Donald Trump insisted Friday that investigative journalist Bob Woodward’s recordings of his a number of interviews with the previous president, featured in Woodward’s upcoming audiobook, “belong” to Trump.
“We’ve already employed the attorneys to sue him,” Trump instructed Fox Information host Brian Kilmeade Friday on his radio program. “Bob Woodward’s a really sleazy man,” he added of the famed Watergate journalist.
Woodward’s audiobook, “The Trump Tapes: Bob Woodward’s Twenty Interviews with President Trump” is scheduled for launch on Tuesday. It consists of greater than eight hours of the journalist’s 20 interviews with Trump over time, interspersed with commentary from Woodward.
Trump appeared to concede that Woodward was the one who arrange the tapes and recorded the interviews, however insisted the rights to make use of the tapes belong to him.
“In some ways, I just like the tapes, I insist on tapes, however I additionally say the tapes belong to me,” Trump instructed Kilmeade. “So which means Woodward has to get no matter deal he made, , we’ll in all probability find yourself in litigation over it. As a result of we gave tapes for the written phrase, not tapes to promote, and that’s at all times made clear,” he mentioned.
Trump insisted he instructed Woodward “these tapes are for the written phrase, these tapes are on your [previous] guide, these are to not be bought, these are tapes on your guide, that will help you. I like that as a result of it’s extra correct,” he added.
“So now he’s making an audiobook out of it, so we’ll sue him,” Trump mentioned.
Woodward couldn’t instantly be reached for remark.
Some revelations from Woodward’s guide have already been recounted in media retailers that obtained advance copies.
In one of many interviews in 2019, Trump admitted that letters from North Korean chief Kim Jong Un that had been seized in August from his Mar-a-Lago compound had been “so prime secret,” The Washington Submit reported. But he nonetheless confirmed them off to Woodward. “Don’t say I gave them to you, OK?” Trump could be heard saying on tape.
In one other audio recording from a 2020 interview with Woodward, Trump mentioned he most popular “harder and meaner” world leaders.
“I like Putin,” Trump instructed Woodward, CNN reported after acquiring an advance copy of the audiobook.
“Getting together with Russia is an efficient factor, not a foul factor, all proper? Particularly as a result of they’ve 1,332 nuclear fucking warheads,” he instructed the journalist.