The Shiflett book would not be published until January 2000. Reform Party deliberations were moving more quickly than the wheels of book publishing, and Stone needed to make sure Trump wasn’t out of the race before it began. Leading up to a crucial national Reform Party gathering on July 23–25, 1999, in Dearborn, Michigan, Stone and Trump began to make their case for a Trump candidacy. In May 1999, Trump attacked former senator Bill Bradley in a Wall Street Journal op-ed for chilling real estate sales by eliminating a tax shelter, which Trump claimed “precipitated” an early 1990s recession. Trump also needled Al Gore for losing ground to Bradley in a Time/CNN poll.
On June 30, 1999, Washington, DC–based research firm Schroth & Associates surveyed 421 national and state Reform Party officials about their favorite presidential candidates not affiliated with a major party. Retired general Colin Powell topped the list with 39 percent, followed by Ross Perot (18 percent), Jesse Ventura (11 percent), and Donald Trump (10 percent). A handful of others, including former Connecticut governor Lowell Weicker, received one or two points. In the July 19, 1999, edition of Newsweek, writer Matt Bai cited the poll in a story about Ventura’s power struggle with Ross Perot over the direction of the Reform Party. “And here’s a strange thought,” Bai wrote. “A close friend of Donald Trump’s tells Newsweek that he was also toying with a bid.”1 Both the Daily News (“Trump Mulling White House”) and New York Post (“Trump ‘Toys’ with Prez Run”) ran with it. Trump played it down and then up, telling the Daily News, “I’m honored by the poll results, but I’m having an awfully good time doing what I’m doing.” He then issued a statement for wide release: “If the Reform Party nominated me, I would probably run and probably win.”
A Ventura spokesman told USA Today that he was not aware Trump had done anything with the party but encouraged anyone to get involved. Reform Party chairman Russell Verney scoffed to the Associated Press that the poll was bogus. “Is this a joke? I have never once heard his name mentioned in the Reform Party.”
He would soon hear more.
Mike Zumbluskas, New York Reform Party strategist: In the ’99 convention I ran for vice chairman of the party, and this is where some of the Trump stuff comes in. I didn’t have a shot at winning. But I went and ran to prevent Lenora Fulani from winning the vice chairmanship. Do you happen to know who Lenora Fulani is?
Lenora Fulani, a New Yorker and onetime neo-Marxist political activist, joined psychotherapist Fred Newman’s minor New Alliance Party, running as its presidential nominee in all 50 states in 1988. Newman’s leadership—and his therapeutic practice of encouraging sleeping with patients—has been described as cultish.2 In 1994, Fulani and Newman joined the Independence Party of New York, aligning with fringe politicians at both ends of the political spectrum. Fulani nevertheless developed strategic alliances with the Reverend Jesse Jackson, the Reverend Al Sharpton, and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and ran for office multiple times at the state and national levels.
Lenora Fulani, New York Reform Party leader: It was the first time that African Americans were present and included in the founding and shaping of a national political party. We wanted to bring people together from the left, center, and right and see if we could set aside social issues and focus on the need for political reform. Social issues were being used by the major parties as a way to divide Americans.
Mike Zumbluskas: The Fulani organization, Fred Newman organization, is a cult that came into the party.
Lenora Fulani: We used to have these political conventions where white men would come in triangle George Washington hats, and some of the younger people of color would come into the conventions wearing Malcolm X t-shirts. We were breaking through some of the unnecessary divisions between Americans who needed to be on the same side together, and it was cool to sit back and watch some of these relationships develop.
Mike Zumbluskas: A few people from New York decided to try to prevent Fulani from becoming vice chair. She knew how to control conventions, and most of the people in the Reform Party were neophytes. We decided we can get more people if we rented an RV and drove to Michigan. I had to go down to Cape May, New Jersey, to pick up the RV. All of a sudden [New York party members traveling with me] started putting on the RV “Trump for President” signs. I’m going, “What is this?” I bought t-shirts and hats saying “Vote for Mike Zumbluskas for Vice Chairman,” with a Big Z. That’s when I first knew Trump was thinking about running for president on the Reform Party line. So our RV starts being called the Trump RV, even though he’s not paying a cent for anything. I paid for probably about 70 percent of this trip, and I’m not a rich man.
Lenora Fulani: We focused on political reform, government accountability, fiscal responsibility, creating opportunity for people to be able to participate, and opening up the process of voter registration.
Mike Zumbluskas: I had a suite, and, basically, I had a party up there. The alcohol was flowing, the reporters, the convention people are up there, and I was taking down Fulani’s people. We were able to get one of Fulani’s playbooks. They had it set up who would stand up, speak, push this motion, and who would second it. I don’t know how we got hold of it, but it was very helpful in convincing people to stay away from her. Roger Stone did have a suite there. They were running around the entire convention with Trump stuff on, pushing him when they were supposed to be stopping Fulani and pushing me.
While the Reform Party could sometimes descend into a wild party, Trump learned more in his dealings with it than just the nasty machinations of party politics. From Ventura’s push to slash income taxes, Perot’s rejection of the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and Buchanan’s immigration alarmism, populist ideas stirred audiences.
The fight for the vice chairmanship was emblematic of the tension at every level of the Reform Party. Those who wanted Perot to maintain control fought against those who wanted the party to expand beyond its founder. Gerry Moan, a New Yorker, and not Fulani, was elected vice chairman. With the internal drama, the Reform Party had not come to any consensus over its 2000 presidential nominee. A host of political independents, has-beens, and ne’er-do-wells fantasized about a bid, but none committed. Arianna Huffington floated a Warren Beatty candidacy in an August 10 column in the Huffington Post. At a Hollywood gathering attended by 150 reporters and hundreds of film industry vets on September 29, the Bulworth star gave a speech advocating campaign finance reform and chastising President Clinton. Ventura favored Weicker, who backed out by October 5, comparing the Reform Party’s bickering to a “food fight.”3
Meanwhile, Republican Pat Buchanan considered a third-party switch, strategizing with Perot’s ex–running mate Pat Choate and seeking a blessing from Reform Party chairman Russell Verney. When Buchanan went on NBC’s Meet the Press on September 12, 1999, he said he was “taking a hard look” at changing parties so he could head the Reform ticket. This shocked Republican elites who worried that a Buchanan–Perot alliance could tip the 2000 election to a Democrat. RNC chairman Jim Nicholson rushed to Buchanan’s Northern Virginia home on September 28 to convince him to stay in the fold.
Jesse Ventura: I got criticized for not taking the reins and running the party. That was not my job. That is a job of the party leaders. My job was to govern Minnesota and to be successful so that people would not be fearful to elect another Reform Party candidate.
Dean Barkley: I worked on Lowell Weicker for a month to get him to run for president. I stayed at a little apartment in the basement of his house in Arlington, Virginia. I thought Lowell would have been great. I got him for two or three hours, and he said okay, but obviously somebody or something changed his mind. Warren called, too. That had to be about one or two in the morning. My wife hands me the phone and says, “It’s Warren Beatty.” Warren Beatty. He told me he was thinking about running for president. We talked for a little bit and that didn’t go very far.
Pat Buchanan: Perot’s people got in touch with my sister [Bay Buchanan, a prominent Republican organizer and commentator] and said if I wanted the Reform Party nomination, I could pretty much have it. Perot and I had national organizations, and together we could get the nomination and use that to get into the debates and establish a new party, which would represent the economic patriotism, economic nationalism, port of control, no more foreign wars, end this interventionism—all the other issues I had run on in ’92 and ’96.
Russell Verney: I spoke to Mr. Buchanan about the possibility of him running in the Reform Party. I was supportive of him. I told him the Reform Party doesn’t take a position on social issues. Whether he opposes or supports abortion is irrelevant to us. We were about economic issues and government reform issues.
Jim Nicholson: I went to Pat’s house in Virginia, I sat down with him and had a long amiable conversation about the damage that he could do to our party and to our country, because it could jeopardize our chances of winning the presidency. He had no chance of winning the presidency.
Pat Buchanan: The main point he made was that I could cost Bush the election. That would mean the opportunity to change the Supreme Court, which I had been working on since the mid-’60s with Richard Nixon. It was a very compelling argument. But I went ahead and did it.
Jim Nicholson: He looked me right in the eyes, seeming to me to be totally convinced in his own mind that he could win. He said the time is now, he could do this, and people want somebody more conservative, more straightforward and blunt and very experienced. I think Pat thought he could win. I really think he thought that.
Pat Buchanan: I thought I could win the election? How could I win the election when I couldn’t win the Republican nomination? No, I never thought I could win. And that’s not why we did it. I believed I might be able to get in the debates and create a new party to represent these ideas.