Two journalists say their new book on Donald Trump pushed them to the limit. The Regime Change authors gained rare access to one of America’s most secretive administrations. Maggie Haberman and Jonathan Swan, both White House correspondents for The New York Times, have co-authored Regime Change, a blockbuster account of Donald Trump’s second term. In promoting the book, the pair made striking claims about just how gruelling the reporting process was, describing encounters and revelations that got them “nearly killed.”
Donald Trump’s new book authors make major claims about reporting it
“We really nearly killed ourselves during this book,” Haberman said. “We are enormously proud of it.” The duo conducted around a thousand interviews over two years, cracking open the White House Situation Room and exposing the inner workings of a presidency that Swan describes as deeply secretive, despite Trump’s public claims to the contrary (via The Guardian).
“There’s a reason that there hasn’t been a ton of inside-the-room reporting since last year,” Swan said. “It’s because it’s really f***ing hard. This is a tiny group of people running the government, and there’s this canard that Trump puts out that, ‘I’m the most transparent president ever.’ It’s complete nonsense. They’re actually … incredibly good at keeping secrets.”
The new book paints a vivid picture of Donald Trump operating on instinct, surrounded by a small circle of loyalists. Haberman and Swan describe the president’s physical decline being monitored by those around him, alongside chaotic scenes in the White House, including the president reportedly attempting to glue gold decorations over the Oval Office fireplace.
Regime Change also covers some of the most consequential decisions of Trump’s second term, including how the US entered the Iran war, with senior officials like Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Energy Secretary Chris Wright reportedly finding out just a day before it began.
“Just think about this for a second,” Swan said. “The two people in the government that would have to handle the biggest energy shock in world history… weren’t in the room for the meetings that led up to this war.”
The book also examines Situation Room discussions around the Jeffrey Epstein scandal and a Memorandum of Understanding with Iran. Trump himself gave them an interview. Regime Change is published by Simon & Schuster.
Originally reported by Devanshi Basu on Mandatory.
