> It's not like he knew anything but comfort.
When it rained and he had to deliver his papers, the chauffeur would take him around.
>> NARRATOR: But Donald's father was tough and insisted everyone learn the family business.
>> He was a guy who worked seven days a week.
It's Sunday-- why wouldn't you be working?
And would, even on the weekends, pile the kids in the car and go to a building site, pick up old nails that weren't used.
Why would you waste a nail?
>> Fred Trump was a machine.
I mean, he was a human machine.
He was driven beyond whatever the description of driven could ever mean.
And when you look at the picture of Fred and you look at Donald, you see the great resemblance between the two.
And when you think about Fred's energy, you see how it is channeled through Donald.
>> NARRATOR: Fred was seen as passionate about the business, but not warm with his children.
>> Cold-- he was not a warm person.
I see his father at the beach, even, with a suit and a tie and a hat, a clipped, very kind of military mustache, and simply being... correct.
>> NARRATOR: Fred had theories.
He shared them with his kids.
Donald especially liked one of them.
>> This is a very deep part of the Trump story.
The family subscribes to a racehorse theory of human development.
They believe that there are superior people, and that if you put together the genes of a superior woman and a superior man, you get a superior offspring.
>> NARRATOR: Fred's other theory: life was a competition.
There were winners and there were losers.
He called the winners "killers."
>> The way the game got played in his household was: if you did not win, you lost.
And losing was you got crushed.
Losing was you didn't matter.
Losing was you were nothing.
>> NARRATOR: Donald took the lessons to heart-- always tried to be the winner.
But he was also a handful.
>> His brother, Robert, who's very discreet, told me that Donald was always the kid in the family who would start throwing birthday cake at all the parties, that you would build up a tower of blocks, he would come knock your blocks down.
>> This is the person he's been, I think, since he was five years old.
Donald told me that he is essentially the person he was in first grade and that he hasn't really changed.
>> His self-definition was built around the idea that he was one tough son of a bitch.
That meant in classrooms, that meant with teachers, that meant with his father.
>> NARRATOR: By the seventh grade, even Fred had had it with Donald's mischief.
He sent him up the Hudson River just a few miles from West Point to the toughest boarding school he could find-- the New York Military Academy.
(drumline performing) >> You have to think of this 13-year-old kid who's lived a very comfortable life, but then all of a sudden, he's the one child of five to be banished to this austere life.
Goodbye, luxury.
Goodbye, Mom and Dad, brothers and sisters.
Hello, drill sergeant.
>> NARRATOR: The New York Military Academy was no-nonsense, heavy on the discipline; over the years, home to the children of gangster John Gotti and Cuban dictator Fulgencio Batista.
>> It was a very austere, very scary place.
I was homesick.
I was crying hysterically.
In fact, I was crying so much the first couple of nights, they put me in the infirmary.
>> We were in a culture of hazing at the military school.
Everyone...
I mean, that's just the way it was.
>> You got hit, you may have gotten slammed against the wall, you got put artificially into fights.
>> NARRATOR: But the rough-and-tumble didn't seem to bother Donald.
He thrived.
>> He liked it.
Apparently he really liked it.
He liked the accountability.
He liked the kind of clarity of it.
And he liked that there was a medal and a prize for everything.
>> NARRATOR: He was a star athlete.
He claimed he could have played pro baseball.
But his classmates agree he was proudest of winning the ultimate accolade in an all-boys school.
He was named "ladies' man" in the school yearbook.
Hugh Hefner, the publisher of Playboy, was a role model for many of the boys.
>> Yeah, you know, he had a very Hugh Hefner, Playboy magazine view of success.
>> NARRATOR: The young cadets learned a lot from Playboy magazine and what they called "barracks talk."
>> In fact, our biggest advice in our lives came from Playboy magazine.
That's how we learned about women.
So that was all of my adolescence.
And that's why getting out of military school was difficult.
You had to realize that you couldn't just follow the Playboy philosophy.
>> NARRATOR: They would graduate and grow up.
But Donald's classmates say in some ways, he hasn't changed at all.
>> The things that we talked about at that time in 1964 really are very close to the kind of way he talks now.
I hear these echoes of the barracks life that we had and that we grew out of.
>> ♪ You can tell by the way I use my walk... ♪ >> NARRATOR: By the early 1970s, Trump had graduated from college.
He headed out of Queens and into Manhattan.
>> From the very first time I met Trump, I thought of "Saturday Night Fever" and Travolta.
>> ♪ Whether you're a brother or whether you're a mother ♪ ♪ You're stayin' alive... ♪ >> He was the kid who grew up as an outsider to where the real action was.
♪ Ah, ah, ah, ah.
♪ And he was acutely aware of it.
♪ Ah, ah, ah, ah.
♪ He always had his eye on what he thought was a glamorous, Hollywood-ish life, and that was the life of Manhattan.
>> I think if you had to pick sort of three stereotypes that are probably constantly tap-dancing in Donald's mind and in his imagination of himself, it's Clint Eastwood, James Bond, and Hugh Hefner.
>> He's really spreading his wings when he comes to Manhattan.
Well, I think he's having the time of his life.
He's a bachelor-- he's an eligible bachelor.
>> NARRATOR: He frequented the city's hottest places.
He met Nikki Haskell, the host of an underground cable show about the party scene.
>> When I saw Donald, nobody knew who he was.
He was just a young, very aggressive, smart boy.
A hotshot, so to speak, someone that had big dreams, and that's what this town is built on.
>> Hi, what's going on?
>> NARRATOR: During the day, he worked hard to do something his father never did-- break into Manhattan real estate.
>> He's a kid who wants to figure out how to make deals, to figure out how to establish a presence for himself in Manhattan.
And he's right to believe that that's not easy to do.
>> NARRATOR: He needed a mentor.
He found one in Roy Cohn, the notorious New York lawyer.
>> Well, he was savage.
Cohn had an incredible reputation for being a tough, tough guy.
>> The scene is Washington and the Senate Investigating Subcommittee.
Mr. Cohn, his friend and aide, was present with Senator McCarthy to answer accusations.
>> NARRATOR: Cohn had become famous during the McCarthy hearings, a witch hunt that accused Americans of communist sympathies.
>> He delighted in the fact that he had ruined so many lives in the McCarthy era.
>> There is detailed testimony of that in the record, Mr. Chairman, of Levitsky's association, close personal association with Julius Rosenberg over a period of years.
>> Roy Cohn humiliated people.
He made up things.
He had no morals.
You couldn't even say that he had the morals of a snake.
He had no morals.
He had no moral center.
>> Everyone knows the most famous legal eagle, my pal and yours, Roy Cohn.
>> Good evening, Nikki.
How are you?
>> Roy was like a street guy.
You know, he was like, "Punch.
You punch me, I'll punch you."
And I think he made Donald very confrontational.
And I think you had that sort of "tough guy, don't take any kind of bull(bleep) from anybody" kind of an attitude.
And I think a lot of that, you know, he instilled in Donald.
>> And in his drawer, he had a picture of Roy, and it was a grainy black-and-white picture, and Roy looked like the devil.
And he would pull it out and he would say, "This is my lawyer.
"If we can't make an agreement, this is who you're going to be dealing with."
>> NARRATOR: In 1973, Trump hired Cohn to defend him and his father.
They had been sued by the federal government for discriminating against black renters looking for apartments in their buildings.
>> The lawsuit revealed that Trump agents allegedly were writing down "C" for colored or "Number 9" to indicate a black prospective tenant, and those people were often turned away.
>> And Trump asked him for advice: "What do I do?
Do I settle?"
And Roy Cohn said, "Never settle."
Roy Cohn said, "You need to fight back harder than they ever hit you."
>> NARRATOR: At a press conference and in court filings, Trump and Cohn claimed they were the victims.
>> He comes right back with a $100 million lawsuit, which was filed by Roy Cohn.
And that was Roy Cohn's signature kind of thing.
>> Roy Cohn taught Donald how to come out punching, how to use lawsuits like machine gun bullets, and take a no-prisoners approach to City Hall, to your business opponents, to anyone else who might get in your way.
And I think Donald reveled in that.
>> NARRATOR: But with damning evidence of racial discrimination, the company was forced to settle.
Nevertheless, Trump didn't admit any wrongdoing and even declared the outcome a victory.
>> This is a classic example of where Trump begins to demonstrate something he talks about all the time today, which is he's a counter-puncher.
So somebody comes after him and says that he's done something nefarious and horrible, and he just goes back at them with all guns blazing.
You know, "Boom, boom, boom!"
And admits nothing.
Never admit anything.
Never say you made a mistake.
Just keep coming.
And if you lose, declare victory.
And that's exactly what happened there.
He lost as clearly as you can lose, but he loudly proclaimed his victory.
>> NARRATOR: The controversy didn't diminish Trump's ambitions to leave his mark on Manhattan.
He had been searching for the perfect location.
>> And Donald came upon this site, which had the Bonwit Teller building on it.
It was kind of a landmark building.
It was next door to Tiffany's.
He loved it.
>> NARRATOR: It was to be called Trump Tower-- 58 stories of high-end retail and high-priced condominiums.
A chance for Donald to finally surpass his father.
To oversee the project, Trump surprised the construction world-- he put a woman in charge.
>> He said that I would be his representative and act sort of like a Donna Trump, he said, calling me a "killer."
I would be in charge of everything that would normally come to him.
>> NARRATOR: The men's world of unions and subcontractors in New York had never seen it before.
>> Donald told me that he thought that men were better than women, especially in this field, but he said a good woman is better than ten good men.
I think he believed that women had to prove themselves more than men, so a good woman would work harder.
>> NARRATOR: Res kept the contractors in line, and executive vice president Louise Sunshine handled the sales.
>> He hired the right people to help him, myself being one of them.
And we got the job done.
>> Look at my next guest.
This is a reporter on Wall Street.
This is what he has in mind... >> NARRATOR: And Trump personally took care of the marketing.
>> Donald Trump, as I say, is just 33 years old.
He now has an apartment for sale in a new Trump building called the Trump Tower, one floor of it, $11 million all together.
You're worth all this money.
You say you didn't say that you want to be worth a billion dollars.
>> No, I really am not looking to make tremendous amounts of money.
I'm looking to enjoy my life, and if that happens to go with it, that's fabulous.
>> NARRATOR: And to help sell the apartments, Trump had a novel idea-- he inflated the floor numbers.
His 58-story building became a 68-story building.
>> How he got away with that, I'm not sure, but he did, and it made a lot of sense in his mind because if you're renting a room, you'd rather be on the 14th floor than on the sixth floor.
In his mind, having an apartment, the higher the apartment was, the better it would look.
>> NARRATOR: In his autobiography, written with author Tony Schwartz, Trump would call it "truthful hyperbole."
>> "People want to believe that something is the biggest "and the greatest and the most spectacular.
I call it truthful hyperbole."
>> I came up with the phrase "truthful hyperbole," and of course it's a ridiculous term because there is no such thing as truthful hyperbole, but it's kind of a winning phrase.
It really does capture a way in which he sees the world.
The truth doesn't mean much to Donald Trump.
>> In the time that I was reporting on him, his lawyer said to me, "Donald is a believer "that if you repeat something enough, people will start to believe it."
>> Its opening party was one to end them all.
Guests, thousands of them, mingled... >> NARRATOR: And at its grand opening, the marketing, the publicity, paid off.
>> ♪ Whoo-hoo!
♪ ♪ This is your celebration.
♪ >> It's Donald Trump constructed out of marble and brass.
That's what Trump Tower is.
It's him.
You know, it's bold, it's big, it's polished, and it's highly marketed.
>> Trump Tower made him.
It was a moment where glitz took over New York, and Donald embodied that glitz.
>> NARRATOR: By his side, his wife, Ivana Zelnícková, a model.
>> And that was one of the first times he really got a taste of real celebrity.
And Donald Trump is a man who thrives in the spotlight.
Outside of the spotlight, I think he feels diminished.
>> NARRATOR: He had succeeded.
Trump Tower was a reality.
He had proof he was a winner, but not in everyone's eyes.
>> There is an old money elite in Manhattan that has never accepted Donald.
He was considered, I think, loud and obnoxious and too self-centered and ill-mannered and not someone who fit in.
And so I think this is where Donald's resentment of the elite comes from.
>> NARRATOR: As Donald and Ivana moved into a penthouse on the top three floors of Trump Tower, something was missing.
>> He doesn't have a lot of friends, but how can somebody in his position have friends?
How do you trust anyone that, you know, isn't working for you?
What do they want out of you?
It's very difficult, it's very lonely at the top, and he is the epitome of loneliness at the top.
>> NARRATOR: But Trump's celebrity was rising.
(TV theme song playing) >> It's another dazzling Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, your password to the last word in money-no-object adventure and excitement!
>> NARRATOR: On television, he was becoming a symbol of business success.
He claimed he was a billionaire.
>> Welcome to the world according to Trump, the billionaire builder with a big bang approach who dared to autograph the Manhattan skyline.
>> NARRATOR: He was now determined to make "Trump" a household name all over America.
He began with a legendary buying spree.
>> Banks were lining up to give him money, and they would beat each other on terms to provide money to him.
He was spending money like a drunken sailor.
He buys a giant yacht that he doesn't really enjoy at all.
>> NARRATOR: There was an airline.
>> He bought the Trump Shuttle from bankrupt Eastern Airlines, had no idea how to run an airline.
>> Donald Trump, the biggest casino owner... >> NARRATOR: Then he built a gambling empire in Atlantic City-- two casinos and a hotel.
(crowd cheering) Then, the iconic Plaza Hotel in New York City.
>> It did seem out of control and possibly even pathological.
Casino after casino after casino after casino.
Hotels, yacht.
Everywhere he turned, another big piece of real estate here, another big piece of real estate there.
>> NARRATOR: By the late 1980s, Donald Trump's ambition pushed him into uncharted territory-- presidential politics.
>> The signs of power and opulence in place, Donald Trump's personal helicopter descended onto this small airfield, greeted by a one-man "Trump for President" bandwagon.
>> I arranged for the Portsmouth, New Hampshire, Chamber of Commerce to invite him for a luncheon speech.
And a local Portsmouth city councilman named Mike Dunbar forms the first known Draft Trump for President Committee.
>> NARRATOR: Trump's political advisor Roger Stone was a longtime associate of Roy Cohn.
>> In truth, I don't think he was ever serious about running in 1988.
I think he liked the publicity, he liked the notoriety.
It was great media.
>> What I want is I want extreme competence.
I want strength and extreme competence, and you need a combination of both, but I want strength and extreme competence at the helm of this country.
>> NARRATOR: In one speech after another, Trump's political message was simple and direct.
>> I am personally tired of seeing this great country of ours being ripped off and really decimated and hurt badly by so many foreign nations that are supposedly our allies.
>> "NATO's ripping us off.
"Why are we paying for this?
"Why don't the Japanese pay for themselves?
"Why don't all our allies, they're rich now, "why don't they pay for themselves?
"Trade, we're getting taken to the cleaners in these trade deals."
So he's already formulating his views as early as '88.
>> Thank you, bye.
>> NARRATOR: He loved the attention, and even began to insert himself into controversial issues in New York City.
>> It is the ages of the accused, 14 to 17 years old, and the horror of their alleged crimes that has caused a furor.
A woman jogging in New York's Central Park last Wednesday night, raped and nearly beaten to death.
>> What happened in Central Park was a violation to him, and he felt it keenly and he had a deep emotional reaction to it, and so he lashed out.
>> He took out a full-page ad after the Central Park jogger case and said, "The kids who did this should be executed.
"This is terrible.
They're beasts, animals."
>> You better believe that I hate the people that took this girl and raped her brutally.
You better believe it.
And it's more than anger, it's hatred.
And I want society to hate them.
>> The unstated text of this was, because they were five minority kids who brutalized a white woman in Central Park and everybody's outraged about it.
And they're different from us, and so we need to treat them with the severest methods possible.
>> NARRATOR: The five young men spent years in prison, but were later exonerated when the actual rapist admitted his guilt.
>> But Donald Trump never apologized.
He didn't want to admit he was wrong, and to this day he has not apologized for the statements he made at the time.
>> NARRATOR: But for Trump, his television rage had made his celebrity bigger than ever, and talk of President Trump had begun.
>> I don't believe that Trump himself felt that he was running for president, but once the notion got stirred up in him, it never went away.
>> NARRATOR: He had fame and success, but in the early 1990s, Donald Trump's life was about to fall apart.
>> The rumors began that he had a girl and so forth, and I was being bombarded with these stories.
>> NARRATOR: Liz Smith was a well-known gossip columnist in newspapers and on television.
Smith kept a close eye on Donald and Ivana.
>> Ivana was totally fixated on Donald.
I heard all these things: that she had tried to please him and gone away and had her breasts augmented and a face lift.
>> NARRATOR: But now there was another woman-- 26-year-old Marla Maples.
Ivana and Donald had been married 12 years.
They had three children.
>> She threw herself in my arms sobbing and crying and saying, "Donald doesn't want me anymore.
"He has told me he can't be sexually attracted to a woman who's had children."
>> The Trumps are good copy, and the gossip columnists are in for a field day.
>> The unfolding saga of Trump versus Trump.
>> A high-octane mix of the stuff that sells newspapers.
>> NARRATOR: For months, the tabloids reported on every detail of the affair, the breakup, and the divorce.
>> The model from Georgia cast as the other woman.
>> It was ugly, it was horribly ugly.
The press was devastating, in my mind.
>> Linking Trump to a bevy of beauties... >> But Donald didn't seem to think it was so devastating at all.
He just rode with it, and he had his camp and Ivana had her camp.
>> In Manhattan, the story is Trump versus Trump.
>> And he was totally comfortable in that period under the tutelage of Roy Cohn and the idea that all publicity is good publicity.
Donald Trump felt that his name, his image, his brand were enhanced by having this war go on in the tabloid newspapers of New York, complete with sexual details of relationships.
>> The worst publicity in the world can end up being good publicity.
Meaning, "Yeah, people said terrible things about me, but they sure know who I am."
And a month later, or three months later, they don't remember what it was they didn't like about you; they just remember they know your name.
>> NARRATOR: Just then, Trump took on the biggest deal of his lifetime-- the Taj Mahal Casino.
>> If Trump Tower is one bookend of Donald Trump's career in business and represents everything that he did right, the Taj Mahal is the other bookend that represents everything he did wrong.
>> NARRATOR: It was huge-- 1,250 rooms.
The casino was the size of two football fields.
$14 million worth of chandeliers.
On Wall Street, some analysts were worried, and one of them spoke to the Wall Street Journal.
>> I saw a real problem.
I didn't think that the company could cover its interest expenses on that debt.
Plus the payroll was enormous because of the scope of the property.
>> NARRATOR: Trump had spent more than a billion dollars on the Taj.
>> "Once the cold winds blow from October to February, "it won't make it.
The market just isn't there."
>> NARRATOR: Donald Trump sent Marvin Roffman's boss this letter.
>> "Mr. Roffman is considered by those in the industry "to be a hair-trigger and, in my opinion, somewhat unstable in his tone and manner of criticism."
>> Donald Trump sees the people who have criticized him or have predicted that he would do poorly, he sees them as traitors.
And so his immediate instinct is to tear that person down.
>> "I am now planning to institute a major lawsuit "against your firm unless Mr. Roffman makes a major public apology or is dismissed."
>> NARRATOR: Roffman had worked at his brokerage firm for 16 years.
He says they told him to back down.
>> Donald Trump was trying to send a message to other people on Wall Street: "You better not badmouth me, or your job may be in jeopardy."
>> NARRATOR: Roffman stood his ground.
>> My firm, I mean, fired me, like, on the spot, and not just in a nice way.
They actually escorted me out the building, and when the elevator got down to the lobby to exit, my boss made a comment to me.
"Marvin, you know, I like you as a person, "but a little friendly advice: keep your mouth shut about this or you'll never work in the industry again."
>> NARRATOR: Burdened by debt, the Taj would not turn a profit.
By that winter, as Roffman predicted, the casino was in serious trouble.
>> His business condition was terrible, worse than terrible.
We were in a deep recession and people weren't going to Atlantic City, so the revenue stream from Atlantic City, the Taj Mahal, and the other casinos was poor.
>> NARRATOR: Trump's other investments had not fared much better.
The Plaza Hotel-- a financial disaster.
The airline Trump Shuttle was bleeding money.
>> He sort of blamed the people around him for what went wrong instead of himself.
>> He started blaming people, he started firing people, he started yelling at people.
He said, "I can be a screamer," and he certainly was, according to various accounts.
>> NARRATOR: Trump had long cast himself as a winner.
Now he was looking like a loser.
>> I think that the downtime for him was really a shock, and he was not prepared for it.
It caught him totally off guard.
But it was probably the biggest challenge of his life.
>> The Donald is facing an incredible cash crisis.
>> Big troubles for Donald Trump.
>> NARRATOR: Trump and his companies owed more than three billion dollars, much of it to the banks that had fueled his spending spree.
>> As quickly as the banks loved him, that's as quick as they saw him as a pariah.
He was like, "Ew, it's Donald Trump."
They didn't want to have anything to do with him.
They wanted their money and they wanted to be rid of Donald Trump.
>> NARRATOR: The bankers descended on Trump Tower.
>> Bankers held gigantic meetings at Trump Tower with, like, 40 banks all sitting around in a room, Donald very sober, looking like... not quite penitent, perhaps, but serious.
>> When you were talking to him in these meetings, it just didn't seem that he had any idea how big the problem was or how it would be resolved.
But he, as far as being a CEO and understanding numbers and understanding the ramifications, doesn't seem like he took economics or accounting in college.
>> Donald Trump's assets are on the line.
Citibank and Trump's other lenders are working on a bailout plan... >> NARRATOR: The bankers faced a fundamental decision.
>> The Trump Organization confirmed today... >> It was at a time when we all were trying to figure out, is it better off this guy being alive financially, or is it better off having him dead financially?
>> NARRATOR: As they stared into the Trump Organization's abyss, the banks came to believe that Trump's assets-- the buildings, the casinos-- were worth more with his name on them than in foreclosure.
>> If they were to take Trump out of it, they would no longer have the name for the casinos, which was a tremendous part of their allure.
Otherwise, basically what could they do?
Liquidate and take a tremendous hit?
>> The brand was worth now so much that bankers were willing to take a haircut in order to hang onto the name.
>> The Trump Princess is said to have a price tag... >> NARRATOR: They sold the yacht and the airline.
>> Trump may have to unload the Trump Shuttle, worth about $220 million.
>> NARRATOR: And they put Trump on a $450,000 a month allowance.
>> By next summer, he could become Atlantic City's biggest... >> NARRATOR: In exchange, he would continue to promote the business.
>> I think bankers look at Trump as a promoter, not as a CEO.
At least that's the way I looked at him, and if you talked to other bankers, I think they share that opinion.
He's a wonderful promoter.
You know, he's the P.T.
Barnum of the 21st century.
>> Donald Trump may have pulled off his biggest deal to date.
>> NARRATOR: Donald Trump had survived.
>> Other lenders are working on a bailout plan... >> NARRATOR: But his casinos were still deeply in debt.
>> The bankers do not want Trump to file for bankruptcy.
>> NARRATOR: He was looking for a way out.
>> One billion dollars of Trump's estimated $3.3 billion debt... >> NARRATOR: He found one-- Wall Street.
>> Donald Trump is gambling investors want to bet on him.
>> This is a very exciting day.
This is just the right time, and it's the right time for this industry.
So we're really, uh... we're really happy, and this is a very exciting day.
>> NARRATOR: He was selling shares in the casinos.
With Trump as the pitchman, the stock DJT hit a high of $35 a share.
>> Of course it left Donald Trump as the steward of a publicly traded company, which is kind of like leaving a kid locked in a candy store overnight.
>> NARRATOR: Trump paid himself $44 million for services, and he'd been reimbursed millions in expenses even as the stock price began to fall.
>> So he was making tens of millions of dollars a year personally while the stock price was sinking, almost collapsing.
>> NARRATOR: The company filed for bankruptcy three times.
Investors lost billions.
>> He never earned a dime for his shareholders, for pensioners who had their retirement funds tied up in those casinos.
Never earned a dime until he just drove the whole thing off the cliff.
>> With all your financial problems, do you think you will survive?
>> Why do you say there are problems?
>> NARRATOR: Trump characteristically described his time in Atlantic City as a success.
>> Everything financially okay?
>> Don't believe everything you read, I'll tell you.
>> Donald Trump believes that he came out ahead because, as he puts it, he was looking out for Donald Trump.
And all of the other people who lost their shirts, it didn't work out for them.
That's the way things go, they should have done a better job of vetting their investment.
>> NARRATOR: And Trump walked away with a key asset-- his name.
>> It really dawned on Trump that he could make a huge business empire out of putting his name everywhere.
"God, I don't have to kill myself trying to buy up land "and deal with zoning boards and, you know, go crazy, "and half the time it doesn't work anyway.
Why don't I just sell my name?"
>> NARRATOR: For Trump, real estate was increasingly a side business; marketing his own name, a full-time job.
>> Do you really think this is the right thing for us to be doing, Ivana?
>> But it feels so right.
>> Then it's a deal.
>> Yes, we eat our pizza the wrong way.
>> Crust first.
>> NARRATOR: Along with his ex-wife, Trump turned his marital problems into a pizza commercial.
>> May I have the last bite?
>> Actually, you're only entitled to half.
>> He's seen that it's a consumer country.
We're all consumers.
We're trained to be consumers.
We're used to being sold to.
He's a really good salesman.
He knows how to sell.
>> It's amazing.
A Big 'N' Tasty for just a dollar?
How do you do it?
What's your secret?
>> NARRATOR: He used his celebrity to sell everything from computers to hamburgers.
>> Got a buck?
You're in luck!
>> Together, Grimace, we could own this town.
>> He realizes that if you're on TV and you're considered a celebrity and you're considered a success, and that you can essentially trade on that for the rest of your life.
>> Stone Cold Steve Austin... >> What's going on over here?
>> NARRATOR: He even took a turn as a professional wrestler.
>> Hey, look at this!
Donald Trump!
>> Donald Trump taking down Vince McMahon!
The hostile takeover!
>> He was seen for quite a long time as a punchline to jokes about the excesses and the failures of the 1980s, and he'd become, you know, a human shingle and a punchline.
"The Apprentice" turned all of that on its head.
>> New York-- my city, where the wheels of the global economy never stop turning.
>> ♪ Money, money, money, money... ♪ >> He became seen as a credible businessperson with a real track record, even though that was at odds with reality.
And the guy who became a reality TV star via "The Apprentice" learned that he could become a reality political star.
>> Who will succeed and who will fail?
And who will be the apprentice?
>> NARRATOR: For 14 seasons, millions of Americans watched a carefully crafted Donald Trump.
>> He's perfectly made up.
He's perfectly coiffed.
He's perfectly lit.
He's in the high-back chair making tough decisions.
What does he look like?
He looks like a president.
>> Donald connected with the American public because they wanted to be like him.
They aspired to be just like him.
They wanted to see all this affluence, and he let them see it.
He let them into every aspect of what it meant to be successful in America.
>> Good morning.
>> Good morning.
>> Everybody's saying I should run for president.
Let me ask you a question.
Meatloaf, should I run for president?
>> Absolutely.
>> Now you would definitely vote for me?
>> NARRATOR: As the show took off, Trump again began to discuss a run for the White House.
>> Who would not vote for me?
Who would not vote for me?
All right, good.
>> ...don't raise your hand.
>> I would say anybody that raised their hand... >> He was very serious, there's no question about it.
His popularity was never higher than it was, you know, during this Apprentice time, and he was literally...
He could do no wrong at that stage.
And I think that he realized, "Wow, if I've hit the high, "let's take it to the... "Where can you go from there?
I want to be president."
>> NARRATOR: And for his political guru Roger Stone, the TV audience could become Trump voters.
>> Which is the greatest single asset to his presidential campaign, because for 14 seasons, he is viewed by the voters, by the population, in a perfect light.
Now I understand the elites say, "Oh, that's reality TV."
Voters don't see it that way.
Television news and television entertainment, it's all television.
>> NARRATOR: He was wealthy again.
He had rehabilitated his image.
The world knew him.
Donald Trump believed he was ready.
>> Please welcome my friend Donald Trump.
>> NARRATOR: Now he saw an issue that he could turn into headlines.
>> Why doesn't he show his birth certificate?
I think he probably... >> Why should he have to?
>> Because I have to and everybody else has to, Whoopi.
(everyone talking at once) Why wouldn't he show...?
Excuse me.
No, excuse me.
I really believe there's a birth certificate.
Why... look, she's smiling.
Why doesn't he show his birth certificate?
>> The birther thing is interesting because it harkens back to Roy Cohn and Joe McCarthy.
Donald gets insight into the fact that you can sensationalize someone's personal history in a brutal and insensitive way.
>> I've never heard any white president asked to be shown the birth certificate!
>> When he was becoming the leader of the birther movement, I think he understood who he was speaking to.
It was the Archie Bunkers, who were uncomfortable with an African-American president.
>> If you're going to be the president of the United States, it says very profoundly that you have to be born in this country.
>> Donald Trump is a billionaire, he's famous, he's on TV, and he's saying he's uncomfortable too.
And he's practicing Roy Cohn, Roger Stone innuendo.
>> Where's that coming from?
>> Excellent question.
I assume the internet.
I am not the progenitor of that, meaning I don't first bring it.
I don't bring the phenomena to his attention.
But Trump understands among Republicans, there's a very substantial majority who have questions about Obama's origins and how he just pops up out of nowhere to become a national figure and whether he was in fact eligible to serve as president.
>> Another political story making news this morning: Donald Trump's growing poll numbers... >> NARRATOR: As the birther issue raised his poll numbers, Trump arrived in New Hampshire for what looked like the beginning of a presidential campaign.
>> As promised, Donald Trump speaking now in Portsmouth, New Hampshire.
Let's listen.
>> You ready?
You get ready.
Whenever you're ready, I'm okay.
>> NARRATOR: Trump's speech was carried live on national television.
But President Obama had a surprise for Trump.
>> If you put a tax on Chinese products... >> Okay, we're going to leave New Hampshire and go to Washington and the White House, where President Obama is speaking.
>> As many of you have been briefed, we provided additional information today about the site of my birth.
>> NARRATOR: Obama had released his birth certificate and upstaged Trump.
>> Yes, in fact, I was born in Hawaii, August 4, 1961, in Kapiolani Hospital.
>> President Barack Obama put an end to questions... >> NARRATOR: With the birth certificate no longer an issue, Washington expected Donald Trump to recede into the background.
>> Put the birther issue to rest once and for all... >> NARRATOR: They were certain he was finished.
But he would spend the next four years laying the groundwork for a comeback.
And at Trump Tower in 2015, he made it official.
He would run for president, prove his critics wrong and get even with the establishment.
>> He's got a great sense of theater.
The orchestration of it recognizes his showmanship.
He's a showman above all.
>> He enters as the royal presence.
>> He understood the drama of coming down the escalator.
>> NARRATOR: He was joined by his third wife, Melania, a supermodel from Slovenia.
>> He descended almost from heaven.
>> He descends down the gold-plated escalator into the rosy marble lobby of Trump Tower.
(crowd cheering) >> That is some group of people.
Thousands!
>> Got on the stage, said, "What a crowd-- thousands!"
It was hundreds.
>> It was like the next chapter of The Apprentice, and it was the moment that he had actually been building toward for decades.
>> Great to be in a wonderful city, New York.
>> Proceeded to launch into an announcement-slash-rant of the type no one's seen in presidential politics before.
>> When Mexico sends its people, they're not sending their best.
>> And so in this moment, he says, "I'm just going to be myself."
Then he takes a seven-minute script and just goes off and goes on and on, and it's kind of stream of consciousness.
>> They're bringing drugs.
They're bringing crime.
They're rapists.
And some, I assume, are good people.
>> It's totally his gut.
We didn't know he was going to talk about crimes committed by illegal aliens... illegal immigrants, and that, you know, that people had been murdered and raped.
>> Sadly... the American dream is dead.
>> Bring it back!
>> But if I get elected president, I will bring it back bigger and better and stronger than ever before, and we will make America great again.
Thank you.
Thank you very much.
Thank you very much.
(crowd cheering) >> It's like a man working without a net.
You're going to tune in to see what he's going to say because it could be anything.
It's got a daredevil quality to it.
It's genuine, it's real.
You're, like, holding your breath.
"What's he going to say next?"
>> NARRATOR: At the time, some thought it was just another publicity stunt.
>> He made a lot of statements that immediately made people dismiss him, that this guy must be a joke, but Donald Trump was somehow finding a way to connect with the people who mattered at that moment for him.
>> NARRATOR: It would turn out to be the first day of what Trump would call "a movement," the beginning of a campaign that would win him the ultimate prize.
>> Donald Trump pulled off one of the biggest political upsets... >> Donald Trump is the 45th president-elect... >> President-elect Trump meets with President Obama... >> NARRATOR: Five years after being humiliated by President Obama... >> Mr. President, it was a great honor being with you... >> NARRATOR: Donald Trump came to the White House as his successor.
>> On the next Frontline, "Divided States of America."
Over two nights, a four-hour special series.
A new president and a deeply divided country.
>> The Donald Trump presidency is going to be anathema to at least part of the population and greatly welcomed by another part, and those two Americas have been at war with one another and they're likely to continue to be so.
>> From Frontline's award-winning political team, the inside story of how we got here.
>> The Republicans told the members, "Just say no."
>> They thought they could ram this right through and to heck with conservatives.
>> Through two terms of a Democratic president... >> They had decided, "We don't need to work with Republicans, because we have supermajorities on the Hill."
>> And the civil war within the Republican Party.
>> I had members who thought sitting down with the president was a big mistake.
>> The searing events that drove the country further apart.
>> The contradiction of this happening in the midst of a black presidency sharpened the irony and intensified the pain.
>> One of my few regrets is my inability to reduce the polarization in our politics.
>> One of his biggest disappointments was not being able to bridge that party divide, that toxicity in this town.
>> And the voters' new choice for change.
>> Make America great again!
>> Donald Trump is the representation of the anti-Obama.
>> He was speaking straight to tens of millions of Americans who think that they've been betrayed-- not anger, betrayal-- by Washington.
>> Coming in two weeks to Frontline.
>> For more on this and other Frontline programs, visit our website at pbs.org/frontline.
>> Frontline's "President Trump" is available on DVD.
To order, visit shopPBS.org.
Or call 1-800-PLAY-PBS.
Frontline is also available for download on iTunes.
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